The South African Civil Aviation Authority (SACAA) says it is concerned about the quality systems in place at SAA, after it emerged that an SAA pilot was found to be operating flights without the correct licence.
This follows an incident on flight SA260 in November last year. While en route to Frankfurt, the aircraft needed to engage a recovery manoeuvre when it encountered atmospheric disturbance over the Swiss Alps. This was done successfully, and the aircraft managed to land safely in Frankfurt. The incident prompted an investigation by SAA, during which the airline uncovered that one of the pilots who had operated the flight had made false representations about his qualifications.
The pilot, who the Mail & Guardian has named as William Chandler, had claimed he had an Airline Transport Pilot License (ATPL) but in fact only had a Commercial Pilot Licence.
Phindiwe Gwebu, executive: corporate services at the SACAA says that, despite this being an isolated incident, the CAA is concerned about the processes at the national carrier. “There are serious safety implications, should this be true, and as a result, we have launched our own investigation to get to the bottom of it,” she said. She went on to say that the CAA was concerned that SAA had not picked up something as serious as this over a number of years, questioning the quality systems of the airline.
“We take note that at no point did the allegedly fraudulent licence present any safety risk to SAA's operation as the pilot in question was in possession of a valid Commercial Pilot Licence (CPL) and was the monitoring pilot and not the commander of the aircraft,” SAA spokesperson, Tlali Tlali, says. “The pilot had successfully completed all required safety training. However, we find it disconcerting that misrepresentations were made about the type of licence that the pilot claimed to possess.”
Phindiwe added that the pilot’s licence would be removed, and that there may be a financial penalty against him. “We do regard this as fraud, and we are going to refer it to the South African Police Service for further investigation.”
SAA meanwhile has laid criminal charges against the pilot, and is seeking to recover millions of rands it says have been unduly expended to the pilot on the strength of the representations he made to the airline.
