NEW DELHI, Jan 27: The Director General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) on Friday
imposed a fine of Rs 10 lakh on Go First airline for leaving behind 55 booked
passengers on its Bengaluru-New Delhi flight on January 9.
The passengers who were to board flight G8 116 to Delhi were still in the coach
when the plane took off. The DGCA had issued a show-cause the day after the
incident. It said, "M/s Go First has failed to comply with the provision specified
in para 5.2 of ATC 02 of 2019."
Go First had then apologised for the lapse "caused due to an inadvertent oversight".
Alternative flights were arranged and the passengers were flown to their destination
soon after, it claimed.
The airline offered all affected passengers one free ticket for travel on any
domestic sector in the next 12 months as compensation. All the staff of the
defaulting flight were taken off the roster till a probe was over.
How it happened: The ground staff, which carried the load and trim sheet,
took the fourth coach and reached the aircraft before the arrival of the third
coach that was delayed on the way. Consequently, the pilots and the crew did
not have reason to doubt if all passengers were not on board, while 55 of them
were left behind.
In another such incident, a Scoot flight for Singapore left behind 35 passengers
and took off ahead of schedule at the Sri Guru Ram Ji International Airport
in Amritsar on January 18.
The flight TR509 with a departure time of 19:55 took off at 16:40. The passengers
who were not aware of the schedule change were left behind. The incident created
chaos at the airport.
Over 280 passengers had booked for travel to Singapore, but the plane took
off with 253 flyers, leaving nearly 35 passengers behind.
The airline told the airport authorities that passengers had been informed
about the change in flight timings via e-mail. A Scoot spokesperson said the
flight was to depart at 7.55 pm but it was prescheduled to 3 pm “due to inclement
weather”. It is learnt that the travel agent who booked the 30 tickets in a
group did not inform the travellers and that the contact numbers or email of
individual passengers were not given to the airline.
The DGCA said it is looking into the matter.
