Civil Aviation Development & Discussion

[Deans]

Thanks for the insight.

Yes, now that you have mentioned it, they always say the meal is at room temperature. I generally take sandwiches (or, airwiches as they call it on IndiGo)...and this part skipped me completely. In fact, some time back, saw an interview of their top guys who said they were even contemplating removing hot beverage from the menu...but lost out by a thin margin on the vote.

You're bang on the 'On-Time' aspect. As a policy, we are expected to take the first flight out and last flight in when going to other cities. IndiGo has the perfect time slots for both the categories in almost all airports. Our in house travel desk has standing instructions to first check for availability of IndiGo flight.

During the winter season this time, we did check which all airlines have CAT III planes and crew...and GoAir was prominently marketing this aspect. I don't know about IndiGo but other player in town with this capability is Air India and I generally avoid them like plague.

Rohit, It's not just a question of an aircraft having CAT3. The airport also has to have an ILS-1/2/3 facility to enable aircraft to operate in reduced visibility. Only Delhi has ILS-3. Chandigarh (for e.g) which is badly hit by fog in winter, got upgraded to 2, only a year back. Thus, a CAT-III aircraft which can operate in 50m of visibility in Delhi, needs 2400 m of visibility to operate in Patna.
P.S - The pilots have also to qualify to operate CAT-III.

[Deans]

Deans, as a high level insider, what is your take on why KF failed on the same routes, airports, fuel, taxes and planes as the other airlines are still operating on?

what aspect of their operating cost was high? over staffed? higher pay?

Singha,
In addition to the points Chetak mentioned in the post below yours, they also made several basic mistakes. For e.g.
- They advertised 5 star services, but at a 3 star price. They did have better service at one time, but overestimated the
no of people willing to pay for that service. If they had 5 aircraft in their fleet, catering to business traffic between Metro's,
things might have been different. Also, when a person who has flown KF, flies on an Ex Deccan aircraft on the next flight, it
creates a lot of dissonance.

- As an example of how costs escalate, a A320 of Indigo or Go has 180 seats. In KF it is just 154 seats, because of the need to
accommodate business class seats (operating cost is the same).
The extra fare paid by the 2-3 business class pax on each flight is not enough to compensate for the lost revenue from
20 economy pax (26 seats * avg load factor of 78%). Moreover, seats had a personal entertainment
system (fairly useless in an hour long flight) which increased the weight of the aircraft and hence fuel consumption. Same with
serving hot meals.

- Too many people in customer service at airports, too many levels of staff. Overpaid and dumb people in management
positions, who seem to have been recruited only because they were `hot women'.

- Started flying to Nanded, Baramati, Latur (and employed people at those stations) only because they were the
constituencies of VIPs.

- Their only profitable routes were their monopoly routes for their ATR's (BLR-Hubli, or Delhi-Kulu/Shimla) they lobbied to tweak the
rules so that the Bombardier jet's introduced by Spice Jet could not operate at some of these locations.
The max length of an aircraft that can land in these airports is determined, among other things, by the type of fire fighting
equipment that AAI has at these airports. The bombardier is marginally longer than the ATR. So, if AAI did not upgrade its
fire fighting equipment, the Bombardier would be barred from operating at those airports. Of course, it would have been in the
interest of civil aviation if this equipment was upgraded, but GoI is not known for such radical thinking.

[nachiket]

Moreover, seats had a personal entertainment
system (fairly useless in an hour long flight) which increased the weight of the aircraft and hence fuel consumption. Same with
serving hot meals.

Jet has the personal entertainment system as well, and they serve free hot meals (or at least they used to till a few years ago). They may not be making a lot of profit but they did not crash and burn like KF did somehow.

I remember flying on Jet,KF and Indian Airlines in India a few times before I came to the US. I was quite surprised that you don't get free meals on US domestic flights. That was something only seen in "low cost" carriers in India at the time. In the US apparently, when it came to domestic flights, every airline was a "low cost carrier". I guess the US carriers realized during the 90's and early 2000's that such expenditures weren't sustainable any more after the increase in oil prices and post 9/11 slowdown had dented their bottomlines.

- Too many people in customer service at airports, too many levels of staff. Overpaid and dumb people in management
positions, who seem to have been recruited only because they were `hot women'.

I guess they had Mallya himself to thank for that particular hiring policy. There used to be snide comments doing the rounds when KF started out that Mallya "interviewed" each female cabin crew candidate before hiring her.

[Singha]

the ex-Deccan KF planes had a dreaded fixed pitch seat. I recall one such 2:30 hrs flight blr -> hyd -> ccu. I was praying to the lord to be let out and be allowed to bend my back a little.

[Deans]

Moreover, seats had a personal entertainment
system (fairly useless in an hour long flight) which increased the weight of the aircraft and hence fuel consumption. Same with
serving hot meals.

Jet has the personal entertainment system as well, and they serve free hot meals (or at least they used to till a few years ago). They may not be making a lot of profit but they did not crash and burn like KF did somehow.

I remember flying on Jet,KF and Indian Airlines in India a few times before I came to the US. I was quite surprised that you don't get free meals on US domestic flights. That was something only seen in "low cost" carriers in India at the time. In the US apparently, when it came to domestic flights, every airline was a "low cost carrier". I guess the US carriers realized during the 90's and early 2000's that such expenditures weren't sustainable any more after the increase in oil prices and post 9/11 slowdown had dented their bottomlines.

- Too many people in customer service at airports, too many levels of staff. Overpaid and dumb people in management
positions, who seem to have been recruited only because they were `hot women'.

I guess they had Mallya himself to thank for that particular hiring policy. There used to be snide comments doing the rounds when KF started out that Mallya "interviewed" each female cabin crew candidate before hiring her.

Nachiket,
Jet has actually been making severe losses over the past 5 years, partly because of its higher operating costs.
The difference with KF, was that it had built up a reserve from the high profits they made back in the years when they were the only private airline (hence they had lower high cost borrowings). Their International operations also do far better than KF
(due to good use of the Brussels hub etc). Also, most of their aircraft are configured in a manner similar to the LCC's.

[Singha]

Met a friend working in doha, qatar yesterday.
He said all of emirates, etihad and qatar are interested in bigtime ops to india. Said emirates is more expensive while etihad and qatar are cheaper. All have plenty of good planes and upcoming hub airports now it seems while emirates tends to hog the spotlight.

[Bade]

Flew Qatar recently. New airport is not yet ready. But the old one is as good as any, but a little congested with increasing traffic. What all these airlines and their hub airports have done is to make sure good connectivity within 2-4 hrs exist from these hubs to all over the world. Doha and Qatar Air (well there are hardly any other airlines flying in there) is an excellent example of this concept.

Whereas our Mumbai and Delhi mafia over the years were happy to provide poor infra and fleece passengers with forced overnight stay in the airport area hotels, likely run by these mafias. Even now the connectivity is poor out of Delhi or Mumbai after a 24 hr long international flight.

[nachiket]

Boeing flight tests redesigned battery for 787 Dreamliner

[Singha]

The Indian civil aviation regulator has deregistered 15 Kingfisher planes paving the way for global leasing companies to take them back and easing worries that the dispute might hurt purchases by other Indian carriers

[Dileep]

There is a reality show "Airplane Repo" on History channel. I am wondering when KF planes appear on the show

[Singha]

do KF employees still report for (unpaid) work at the airports to keep a paper trail for eventual lawsuits and compensation ?
why hasnt anyone sued mallya based on his personal wealth to atleast clear the pending salaries and give a decent farewell to the staff?
I guess is because the banks are 100s of cr in red each and have first bite on any resources...and they are likely letting him go free and making this a NPA.

I wonder if these ground offices too would be locked up by terminal operators for non-payment of dues?

[Bade]

Political connections saar...and a large fan following. Anything goes in Yindia if you have the right connections. He is an honored Rajya Sabha member to boot.

[krishnan]

and others too have their hands dirty, why was he evend allowed to run a loss making airline for so long ????

[Neela]

Political connections saar...and a large fan following. Anything goes in Yindia if you have the right connections. He is an honored Rajya Sabha member to boot.

Radia tapes has a mention by someone somewhere that Praful PAtel works for Mallya.
Can he do the same with his F1 team and not pay any salaries? Those guys earn millions!
He has not paid for almost a year now. And that shows that he has no intention of paying in the future. The promises recently are too ensure smooth passage for RCB.

[Deans]

Political connections saar...and a large fan following. Anything goes in Yindia if you have the right connections. He is an honored Rajya Sabha member to boot.

Radia tapes has a mention by someone somewhere that Praful PAtel works for Mallya.
Can he do the same with his F1 team and not pay any salaries? Those guys earn millions!
He has not paid for almost a year now. And that shows that he has no intention of paying in the future. The promises recently are too ensure smooth passage for RCB.

Not just political connections but the fact that the Media (and by extension, a lot of us) still treat VM as a celebrity rather
than a criminal. It is not just unpaid salaries, but not depositing of PF (deducted from salaries) or service tax (collected from
passengers) with GoI, either of which are very serious offenses.
The rot goes deep. I've wondered how any banker could have approved the loan restructuring plan that they did - convert
loans to equity at higher than the market price (after which the share price crashed). Similarly, how would the PSU Oil companies
and AAI allow them to operate for so long without paying.

[Bade]

I truly feel bad for KF employees, I used KF in those days due to their attitude. Very helpful. Even when they did not refund me my fare, the kochi staff was almost apologetic though not admitting it. Very little they could do with such a monster at the helm. Mine perhaps was not just one such case. It was a small amount of money for me. So no big deal.
I saw the same nice customer service in CCU where you would least expect it. Way better than Jet Air's. Nice hard working folks.

I only had issue with their red short skirts on fat or overly thin Indian legs. Did not suit them at all. A sarong type would have been better. Mallya got carried away staring at his swimswuit calendar and models flocking his seaside villas for weekends. Not everyone is made with perfect legs.

[Singha]

i am sure his pool parties are well stocked with gori meaty legs too.

but more to the point, as Deans mentioned its a crime not deposit the PF and service taxes and that for so long despite repeated reminders by the IT dept.

I guess the likes of SBI and HDFC bank who lent him 1000s of crores would look bad, and all the strong square jawed banking CEO's who talk a big game in leadership conclaves on CNBC would come out looking like the political appointees and bag carriers.

[Prasad]

Mallya doesn't seem to be too affected by all this. He was at the recent Malaysian GP and talk in F1 circles about him running out of money for the race seemed to have been pushed to the background after Adrian Sutil brought in some money. I suppose if they pick Bianchi next year, they'll get subsidised Ferrari engines and save more money. Besides given their recent form, I'm sure they'll make more than enough this season. So Mallya seems to be in a pretty good position as far as his F1 team is concerned. I don't think anyone can touch Sahara either. In the end, the lowly workers get shafter while Mallya parties on the Indian Princess.

[Austin]

Our own Airforce One from VIP Squad 737 BBJ , can see the MAWS on nose.

[RoyG]

We need to begin manufacturing our own passenger planes. They are probably loaded with listening devices and have back doors built into the various systems. The Chinese found some a few years back on theirs.

[Austin]

We need to begin manufacturing our own passenger planes. They are probably loaded with listening devices and have back doors built into the various systems. The Chinese found some a few years back on theirs.

Agree , these are god sent opportunities for foreign intel to have a close look at the aircraft and the bug it ...hopefully our Intel would have sanitised the aircraft and its clean ...having tons of black boxes thats another issue but right now there is not much choice ...we need to have our own aircraft atleast start with something small and move up to narrow body class.

[Dileep]

Isn't KF a limited company? So, how can someone sue Mallya for money? His liability is limited to his shares!!

[Austin]

Finally some news on RTA

AeSI pledges to propel India's now grounded RTA dream

Hyderabad: India’s dream of developing a Regional Transport Aircraft (RTA) might be far from reality, but the Aeronautical Society of India (AeSI) on Sunday took a pledge at the historical Taramati Baradari, near Golconda Fort, in Hyderabad, to push the case with renewed energy. At the concluding session of the two-day International Conference and Exhibition on RTA, the aerospace brains decided to present a strong case to the government within a month. However, absent from the scene was Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL), with not a single official present during the concluding session.

Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) chief V K Saraswat told Express that the AeSI will present a report based on the thoughts gathered from experts in the field of military and commercial aviation. “A techno-commercial analysis is already in place put out by the National Aerospace Laboratories. We will add impetus to this report. What needs to be built and what needs to be bought should be decided first. Infrastructure, human resources, feasible routes, technology gaps that need to be addressed and funding are some key areas for the RTA project,” Saraswat said.

According to him, India’s RTA programme has to be a public-private company with proper checks and balances. “Accountability is the key. We need to have a strong project management team. This project should not be lead by a government agency,” Saraswat said. When asked about the absence of HAL officials during the final phase of the event, the DRDO chief said: “I don’t see that as a major issue. They were here yesterday.”

S K Chaudhuri, director, Research Centre Imarat (RCI), felt that an autonomous body should drive the RTA project. “We need to look at this project from a new angle. A cultural change is must and it can happen only through a consortium of public, private partnership. Automation, upgradation of small airports in the country and the creation of a rugged network are areas we need to focus,” Chaudhuri said.

Keeping in mind the mammoth challenge of certification of the RTA, Charan Das, joint director general, DGCA, felt that the platform must be cleared as per the international standards. “It is a cumbersome process to certify RTA with the existing manpower we have. Roping in an internal agency will be the right idea, which will also give us some exposure in their pattern of thinking and work philosophies,” Das said.

P N A P Rao, former project director of Aeronautical Development Agency (ADA) told Express that India should first decide on the partners of this project. “If we are serious, then we should decide who will make RTA. Somebody has to own it first and we can’t repeat the mistakes we made in the past. Today, we have the expertise in developing Tejas and now we must quickly get on with the civil segment too,” Rao said.

[Austin]

I think the best best for HAL right now to to develop a passenger variant of MTA , from the specs it looks like MTA can do a 3500-4000 km with 100 seater config , that about 15 T for that range.

Then they can think about selling civil version of MTA to Government , Indian Airlines and Agency .

Future prospect they can think about RTA and its variant after they have gained adequade competiencies in designing , production , capacity building , certification and post aircraft sale purchase and the hazar nuances that goes into it. .... they need experience in doing all this before they venture independently in to their own grove.

Its a tough call as civil market is highly competitive and there are many players involved and its time sensitive too .... HAL or other agency cannot approach it in the same way as they approach armed forces with the attitude that they have a captive market and a delay of few years is ALL OK.

I am not sure if any private player in India will put money on RTA unless they see clear profit and firm orders coming in ...so mostly it would be government investement initially even if it means loss in near and medium term but unless we dont cross those hurdle we cant think of building a civil aircraft thats competitive in international market.

[Deans]

I was briefly part of the commercial feasibility of the RTA, back in 2010. The project has not moved since then. Austin pretty much sums up my views. My view was that we were probably better off partnering either Embraer (E 175/190) or the Russians (Sukhoi superjet)
and co-produce, rather than re-invent the wheel. Brazil and Russia are both keen to reduce dependence on Boeing/Airbus and
there would be few political hurdles in partnering with either country.

[SSridhar]

Management Control of Chennai & Kolkatta New Airports may go to Global Operators - Business Line

In fact, AAI should never have been allowed to execute these two projects. They have no expertise and they refuse to learn. They have made a complete mess of the new domestic and international termnal at Chennai which are still not open even after a two year delay. When they eventually open, several important facilties such as in-line baggage scanning, multi-level car parking, a walkaltor between the two terminal etc would be missing. Important infrastructure projects should not be given to GoI babus who lack ability to implement them.

The Government is considering giving the management control of the new Kolkata and Chennai airports, built by the Airports Authority of India, to global operators through a competitive bidding process.

Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh said today that the AAI could set up joint ventures with major foreign airport operators to carry out operations and management of these two crucial metro airports.

Addressing a CII meet on aviation here, he said, “The AAI could give management control of these airports through a competitive bidding process.

[Anurag]

"The Airline that killed my pet"

As a pet owner the attitude by Jet Airways would drive me over the edge. Pathetic!

http://blogs.wsj.com/indiarealtime/2013 ... ed-my-pet/

[manish]

In fact, AAI should never have been allowed to execute these two projects. They have no expertise and they refuse to learn. They have made a complete mess of the new domestic and international termnal at Chennai which are still not open even after a two year delay. When they eventually open, several important facilties such as in-line baggage scanning, multi-level car parking, a walkaltor between the two terminal etc would be missing. Important infrastructure projects should not be given to GoI babus who lack ability to implement them.

SSridhar saar, wasn't it the respective state govts (MuKa in TN and commies in WB) who opposed the privatization of their airports in first place?

This has really been a disaster, more so for MAA than for anyone else. It really is the biggest dog in the airport game down south but the decision to keep it away from pvt hands during the heydays of Indian PPP infra buildout boom in the mid-2000s has hurt badly.

Especially, I never understood how the otherwise intellectual and forward thinking junta in Chennai/TN just sat quiet watching from the sidelines even as their cousins across the borders in BLR and HYD went ahead with showpiece airports. The silence is in stark contrast to the sense of urgency and competition one saw in public debates/media in HYD and BLR in the run up to the opening of their new airports in 2008 (Singha saar may recall ToI whipping up sentiments in BLR by printing "BLR khatrey mein" type articles warning of delays in BIAL vis-a-vis RGIA).

Strange. Was it the promise of the Sriperumbudur greenfield airport that has/had kept the public at bay?

[Singha]

back in those days AAI opposed tooth and nail the idea of pvt operators and they had some political support.
so ABV govt made a peace offering by sacrificing these two apts for the AAI monster to feed on while releasing the rest from captivity...else chennai which has more pax, bigger economy & more international flights is a more viable apt for pvt operators than Hyd & blr for instance.

this is a case of what sounded like a pragmatic decision to unblock things then coming back to haunt us later. so here we have india's 3rd biggest industrial city and biggest in entire south india without a proper airport.

[Theo_Fidel]

Manish,

That is not correct. I don't know about WB but TN/DMK was for privatizing the airport. But no one knew how to bell the AAI union cat. The reason for less protest is that Chennai airport is relatively efficiently run. It helps that mount road is right outside. Chennai has been focused on getting the metro up and running. The roads are completely torn up and the traffic arrangements make your head spin. In that porattam the airport has been ignored. But quitely the second run way across the creek is getting ready in fits and starts and the metro station is coming up right inside the airport. It is good they are thinking of privatizing, the AAI has botched the airport expansion big time, esp. WRT schedule and bad planning.

[manish]

Manish,

That is not correct. I don't know about WB but TN/DMK was for privatizing the airport. But no one knew how to bell the AAI union cat. The reason for less protest is that Chennai airport is relatively efficiently run. It helps that mount road is right outside. Chennai has been focused on getting the metro up and running. The roads are completely torn up and the traffic arrangements make your head spin. In that porattam the airport has been ignored. But quitely the second run way across the creek is getting ready in fits and starts and the metro station is coming up right inside the airport. It is good they are thinking of privatizing, the AAI has botched the airport expansion big time, esp. WRT schedule and bad planning.

Thanks Theo for clearing up the scene on DMK's stand.

On the other hand, I beg to differ with you on MAA being anything close to efficient. I have personally used the airport fairly frequently in the last few years and almost every visit to the domestic terminal was a nightmare. The ongoing construction/upgradation only made it worse.

At least till late last year, you had to ensure that you were in the airport well over 2 hrs prior to flight departure for early morning flights to ensure you completed boarding on time - the serpentine queues from the domestic security check used to snake all the way to the far end of the terminal (closer to the SpiceJet check-in counters and sometimes even beyond that)!

And once you completed the security check, it was a case of fighting for seats in the departure area adorned with mosquitoes, houseflies and stinking toilets. Not to mention the painfully few, substandard options for food within the terminal. When the time for boarding comes, you encounter queues that criss-cross each other cutting across multiple gates simultaneously - certainly doesn't pass for efficiency in my book at least. My last visit was less than two months ago and it was the same dreary experience for me at the domestic terminal.

It was as far from 'well-run' as you could get - no two ways about it. Perhaps people can fill in on their experiences on the international terminal side.

BTW, every single major metro city in India is building a metro line as well - this was/is not something unique to Chennai and that is hardly an excuse for neglecting the airport IMHO. In BLR for example, the construction of both the metro as well as the new airport went on almost in parallel between 2005-2008. IGI T1C, T1D and T3 were built in parallel with the Delhi Metro.

Chennai is a place I had called home till recently for a couple of years and it did hurt to see the way two critical pieces of infra - the port and airport were being handled, whoever the guilty party may be .

[Supratik]

The Kolkata airport unions opposed privatization and they were supported by both Left and Mamata. Similarly the Chennai airport pvtization was opposed by the union supported by DMK. On the whole they have done a much better job with Kolkata airport than Chennai. The latter looks pretty ordinary not fit for a metro city. The least they can do is to let pvt operators handle the airports. Shudder to think what will happen if the AAI operates it. At some point they should just sell the airports.

[Vamsi.R]

i really like the Hyderabad airport ..well maintained and the approach road is excellent.

[Theo_Fidel]

Manish,

I agree. It could be better run and is not befitting an international airport. Maybe people’s expectations are low. It better than the monster called Central Station! It is just my experience that the focus in Madras is on the metro, no one mentioned the airport to me even once.

[Singha]

some pics and comments of the new kolkata terminal here
http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthrea ... 0&page=269

left to AAI, all of that shine will degenerate back to the old comfortable levels in a couple of years. GOI needs to save this terminal and its capex from AAI's claws now... before its too late.

[Javee]

Air travellers to Chennai who flew in on Spicejet and GoAir flights on Thursday were a pleasantly surprised lot as they got to experience the new domestic terminal. Though the design, lighting and facilities of the terminal have come in for much praise, some old complaints like lack of signage and distance from the taxi bays continued to pour in.

The airport terminals, which were constructed around the old terminals at a cost of Rs 2,150 crore, were inaugurated January end. Test arrivals have been handled over past two weeks and various issues like an over-steep ramp have been defused to get things in order.

Spicejet and GoAir are the first airlines to shift their arrival operations to the new terminal, but their staff were still feeling their way around. “The air hostess was unable to tell us which conveyor belt the luggage would come on because they weren’t sure. So that took some time to find. I think the signs weren’t working correctly as they’re still being tested,” said Thiru, a passenger who flew in to Chennai on a GoAir flight.

Given that passengers weren’t complaining about the sorry state of the urinals and toilets at the airport, for once, AAI staff were pleased with the operations on Thursday, and are gearing up to handle departures as well. Once departures begin, all airlines will finish shifting and the terminal will be ‘fully’ active. “This could take between 15 days to a month,” estimated an AAI official.

One of the biggest gripes, especially from a frequent flyer who came in from Hyderabad, was the lack of signage outside the terminal. “New flyers were very put off by the fact that there were long lines for taxi services, and none had boards. They used makeshift tables and were writing manual bills which put off some people. Also when they came out, they didn’t know where to get their taxis as the bays are all near the old terminal,” pointed out the passenger.

Was there help at hand? Not in the least, he added — perhaps a few people to guide arriving passengers would go a long way, he suggested

http://newindianexpress.com/cities/chen ... 521235.ece

[Javee]

Chennai Airport Pics,

http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthrea ... 0&page=338

[Austin]

Superjet 100 LR – logical development

[SriKumar]

Recently, Boeing received approval to commence limited test flights to test their battery solutions and assess the electrical (and fire safety) performance. They did one flight recently. Below is a comment on the changes made. (link added later: http://www.latimes.com/business/money/l ... 7134.story)

The Chicago company unveiled a plan to fix the 787 battery system on March 14. It involves insulating and spacing out parts in the battery unit, reducing charging levels so the battery cannot be overcharged and enclosing the lithium-ion batteries in stainless-steel cases so little oxygen can get at them.

Other articles mention the addition of venting systems to direct fumes/chemicals safely outside the plane. All of the above is to reduce/eliminate the possibility of starting a fire. It really does not seem like the root cause has been found. On a related note, it is interesting that this problem was not even seen in the testing done before commercial release, which means that it will be difficult to replicate the short-circuit in any sort of a testing mode (vs. a commercial release mode). Looks like some things are caught only under commercial flying conditions. From the same article:

The problems with the new battery technology have already prompted Boeing's European rival Airbus to revert to standard nickel-cadmium batteries in its A350 plane, designed to compete with the Dreamliner and due to make its first test flight in the middle of this year.

The article below suggests that FAA wants to limit the emergency detour time for 787 from 3 hours to 2 hours. Will have implications for flight routes and fuel consumption for long-range trans-oceanic flights (ETOPS). http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/03/ ... 0920130327

Until it was grounded on January 16, the 787 was permitted to fly routes that ranged as much as three hours away from an airport. Boeing has asked the FAA to extend that range to 5-1/2 hours. That change would enable airlines to fly many more routes across remote areas such as the North Pole.

Now the jet faces the potential temporary loss of its ETOPS approval or a roll-back to two hours, according to government officials and aviation experts.

Moral of the story: get your game right the first time. If something screws up, everything comes under the scanner.

[Austin]

If it roll backs to 2 hour then it would be rated at ETOPS 120 , i think.

The pressure to get aircraft quickly into the market within the aggresive deadline set to the customer also means things are overlooked to meet Certification deadline, Hopefully this would set an example to new players trying to bring their own aircraft.