News Backgrounder
Under ICAO scrutiny
Thailand vows to restore its top air safety rating by year end.
July 1st 2015
A certain fatalism greeted the news last month that the United Nation’s aviation body had “red flagged” Thailand and downgraded its safety rating to category 2 after Thai regulators failed to meet a 90-day deadline to improve “Significant Safety Concerns (SSC) present in the country’s aviation standards system. Read More »
Days before the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) posted a red flag against Thailand on its data base, the director general of the Department of Civil Aviation had been dismissed because he had failed to promptly address ICAO’s concerns.
As well, it was generally known that the regulators were running out of time to comply to the improvements ICAO required, especially after a Thai delegation had flown to ICAO headquarters to plead for more time to fix its problems.
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Once the decision was announced, Thai aviation industry leaders came out fighting. Thai Airways International (THAI) president, Charamporn Jotikasthira, assured the travelling public that his airline maintained high safety standards. He added the report did not mean air transport services, airlines, aircraft and airports of Thailand were substandard.
He said THAI had obtained certification from international organisations concerned with aviation safety, including the International Air Transport Association, the European Air Safety Agency, Federal Aviation Administration of the U. S., the Australian Civil Aviation Safety Authority, the Civil Aviation Administration of China and Japan Civil Aviation Bureau.
“Since February 2015, when ICAO issued the SSC note on Thai DCA, Thai Airways International has had to rely on other states’ civil aviation authorities to provide oversight for where THAI operates. As such, THAI has undergone additional and more frequent safety audits and station inspections by these authorities, the THAI president said.
“THAI has been able to continue operating regular flights to these countries. In the very near future, THAI will be audited at the company’s base by other states’ civil aviation authorities.”
Thailand’s deputy transport minister, Arkhom Termpittayapaisith, said he would improve flight safety conditions before ICAO returns for its next scheduled inspection in October or November.
“We have to be thorough before they come for the re-audit. Every problem must be fixed by then,” he said. The nation’s transport minister, Prajin Junthong, has started a training program for 25 aviation officials so they can carry out re-certification inspections on 28 airlines, a task Thailand’s aviation authorities expect to complete by November.
In March, ICAO gave Thailand 90 days to resolve issues that included insufficient personnel inspection, issues with certification of transportation of hazardous goods and leniency in issuing air transport licences. ICAO found a conflict of interest in that the Department of Civil Aviation is both the regulator and the operator of several Provincial airports in the country.
The shift from category 1 to category 2 means that Thailand’s airlines cannot add routes to their network or start up new airline partnerships. Long haul budget carrier, NokScoot, would be effected by the negative re-rating as would other low-cost carriers planning to use Bangkok as a region hub for expansion.
The decision is a severe blow to Thailand’s aviation reputation. It now takes its place on an ICAO red flag list along side Angola, Botswana, Djibouti, Eritrea, Georgia, Haiti, Kazakhstan, Lebanon, Malawi, Nepal, Sierra Leone and Uruguay.
It is also bad news for the country’s economy, which is still recovering from political upheaval, that lead to a military coup, and the arrest and upcoming trial of the country’s last prime minister.
Since the ICAO audit was completed, some nations have raised serious concerns about Thai airlines and have stepped up their inspections of Thai-registered aircraft arriving at their airports.
In a recent report, which was cited in the Bangkok Post newspaper, the Economic Intelligence Centre of the Siam Commercial Bank warned a red flag could cause international aviation agencies to re-evaluate the safety of Thai aviation facilities. “If Thailand’s air safety rating is downgraded by international aviation agencies, Thai airlines will face the loss of goodwill, higher operating costs, and increasing competition from foreign carriers.
“Charter carriers will lose out as their operating licences are issued on a case-by-case basis. Full-service airlines and medium-haul low-cost carriers will experience setbacks in their growth plans from the inability to establish new routes or to increase their flight frequencies,” it said.
Officials at Thailand’s DCA didn’t immediately respond to the decision, but an un-named source in the department did suggest the red flag might not lead to any more adverse results. It said the international community was aware Thai authorities were improving their aviation certification standards, including a review of all certificates of Thai-registered airlines and the training of personnel.
