Backseat drivers

The problem with Congressional investigations is the tendency of some legislators to grandstand. They become backseat drivers with their very little new knowledge. This happened again in the House investigation of the New Year’s Day no-fly event.

Some congressmen questioned the emergency procurement of two units of uninterruptible power supply (UPS) since we now know a faulty circuit breaker was the technical malfunction that brought the country’s airspace to a standstill on New Year’s Day.

CAAP director-general Manuel “Skee” Tamayo explained that they consulted with the supplier who said the UPS was now half its lifespan. The brand-new UPS units being procured are upgraded and are more modern.

Tamayo said they decided to do an emergency purchase of the UPS units when they were not certain about the cause of the airspace mess.

“There were still a lot of possibilities, so we were not sure. We just wanted to rule out the possibility that the UPS will create future problems,” the CAAP official added.

Furthermore, Tamayo said the old UPS equipment would not be discarded. These would be continuously maintained by CAAP to serve as a backup, something we didn’t have before, but should have had.

Besides, the bidding for the new UPS units was already done.

“We followed the same procedures, but we just had to expedite and other suppliers were invited, including the original manufacturer,” he added.

The congressmen weren’t convinced, insisting the new UPS units are not urgently needed. They cited the words of Transportation Secretary Jaime Bautista who had said that CAAP’s current UPS equipment is still functional in its “midlife.” In other words, puede pa.

Hay naku! Here we go again with the puede na yan, puede pa mentality. We are scrimping on pennies, but losing billions and putting lives in danger when the puede na or puede pa becomes hindi na pala puede.

I am surprised that a congressman from Mindanao, who often takes domestic flights, wasn’t worried that the puede pa UPS that’s used up half its expected life may conk out while he is on a flight and endanger his life.

False economy is never good. If the experts say we should play it safe and get new equipment, we should do so.

Apparently, CAAP has always been operating on a puede pa naman system. This is what the legislators should investigate.

I received a letter from a reader who claims first-hand knowledge that “requests for much needed maintenance, replacement and/or upgrading were not acted upon properly.”

The letter, said to have been sent to Junior, claims that “having received no positive response on their requests, technical personnel become resourceful in looking for solutions. They resort to scavenging, salvaging materials available in their warehouse, specifically, used items that they see would be the ultimo remedyo.

“With these becoming normal, demoralization sets in, making technical personnel complacent in performing their specific tasks, specifically, preventive maintenance with... ‘ok pwede pa yan attitude’ and worse, there were times that attitude upgraded into ... ‘ok lang gumagana pa naman’...”

That attitude is prevalent in other agencies. I remember being a judge in MetroBank’s Outstanding Kawal Award many years ago. The enlisted man who won an award was a mechanic whose achievement was to find ways of keeping those old helicopters flying through sheer abilidad.

CAAP is a technical agency. It is best that legislators who are not well versed on the technical stuff resist the temptation to backseat drive.

CAAP officials have this awesome responsibility of protecting thousands of lives who take flights within our air control zone. Let them make decisions that are necessary, even if they err on the side of spending a little more for safety assurance.

Indeed, if the legislators want to ride on the backs of CAAP officials, they should grill them on how they ensure proper maintenance of all facilities, specially those that should be failsafe. They should also provide the resources needed to help CAAP keep our skies safe.

Another letter sent to Junior talks of vital aviation equipment at Mactan International Airport that urgently needs maintenance or calibration. These should be looked into too.

Among the facilities mentioned is the ILS or Instrument Landing System precision aid that is used to provide descent guidance signals for aircraft landing on the runway under normal or adverse weather conditions. It provides pilots with precise vertical and horizontal guidance during the landing approach.

The re-calibration of the ILS should have been done a year ago,  Jan. 12, 2022, to be exact. It may now be transmitting inaccurate data the pilots need in guiding their angle of landing approach. A faulty reading can make touchdown way too late, making the length of the runway too short, thus, causing the aircraft to overshoot the runway.

Why weren’t essential safety checks done during the Duterte watch?

Basically, the main reason is financial. It costs about P250,000 per hour per NavAid, and re-calibrating the ILS needs an average of 12 hours, the letter to Junior claims.

The letter writer further claims it is not only Mactan International Airport, but also other principal airports that have similar safety concerns.

The other serious safety concern is human resources. We are losing our trained air traffic controllers who opt for foreign jobs due to the large pay disparity. We pay just about $1,000 a month when in the Middle East, the pay can go up to as high as $5,000.

There is also a high burnout rate for the job. That should be easy to understand. An air traffic controller is responsible for multiple planes and thousands of passengers take off and land safely within seconds of each other, and our facilities are not modern enough.

I am told that by age 40, an air traffic controller has had enough nerve-wracking tension to make him retire. Thus, he has to make as much money as he can for his family while he can.

Those are serious gaps in aviation safety that must be looked into.

Hopefully, these bigger issues are addressed by the legislators with the aim of helping CAAP officials fix the mess by giving them the resources required. Backseat driving with penny ante ideas does not help.

Boo Chanco’s email address is [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @boochanco.