Residents of Lookout expressed concern after a Fly Montserrat plane appeared to lose use of an engine and dip towards the ground earlier this week.
However, the company has assured that the engine failure was simulated and a “routine procedure” as part of continuing pilot training.
Captain Nigel Harris, managing director of Fly Montserrat, spoke to Basil Chambers on ZJB Radio about the incident with the Britten-Norman Islander aircraft on 7 June.
He said: “I think it’s absolutely right and proper that we train as much as we can so that God forbid it ever happened one day, we’re on the ball.”
The discussion came after dozens of worried residents took to social media when they saw a plane make unusual sounds and fall towards the ground on the afternoon of 6 June.
Comments included: “Scary indeed”, “Have mercy”, “Not again”, “That do not look nor sound good at all”, and “We need to get rid of them planes”.
Some mentioned Fly Montserrat’s flight 107 which crashed shortly after take-off in Antigua on 7 October 2012, killing three of the four occupants.
Captain Benjamin Kadouch, the pilot of the plane used in the training, also commented in response to the concerns and insisted that there had never been any safety issue.
“I was the pilot. It was a training. Therefore, there was no passenger (obviously) on board,” he wrote.
“The control tower (which is the only authority to be informed before such a manoeuvre is performed) was informed in advance and approved the exercise.
“Nothing unsafe. Everything under control, again it was a training flight.”
Recurrent training
In his radio interview, Fly Montserrat’s managing director gave further details on the flight.
“Yesterday afternoon, our pilot was flying empty – empty means no passengers, just him on his own in the aeroplane, from Montserrat back to Antigua,” Harris said.
“And he decided, quite sensibly, I’ll use this as an opportunity to do some recurrent training.”
He explained that before the pilot left Montserrat, he spoke to air traffic control at John A Osborne Airport and said he was going to simulate an engine failure for training purposes.
“Air traffic went ‘no problem, how sensible’. Everybody at the airport knew exactly what was going on. It was rehearsed. It was predetermined,” he said.
“So, he then carried on, he took off, simulated engine failure, contained it, did his drills and continued to Antigua. This to me sounds very sensible.”
He told ZJB Radio that the drill was not part of the six-monthly assessed training that pilots are required to do so did not need anyone else on board.
It demonstrates that the pilot is “competent, trained and familiar with dealing with the procedure” as well as demonstrating that the aircraft is capable of dealing with it, he said.
Chambers asked Harris if it would be sensible to issue an alert the next time there is a similar training scenario, to allay the concerns of residents.
“It’s a good suggestion and it’s one we’ll take on board,” Fly Montserrat’s managing director said.
