By Lynford Simpson, Staff Reporter
JUNIOR PILOTS who are still honing their skills and who have asked the Civil Aviation Authority to install an instrument landing system (ILS) at the Norman Manley International Airport, Kingston, will have to wait until 2002 for the costly equipment.
It would make it easier for them to land, and prevent near disasters like that on November 4 when Air Jamaica Flight 010 flew past the airport's runway and just missed crashing into houses in Hope Pastures, several miles away.
However, the cost, US$900,000 (J$42.3m), has proved to be the inhibiting factor, Col. Torrance Lewis, head of the CAA, told The Gleaner in an interview on Friday.
But while funding has delayed the installation of an ILS at the Norman Manley International, US$2.3 million (J$108 million) has been identified to train 70 air traffic controllers to use radar equipment that has been installed since 1998, but which does not work. Among the 70 will be 18 who were already trained in Canada at a cost of C$25,000 each for a total of J$12.15 million.
Re-training becomes necessary as the radar which was installed at a whopping US$23 million (J$1.1 billion) is still not functional. The money is a loan from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB).
Another US$7 million (J$322 million), a loan from the Export Development Corporation (EDC) of Canada and Citibank, NA, was spent to upgrade the Doppler Very-High-Frequency Omni-Directional Range, or DVOR navigational system, and radio equipment at both the Norman Manley and Sangster Internat-ional airports. An ILS was also installed at Sangster International.
"We actually put in a request for (ILS equipment) for both Sangster and Manley but when we had to prioritise, the priority was Sangster," Col. Lewis told The Gleaner. He explained that the weather at Norman Manley was much better and there were "very few rain-affected days".
Robert Pickersgill, Transport and Works Minister, who sat in on Friday's interview, said no cost would be spared to have the equipment in place as the safety of the travelling public was paramount.
"Anything that is to be done or not done must be brought to the attention of the Prime Minister and his Cabinet," Mr. Pickersgill said. Patrick Stern, manager for air traffic services at the CAA, stressed that the absence of the ILS at the Norman Manley International, did not mean safety was being compromised.
Col. Lewis dismissed reports that the ILS in Montego Bay malfunctioned often. He said it was installed only in June and performed satisfactorily when it was first inspected by a team from the Federal Aviation Administration of the USA.
A part subsequently went out of service but it has since been fixed. It will remain out of service until it is passed by the FAA, which is sending a team here tomorrow to conduct an investigation. Col. Lewis said that this had been planned well before the recent incident.
