When the Indigo plane stuck in the storm asked for help from Pakistan, what happened at that time, DGCA told the whole story:

News Topical, Digital Desk : Aviation regulator DGCA said on Friday that the pilot of an IndiGo flight from the national capital Delhi to Srinagar on Wednesday had sought permission to enter Pakistan airspace to avoid bad weather, but the request was rejected. Giving details about the incident, the DGCA said that none of the passengers on board the plane were injured. The nose radome of the plane has been damaged due to the storm. The DGCA is investigating the incident of the plane getting hit by bad weather.

DGCA gave detailed information

The DGCA said that as per the crew member's statement, the pilot had requested the Air Force Northern Control (IAF) to go left (to the international border) due to bad weather, but was not granted permission. The DGCA said that the crew later approached Lahore to enter Pakistan airspace to avoid bad weather, but that too was rejected.

The DGCA said that the crew members initially tried to return but due to storm and clouds, they decided to proceed in bad weather. After this, they had to face hailstorm and severe bad weather. The pilot decided to proceed in the same direction by the shortest route towards Srinagar to avoid bad weather.

Such a warning was issued

The aviation regulator said warnings for 'angle of attack fault', 'alternative law protection lost', 'backup speed scale unreliable' were issued during the thunderstorm. 'Angle of attack fault' indicates a fault in the system responsible for measuring and interpreting the angle between the aircraft's wings and the air. 'Alternative law protection lost' refers to a flight control law that indicates a fault in multiple systems or sensors while 'backup speed scale unreliable' is a system used in Airbus aircraft that helps pilots maintain safe flight speeds when there is a disturbance in the airspeed signal.

Due to strong winds, the aircraft's 'autopilot' (automatic mode) malfunctioned and the aircraft's speed varied widely. As a result, maximum operating speed/maximum operating MAC (VMO/MMO) warnings and repeated stall warnings started being issued. The DGCA said that the aircraft's descent rate reached 8,500 fpm (feet per minute) and the crew flew the aircraft 'manually' until it came out of the hailstorm. After activating all the checklist actions, the crew declared 'pan pan' to Srinagar ATC and requested for 'radar vector' and landed the aircraft safely with 'auto thrust' operating normally. Let us tell you that 'pan pan' is derived from the French word 'pan', which means failure or getting into difficulty. Usually, 'pan pan' is used in the context of an emergency situation.

Indian Air Force made a safe landing

At the same time, the Indian Air Force has confirmed that Lahore ATC had refused to allow IndiGo flight 6E 214 to use Pakistan's airspace. After this, the flight was helped to land safely in Srinagar airspace. The Air Force has said that the Indian Northern Area Control gave some advice to the pilot and the plane was diverted to Srinagar via an alternate route. From here, the Air Force took control and a safe landing was made by updating the real time control vector and ground speed.