SkyAlps, flight operations restored after suspension of 7 planes
About ten days have passed since the "tsunami" that hit the South Tyrolean company SkyAlps. What has happened? Why [...]
Some 10 days have passed since the "tsunami" that hit the South Tyrolean company SkyAlps. What happened? Because 7 of the planes make up the Bolzano carrier's fleet were "temporarily suspended"? More importantly, how is the company making up for the halving of the fleet? Let's rewind the tape.
In this article:
Between February 26 and 28 past few years, Enac conducted a extraordinary audit at the company's headquarters, during which "a number of nonconformities" related to aircraft maintenance. The body, going into more detail, found "the existence of deficiencies in aircraft maintenance attestations with respect to the regulatory flight safety requirements set by EU Reg. 1321/2012," reads the statement issued by ENAC on March 4.
In addition to this, then, "the attestations provided by a company technician in charge of performing maintenance, who was banned from accessing all airports where Sky Alps operates, did not conform." Hence, finally, the decision to Leave 7 of the 14 aircraft on the ground that make up the carrier's fleet.
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The company, which continues to maintain its air operator certification - announced early on that it would work to "Replace idle machines with other aircraft", and so it did. Since March 1, several aircraft of other operators (such as, among others, Luxwing e Universal Air) began flying for SkyAlps in ACMI (an acronym that stands for aircraft, crew, maintenance, insurance; in fact it is a lease agreement that includes not only the aircraft but also the crew and maintenance). As can be seen through the flight history on FlightRadar24, at the moment only one aircraft with the livery of the Bolzano company is still active: it is a De Havilland Canada Dash 8-400, markings 9H-PAUL.
Has the problem, then, returned? More or less, yes; flight operations have been restored. Now all that remains is to wait for the 7 "temporarily suspended" aircraft to be able to restart their engines. At the moment, however, it is not yet known when: as ENAC explained in a note, "the return to service may take place upon completion of the appropriate corrective actions to be proposed by Sky Alps and previously accepted by the Enac team in charge of certification and oversight of the company."
