April 21: The International Aviation Safety Assessment (IASA) Program carried out by the United States Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) lists the Civil Aviation Authority of Bangladesh (CAAB) in Category 2 (I will go into the details of this later; in short it means that the CAAB does not meet the International Civil Aviation Organization's minimum safety standards).

April 22: Biman reverts back to its New York flights through Brussels. The State Minister says to the local media that the unexpected regulatory intervention by the FAA has forced Biman to revert to its previous routing, and if the FAA does not allow Biman to operate the flight through Manchester, he would have no choice but to stop the New York service since he finds no point in operating the flight through Brussels incurring huge losses.

It is not new for Biman to put its passengers in trouble. If you can recall the not-so-distant instances of how it handled the 2005-2006 Hajj operations, or how it left over 200 people stranded at Brussels airport with no food for about 2 days, you would know what I am trying to say.

The airline had launched the new service through Manchester, inconveniencing the expatriate Bangladeshis living in the US because now they would have had to obtain the transit-visa for UK to come to Bangladesh by Biman, which was not required when the flight operated through Brussels.

And now, following the FAA restrictions, they have reverted back to Brussels, but the State Minister is saying he would rather drop the service than operate it through Brussels. Well, with the prices of fuel skyrocketing and the DC-10-30 costing well over $10,000 to fly every hour, coupled with the long-overdue debt of over Tk 1,000 crore with the Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation for jet fuel, the Minister perhaps had no option but to issue the pre-emptive message.

But that is not all. Let me shed some light on what the Civil Aviation Authority of Bangladesh (CAAB) is up against. The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) lists the CAAB in Category 2 of the International Aviation Safety Assessment (IASA) Program.

The IASA Program, established in August 1992 by the FAA, focuses on a country's ability, not the individual air carrier, to adhere to international standards and recommended practices for aircraft operations and maintenance established by the United Nation's technical agency for aviation, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). The assessment has two ratings: Category 1 that complies with the ICAO standards, and Category 2 that does not comply with the ICAO standards.

Being listed as Category 2, it means that the FAA has assessed the CAAB and determined that it does not provide safety oversight of its air carrier operators in accordance with the minimum safety oversight standards established by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). The rating is applied if one or more of the following deficiencies are identified:

1. The country lacks laws or regulations necessary to support the certification and oversight of air carriers in accordance with minimum international standards.

2. The CAA lacks the technical expertise, resources, and organization to license or oversee air carrier operations.

3. The CAA does not have adequately trained and qualified technical personnel.

4. The CAA does not provide adequate inspector guidance to ensure enforcement of, and compliance with, minimum international standards.

5. The CAA has insufficient documentation and records of certification and inadequate continuing oversight and surveillance of air carrier operations.

Category 2 includes two groups of countries: one whose air carriers have existing operations to the US, and one whose air carriers does not. CAAB of course belongs to the former group, thanks to Biman's "prestigious" New York service.

The result definition of the IASA Program clearly states that: "While in Category 2 status, carriers from these countries will be permitted to continue operations at current levels under heightened FAA surveillance. Expansion or changes in services to the US by such carriers are not permitted while in category 2, although new services will be permitted if operated using aircraft wet-leased from a duly authorised and properly supervised US carrier or a foreign air carrier from a category 1 country that is authorised to serve the United States using its own aircraft."

This means that after CAAB was listed in Category 2, Biman could have continued the New York service through Brussels. Instead, Biman decided to change the route and began operating the flight through Manchester replacing Brussels, without prior permission from the FAA or complying with the obligatory rules, and now allegedly faces a penalty by FAA amounting between $400,000 to 800,000. Has the Ministry attempted to find out what the Flight Safety & Operations divisions of both CAAB and Biman were doing while all this was happening?

Traditionally, deputed senior officials from the Bangladesh Air Force (BAF), assuming that they would know best about the commercial aviation industry (!), spearhead CAAB management. Of all the other countries listed in Category 2 of the IASA, Bangladesh has the highest number of international airlines operating into the country, and possibly the highest inbound and outbound air traffic. The other countries in the exact same category and group as Bangladesh are Bulgaria, Cote D'Ivoire, Ecuador, Ghana, Guatemala, Guyana, Nauru, Serbia & Montenegro, and Ukraine.

Now that the CAAB is listed in Category 2 of the IASA, it directly questions the competency and capability of the entire management of CAAB and in particular that of the Chairman, the Director of Flight Safety, and the Director of Operations. What actions, if any, will the Ministry of Civil Aviation & Tourism take against the evidently incompetent management of CAAB that has caused such disgrace for the whole nation?

As for Biman, the organisation has seen about a couple of dozen Managing Directors in about thirty years of its operation as an airline, most of whom have never had any experience in the industry of commercial aviation. I refuse to believe that an airline cannot run profitably being state-owned. There are airlines in the Middle East and Southeast Asia that are completely state-owned and are performing exceptionally well, not because they have plenty of funds at their disposal, but because they are run by management which has experience in the industry and which is free from all unnecessary government intervention.

For what has happened in this Brussels-Manchester-Brussels debacle for Biman's New York service, the Managing Director of Biman along with the rest of the management team, in particular the Director of Flight Operations should be held responsible. Only a lapse in coordination between Biman and CAAB, or complete absence thereof, could lead to a situation like this where the national airline is turned into a laughing stock for the rest of the world.

The Ministry of Civil Aviation & Tourism is the governing authority of both CAAB and Biman. While Biman and CAAB can point fingers at each other and make themselves look even more ridiculous than they already are, it is the Ministry who should act wisely. The airline is owned by the state, and not by any political party, and the CAAB is there to ultimately serve the travelling people of the country. The Ministry, therefore, owes an explanation to the nation.

The author, currently an aviation industry consultant, has previously worked on projects with The Boeing Company, Honeywell Aerospace, and has worked with FAA's Operational Evolution Plan (OEP) in 2004-2005.