You once said that the current compensation levels for passengers of delayed and cancelled flights are far lower than other countries. Will CAAV tell airlines to pay higher compensation for affected guests in the future?

Lai Xuan Thanh: It is true that the current compensation remains low. While compensation payments for flight delays and cancellations in European countries are at least 250 euros, those in Vietnam range from VND100,000 and VND300,000 depending on distances of flights.

CAAV is drafting a circular intended to increase compensation amounts that airlines will have to pay for passengers affected by their flight delays and cancellations, and will present it to the Ministry of Transport this month for consideration.

Though many measures have been adopted, the number of flight delays and cancellations drops modestly. Will CAAV require airlines to rearrange take-off and landing schedules at airports?

We have observed that nearly 50% of the delayed flights have resulted from late arrivals of aircraft at departure airports. Currently, a jetliner operates four flights a day on average, and the late arrival of a single aircraft will have a domino effect on other flights.

To resolve this, CAAV has told authorities of Noi Bai, Danang and Tan Son Nhat international airports to manage to reduce late aircraft arrivals. Besides, airlines need to improve their aircraft maintenance quality to avoid technical glitches just before departure time.

CAAV will strive to ease overloads at Tan Son Nhat airport by expanding the plane parking area at the airport by 7.63 hectares and work is scheduled to begin this October.

Other airports like Cat Bi in Haiphong City and Vinh in Nghe An Province will be equipped with more passenger boarding stairs to speed up embarkations and disembarkations towards the year-end, thus helping reduce flight delays and cancellations.

Air traffic safety and aviation security were among major concerns in the first half of this year. What are the main reasons?

There were 145 aviation security violations recorded in the January-June period, up 95.9% year-on-year, and 173 incidents concerning flight safety, up 32 cases.

Regarding air traffic safety violations, infrastructure has yet to meet the demand in peak hours and the compliance with safety requirements and the capacities of aviation staff are still limited.

Aviation security failures were also attributable to the poor coordination among units at airports as well as a lack of awareness among some passengers when making bomb hoaxes, arbitrarily opening the emergency exit doors of aircraft or taking life jackets out.

Such incidents happen so frequently. Is it because punitive measures are not strict enough?

The current punishments for violators in the aviation sector are very detailed and the punishments for violations of employees are pretty strict. For instance, regarding the incident in which two aircraft almost collided on the runway at Danang Airport late last June, the chief controller was fined VND45 million, had his certificate taken back and was demoted. The director of Central Air Traffic Company was temporarily suspended from his post and even leaders of Vietnam Air Traffic Management Corporation were criticized.

For passengers, though measures about flight safety are introduced via many channels, there are still violations. Therefore, I think fines should be heavier and stricter.

As an aviation authority, what steps should CAAV take to reduce security and safety rule violations?

We will continue tightening supervision and apply heavy financial sanctions to the entire system. This means heads of management units and violators will be punished. Besides, we will further provide flight safety information for passengers by a variety of methods when passengers arrive at airports and draft amendments and stricter punitive measures to existing aviation regulations.

SGT/VNN