AVIATION
South Korea relaxes aviation ban
Suchat Sritama
The Nation


Transport Minister Prajin Juntong at a news briefing on April 7.

BANGKOK: -- South Korea temporarily allows Jet Asia Airways to operate charter flights to the country, according to Transport Minister ACM Prajin Juntong.

The permission will be effective only during April 7-15, said Prajin.

Still, the Korea office of civil aviation’s permission is not extended to Asia Atlantic Airlines and NokScoot.

The three airlines plan a number charter flights to South Korea throughout April for 22,119 passengers.

"For scheduled flights by Thai Airways (International) and Thai AirAsiaX, the Korean authorities said it may relax the rules if they plan to increase the number of flights," Prajin said.

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/business/South-Korea-relaxes-aviation-ban-30257568.html


-- The Nation 2015-04-07

So they cut a deal to allow people to fly in these unsafe planes just for songkran holiday. Let's just hope nothing bad happens because of it. I know I will not be taking a chance risk in my life just so TAT can make the revenue it wants for the holiday.

It makes sense that some airlines might tend to be safer than others, due to their size or more-modern fleet or better financial-resources or engineering-backup or management-ability, and that some other small recent start-up operations with elderly-aircraft might bear closer examination.

Sorting the sheep from the goats, that's the problem.

Edited April 7, 201511 yr by Ricardo

The planes are not unsafe the extra fights congest the airspace and make parking problems at the airport that's the safety issue fm's

I have to admit to being a cynic comes with age I guess, and I would dearly love to believe the Thai version of things, gets harder all the time.

Japan and Korea place bans on charted flights from Thailand for good reason based on Thailand's poor performance on air safety audits. The Thais send a delegation to discuss the issue Japan and Korea change their mind and allow Thai charter flights, with some conditions.

What is going on here, is it safe or not?

NokScoot cancels charter flights to Japan, South Korea until April 27

* Nearly 150,000 passengers affected by Japan, Korea bans

* South Korea permits Jet Asia, scheduled flights for short term (Adds minister comments about South Korea's ban)

By Manunphattr Dhanananphorn

BANGKOK, April 7 (Reuters) - Thai long-haul low-cost carrier NokScoot said on Tuesday it has cancelled all charter flights to Japan and South Korea until April 27, pending a licence re-evaluation by the authorities.

NokScoot, a joint venture between Nok Airlines PCL and a subsidiary of Singapore Airlines Ltd, will have to refund more than 20,000 passengers booked on flights during the period, Chairman Patee Sarasin told Reuters.

MORE:

Edited April 8, 201511 yr by TallGuyJohninBKK

I have to admit to being a cynic comes with age I guess, and I would dearly love to believe the Thai version of things, gets harder all the time.

Japan and Korea place bans on charted flights from Thailand for good reason based on Thailand's poor performance on air safety audits. The Thais send a delegation to discuss the issue Japan and Korea change their mind and allow Thai charter flights, with some conditions.

What is going on here, is it safe or not?

You would need to get an English version of the ICAO report to find out what exactly all the problems are and what the requirements are to fix them. I did a Goole search and turned up some information but not the right report.

The problem in Thailand is that they are seriously understaffed and have been for many years as most previous governments have simply ignored the problem but unfortunately for this government, they inherited it. It could have been any government in power at this time and they would have HAD to do something much like this government is doing.

http://www.icao.int/safety/Documents/ICAO_2014%20Safety%20Report_final_02042014_web.pdf