SpiceJet decided to be a little excited about the festival of colours, Holi, which was celebrated around the country earlier this week. Not a bad thought in its own right, except this attracted the attention of the aviation regulator DGCA who thinks they have not done the right thing by organising some song and dance on board.
Here is a video of the dance on board SG 876 between Goa and Bangalore as captured by a passenger. The same performance was conducted on 8 flights of the airline on March 17.
As per the airline, the cabin was staffed with three extra cabin crew members and the cockpit was manned at all times during this 2.5 minutes performance.
However, the DGCA has suspended two pilots, and issued a notice to the airline threatening to ground the airline. Here is an excerpt of the notice, courtesy The Times of India:
Cabin crew acts had drawn the attention of other crew on duty, thus reducing their preparedness/alertness. The frequent movement of the dancing crew may have affected the aircraft’s centre of gravity during flight and created turbulence. The airline is charged with permitting use of cellphones in the air to take pictures “which is against present regulation”. It is accused of creating an environment that “might have instigated passengers to become unruly…. It is established that SpiceJet failed to observe various safety regulations to provide a safe flight.
Now, someone got to take DGCA to the west and show them how Southwest and Virgin America used to strut their stuff on board. In the past, even FinnAir did a little jig on their India flight on the occasion of Republic Day.
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Latest news is that the pilots have been suspended!
I agree with the action taken. There is no need to dance in the skies if it is going to pose a risk to flight control. They can dance whole day in their terminal. Who cares. And what does the airline trying to say here? Anyone can dance in the skies? Just think – can you and I dance in a plane if it is say our birthday or wedding day? What gives right to these people to dance?
SpiceJet is the most unethical airline i ever seen. I’ve seen people click pictures and talk on the phone when the plane is taking off/landing, and none of the crew gives a damn. Good work DGCA on nailing these idiots for doing irresponsible crap 35000 feet in air and risking 180+ precious lives for some lousy marketing gimmick. It is a real misfortune that they are owned indirectly by Karunanidhi that they will go scott free.
They’re paranoid of FAA now.
DGCA is behaving like a school master.
This is typical regressive babus at work.. I am no aviation expert but I dont think the security was jeopardized at any time! There are lots of areas where security can be tightened other than this!!
I personally have seen South West FAs go bonkers while celebrating birthday. Everyone seems to be lacking a sense of humor these days 🙂