Rajnath Singh was treated to a detailed presentation by the IAF on the CDS chopper crash inquiry report for over 45 minutes. Chopper crashed on December 8 which led to the death of Chief of Defence Staff General Bipin Rawat, his wife and 12 other military personnel, informed sources on Wednesday as reported by ANI.
“IAF gave a detailed presentation for over 45 minutes to Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on the CDS chopper crash inquiry report. The tri-services probe report has given its findings on reasons behind the crash and made recommendations for the future chopper operations for flying VIPs,” a government source said.
Ajay Kumar, the Defence Secretary, Vivek Ran Chaudhari and Manvendra Singh, the head of the inquiry committee, presented the report to the Defence Minister.
In addition, the tri-services inquiry team is proposing to revise the standard operating procedures for helicopters that transport high ranking defense officials, the sources stated.
The sources said, when the Mi-17V5 crashed, the plane entered a thick cloud cover that appeared suddenly in the hills while following a railway line.
According to sources, the crew hit a cliff because they had decided to fly out of cloud cover rather than land. The helicopter was flying at a low altitude and the crew knew the terrain, so they decided to go out of the clouds rather than land.
Nevertheless, sources indicated that the entire crew belonged to the ‘master green’ category, and that they believed there was no emergency signal made to the ground stations, so they felt confident they could escape the situation.
According to sources, the ‘Master Green’ title is given to the best pilots in the three forces’ helicopter and transport aircraft fleets since they can land or take off in low visibility as well.
Additionally, it stated that one of the recommendations learned to be made by the inquiry committee is that future crews will be made up of a mix of master green and other category pilots, so that if necessary, help can be obtained from the ground stations.
Air Marshal M Singh’s inquiry committee is also said to have made a number of other recommendations.
