Indonesia's Airlines Fail Safety Test

AUSTRALIAN travellers are being warned to reconsider flying on Indonesian planes amid revelations none of the country's airlines meet appropriate safety standards.

The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade took the unusual step yesterday of urging travellers to take note of a safety audit report in the country.

Indonesia's civil aviation authority carried out a performance assessment on the country's commercial airlines, finding that none of the 21 operators were found to be ''Category1'' -- that is, none met ''requirements of the civil aviation safety regulations''.

The study came in the wake of the fatal Garuda crash in Yogyakarta earlier this month, which killed 21 people including five Australians.

That tragedy, in which the jet overshot the runway and burst into flames, came after an Adam Air jet carrying 102 people disappeared in January.

In an advisory posted on the smarttraveller website, DFAT urged caution when travelling by air in the region.

Australians are ''advised to take [the safety audit] into account and check with their travel agents when making travel plans in Indonesia'', the department bulletin said.

The study of 54 aviation firms revealed that none of them made it to the first of three rating classes, one being the safest.

Garuda, Indonesia AirAsia and Mandala Airlines were among those which fell into Category2 -- which defines that they met minimal requirements of civil aviation safety regulations but some had not been implemented.

Alarmingly, six airlines -- including Batavia Air, Adam Air, and Kartika Airlines -- were placed in the lowest Category3, considered to have met only minimal safety standards. Those airlines would be given three months to improve safety or risk being shut down.

''None of the airlines were assessed as Category1,'' smartraveller states.

Journalist Morgan Mellish, AusAID Indonesia chief Allison Sudradjat, Australian Federal Police agents Brice Steele and Mark Scott and diplomat Liz O'Neill died in the crash.

Journalist Cynthia Banham remains in hospital after suffering horrific burns and having one leg amputated.

They were covering Foreign Affairs Minister Alexander Downer's trip to Yogyakarta. Mr Downer was on a VIP plane. Fairfax Media and News Ltd, publisher of The Daily Telegraph, have told the Government they will no longer allow journalists and photographers to cover Government trips unless they can travel on the same VIP aircraft.

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