Brazilian President Says Aviation Crisis Is Resolved

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said Saturday that the serious aviation crisis in his country has been resolved and expressed confidence that passengers will be able to travel with their minds at ease during the Christmas season.

In a statement to the press in the central Bolivian city of Cochabamba, where he was attending the 2nd South American Summit, Lula said that he had to return sooner than scheduled to Brazil in order to discuss the crisis with aviation authorities.

"But I believe the situation is back to normal. The necessary measures have been taken to resolve the crisis," he said.

For several weeks passengers have met with flight cancellations and delays of up to 12 hours in Brazilian airports due to infrastructure problems, defective communications equipment, congested air traffic and protests by air traffic controllers.

"We're going to decentralize. We are going to have control in Sao Paulo and other important capitals and we are going to train our personnel better," the president said in explaining the measures adopted.

"For that reason I believe the problem is under control. We are trying on a day-to-day basis to see how the adopted measures work," he said.

Air traffic control in Brazil is currently centered in Brasilia and is chiefly in the hands of military controllers who have other duties as members of the armed forces, such as taking part in physical exercises.

"I want Brazil to have a happy Christmas and for people to travel with their minds at ease," he said.

"It makes no sense that Brazil has problems in its airports. We can put up with them when there is too much rain or when a control tower blacks out, but the lack of equipment for air traffic control is something we're not going to put up with any more," Lula said with reference to the complaints that air traffic control equipment in Brazilian airports has operating problems and is obsolete.

The airline crisis got worse at the beginning of this week with the temporary interruption of communications in the Brasilia air traffic control tower, forcing scores of airplanes to change course or make unscheduled landings.

At least 350 of Tuesday's scheduled 1,241 flights were delayed and another 67 were cancelled at the country's main airports, according to figures provided by the ANAC national civil aviation agency.

The initial delays caused a domino effect and by midday on Wednesday there had been at least another 150 flight delays at the airports, where hundreds, if not thousands, of passengers spent the night in uncomfortable conditions not knowing when - or if - they would be able to board their flights.

Hundreds of passengers protested on Wednesday with derisive whistling and shouts while they complained about the lack of information and the misrouting of hundreds of pieces of luggage.

Delays affected close to a half the flights scheduled for last Thursday.

The air traffic controllers, who are pushing for better working conditions and for their independence from the air force, have aggravated the crisis with go-slow operations.

They stepped up the pressure tactics when the air force fired eight controllers in Brasilia who are being investigated because they were on duty Sept. 29 when an airplane crash caused the death of 154 passengers and the greatest air tragedy in the nation's history.

On that day a Gol airlines Boeing 737 went down in a remote part of the Amazon jungle after a mid-air collision with a Legacy executive jet manufactured by Brazil's Embraer. The smaller plane was able to land safely.

The two aircraft were traveling in opposite directions but along the same air route and at the same altitude, a fact that was not detected in time by air traffic control radars. Compounding the problem, the Brasilia airport control tower was not able to raise the pilots to tell them to change course, according to the version of events given by air traffic controllers.

Copyright: EFE Ingles -- 12/11/06

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