The runway at Mangalore is what is labelled as a critical runway for the Boeing 737 in aviation jargon,which simply means that pilots have to exercise a little more caution while landing there, said Sanjay Bishnoi,Pune-based Air India Express pilot who flew on the Dubai-Mangalore route twice in the past two weeks,landing there on the May 11 and again on May 15.
Bishnoi was closely associated with the co-pilot of the ill fated aircraft,H S Ahluwalia,and had also visited Ahluwalias home in Mangalore a week earlier.
He Ahluwalia had been trying without success to get a posting in Mumbai because his family stays there,but he told me that he was satisfied with his current posting as he had found peace of mind in Mangalore, Bishnoi said.
He was a very experienced pilot and had made that landing several times before,so a mistake from his side was unlikely, he said.
On what could have gone wrong on Saturday,Bishnoi said the cause of the crash was open to speculation at the moment. The 8,000-foot runway is just long enough to land this particular model of aircraft and the objective is to keep your speed as low as possible during the landing.