JEDDAH – The General Authority of Civil Aviation (GACA) has warned the Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) that its Umrah flights to Jeddah will be suspended if it fails to overcome delay. PIA's country manager in the Kingdom Shahbaz Ahmed talking to Saudi Gazette admitted that the airline has been served such a letter and that they have forwarded it to the airline head office in Pakistan. “We have forwarded the complaint to Pakistan and asked them to take care of things on their side since flights were getting delayed from point of origin and not in Jeddah,” he said. He said that they have explained things to the people back home that operations in Jeddah are so huge that they cannot handle such big delays. The Saudi aviation authority has also reportedly warned the PIA that it would only allow one flight a day for Jeddah if it does not follow the flight operations schedule. The ground handling agency – Ports Projects Management and Development Company – said that PIA has operated four Umrah extra section flights without reservation and approved schedule and it has neither operated 14 approved Umrah flights nor they bothered to file any cancellation. Over and above PIA has operated 70 per cent of its flights delay of its schedule. It said PIA must depute extra manpower to handle delayed flight at Haj terminal. The PIA must file the delay at least eight to 10 hours prior to scheduled departure except any technical issue. The GACA said that PIA was supposed to provide all PIA on-duty supervisor with one mobile number, provide PPMDC operation duty manager with the duty supervisor monthly roster and their telephone numbers, inform PPMDC operation duty manager about any changes on schedule flights transferring Umrah passengers, and ensure that it will not transport normal passengers on Umrah flights. PIA spokeman Mashhood Tajwar told Dawn that it had taken up the matter and somehow it had overcome the problem. He said congestion at the Jeddah airport was also one of the reasons for flight delays.
