Days after a deadly crash of PIA’s flight-661 in Havelian region of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, which claimed more than 45 lives, the airline’s employees sacrificed a black goat at Benazir Bhutto Airport in Islamabad on Sunday.moments before the ATR jet took off for the first time after shakedown tests.
The ritual took place to ward off any ‘evils’ to avoid accidents moments before the ATR jet took off for the first time after shakedown tests.
The PIA had grounded all of its 10 ATR aircraft after the Civil Aviation Authority ordered shakedown tests of the planes.
“It has been decided to keep all 10 ATR aircraft grounded till they are cleared after a thorough examination,” the airline said in a statement. It added the temporary suspension of ATR operation “will affect PIA’s flights to smaller airports like Gwadar, Turbat, Panjgur, Mohenjo Daro, Zhob, Bahawalpur, Dera Ghazi Khan, Chitral and Gilgit.”
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The directions came after an ATR aircraft reportedly caught fire while on the runway of Multan Airport before taking off last week.
The PIA airplane PK-581 with 48 passengers on board was set to take off from Multan to Karachi when it suffered a blaze incident.