A big mishap at the Mumbai airport, which could have killed hundreds was averted on Monday thanks to fast action by the pilot of an Air India flight.

The flight all set to take off, aborted its effort as a helicopter came in its way. The Air Force helicopter that missed the crash was part of President Pratibha Patil’s convoy of three helicopters.
In fact, sources say the President was on the second chopper.

The flight with 150 passengers had been cleared for take off by Mumbai’s Air Traffic Control, but just as the plane reached the runway and was about to speed up, the ATC asked the pilot to abort.

The pilot applied brakes and approximately at the same time three Air Force choppers landed on the runway.

Avoided a crash by seconds.

“The ATC did not know,” said S S Kohli, Pilot, Flight IC 866.

Was the Air Force at responsibility for not following the usual operating process in this case? When a VIP is traveling, a fleet of helicopters usually fly in a pattern with the leading helicopter speaking to the Air Traffic Control.

In this case, sources say, it was the second helicopter, which told ATC that it was three miles away and that it would touch down at 9:20 am.

The ATC assumed there was sufficient time for the flight to Delhi take off.

At 9:17 am, the Air India Plane was on runway No. 27 when the first helicopter of the Presidential fleet flew into the path of the Air India aircraft.

At the very last instant the ATC noticed this helicopter very close to the commercial plane and asked IC-866 to abort take off.

The helicopter landed on the same runway at right angles to the Air India plane hardly meters away from it.

The second helicopter, which had been touch with Air Traffic Control all along then landed at 9:20 am, which means in result the first helicopter landed without permission.

A tyre of the plane had to be altered after the wear and tear caused by the unexpected braking.

“When we looked out of the flight, we saw that the choppers were just 20 meters away from our plane. The tyres burst maybe because they tilted. People were not hurt,” said Hitesh Solanki, Passenger.

The Air India flight took off 3 hours later with all passengers safe even as the President went about her business in Gondia district of Maharashtra.