Engine trouble forces down Ginandjar's plane

Engine trouble forces down Ginandjar's plane

JAKARTA (JP): Engine trouble forced a Garuda Indonesia jet
carrying a group of Indonesian pilgrims, including Minister of
National Development Planning Ginandjar Kartasasmita, to land in
Colombo, Sri Lanka, on Saturday.

The passengers on the 192nd haj flight from Indonesia were
then brought back to Jakarta. They left for Jeddah and continued
on to Mecca in Saudi Arabia on another plane yesterday morning.

"Two of three navigation machines were in trouble," an
official at the national carrier's haj post said yesterday. "All
the passengers are in good condition."

The GA 7520 flight with 465 passengers on board took off from
Halim Perdanakusumah airport on Saturday at 6 p.m. It developed
engine trouble about three hours after departure.

In a separate development, nearly 200 Moslems registered to go
on a privately-arranged haj pilgrimage were left stranded over
the weekend at Soekarno-Hatta Airport in Cengkareng due to
immigration problems.

The prospective pilgrims were trying to go to the Holy Land
using ordinary green passports rather than the specially issued
brown haj passports.

People with brown passports leave for Mecca at Halim
Perdanakusumah airport while those with green passports use
Soekarno-Hatta.

Each of the pilgrims, who had to stay at the airport for three
days until yesterday, paid the private tour agency Rp 11 million
(US$4657), almost four million rupiah more expensive than the
government-sponsored trip.

The agency reportedly told the pilgrims to just go to the
airport and that they would receive their passports and visas
there.

Minister of Religious Affairs Tarmizi Taher promised on
Saturday that he would take action against the agency. (01)