Garuda resumes flights of Airbus A-300 B4 fleet

JAKARTA (JP): Garuda's fleet of Airbus A-300 B4s, one of which crashed last week in Sibolangit, North Sumatra, killing all people on board, has resumed operations after a routine inspection.

The national carrier's spokesman, Pudjobroto, confirmed yesterday that three of the eight airplanes had resumed their normal operations on the Jakarta-Surabaya (East Java), Jakarta- Denpasar (Bali), and Jakarta-Singapore routes.

"It is not true that the airplanes have been grounded because of the accident in Sibolangit," Pudjobroto said, adding that the three jets were registered as PKGAA, PKGAF and PKGAH.

The remaining five airplanes were still undergoing inspection, he said.

An Airbus A-300 B4 flying from Jakarta to Medan, North Sumatra, crashed minutes before it was due to land at Polonia airport, killing the 222 passengers and 12 crew.

Garuda has gradually purchased a total of nine A-300 B4s since the beginning of 1982.

A spokesman for the Ministry of Transportation, Bambang S. Ervan, said yesterday that the government had never instructed Garuda to ground the A-300 B4s.

Separately, the state-owned Merpati Nusantara Airlines has further extended the cancellation of its Jambi-Jakarta and Jambi- Batam flights until Oct. 15 due to the thick haze shrouding Jambi's Sultan Thaha Airport.

Merpati's district manager in Jambi, Ahmad Fauzi, was quoted by Antara news agency as saying yesterday that the extension meant a total of 101 flights to the airport had been canceled since the first suspension last month.

Antara quoted Jambi's office of the transportation ministry as saying that Merpati had lost about Rp 1 billion (US$294,117) in revenue because of the halting of services.

Severe haze problems, caused by prolonged forest fires in Sumatra, had reduced visibility in the vicinity to less than 100 meters, while the required visibility is 3,200 meter, it said.

The smog had disrupted air transportation activities in the affected areas for more than one month.

Merpati said passengers traveling to and from the area were served through Palembang (South Sumatra), a five to seven-hour drive from Jambi. (das/icn)