Choppers, aircraft to pick up air crash victims in one hour: Air Force

Shillong: The Indian Air Force on Tuesday said it is making provisions for helicopters and aircraft to ensure that air crash victims can be picked up within one hour of the mishap.

"We are making provisions in terms of practices, procedures and training to ensure that henceforth, if something goes down, we will be able to pick it up within an hour. If not, we are not doing the job properly," Eastern Air Command Chief Air Marshal C Harikumar said.

"We do have a terrain that has a lot of vegetation and sometimes when helicopters or something goes down, we are unable to pick it up. What happened with Pawan Hans, it took us some time, but I promise you as we go on, this will change," he said.

Harikumar highlighted the fact that there are pilot rescue vehicles (PRV) in the cockpits which can be activated by the pilot or an automated emergency location transmitter which is activated on impact.

The Eastern Command Chief said the moment a helichopter or aircraft hits the ground, information would be transmitted to the satellite wherein an agency would react and provide information.

"Some (PRVs) come in pre-fixed, while some as add-ons. Those that have been added subsequently, have not been performing very well. But, slowly we are checking on it," he said.

"Whatever system we have on board should be able to react and give us information... We are talking of better electro optical, Infra-Red cameras to see if something happened in the hills," he said.

"It has a lot of precision issues in terms of the fact that we cannot have aeroplanes that deviate from the path because of weather and going off and hitting hills.

"The latest measures and provisions will ensure that the emergency location transmitters fitted on helicopter and aircraft are of improved functionality," he added.