A senior civil aviation official yesterday blew the whistle on civil aviation safety measures saying that no supervised in-flight checks were carried out for ten months on aircraft despite Cypriot airlines paying the authority to do the specific job.
Air transport licensing chief Charalambos Hadjigeorgiou criticised what he said was the shambolic way civil aviation was run in light of the Helios Airways crash that killed all 121 people on board, most of them Cypriot families.
"It was said that all the checks were conducted as they should have been, well I'm here to confirm that for the past ten months no such flight inspections were carried out," Hadjigeorgiou told CyBC radio during a lively discussion between politicians on who should bear responsibility for the crash.
"Whether this has any relation to the accident is up to the Greek investigators," he added.
He said Cypriot airlines paid for mandatory airworthiness checks valid from April 1, 2004 through to March 31, 2005 but none were actually carried out.
According to the official, Cyprus Airways paid £90,900 for these checks that were never undertaken, Eurocypria, the charter arm of Cyprus Airways, paid £49,800 Cyp and Helios £64,800 for this period.
"Why this didn't happen, you will have to ask the (Communications) Ministry and civil aviation for the answer."
With tourism being the island's life blood, the revelations do not sit well with efforts to assure holidaymakers Cyprus is a safe place to fly to.
Cyprus Airways declined to make any comment about the allegations when asked to do so by The Cyprus Weekly.
The Communications Ministry poured cold water on the allegations saying that Hadjigeorgiou's comments were "misleading" and the Minister, Haris Thrassou, will hold a press conference today to respond to the charges.
"The facts as presented by Mr Hadjigeorgiou create misleading impressions over the whole issue and particularly over the possible cause of the accident," said a ministry statement.
Attorney-general Petros Clerides is expected to invite the employee to give a statement and submit any relevant documents to back up his claims.
Emergency meeting
An emergency meeting took place last night at the Communications Ministry, involving Thrassou and Clerides, following the damaging accusations.
Inside sources said the official was not responsible for safety issues, but only licensing, and was released from the Greek civil aviation authority on "medical grounds". Hadjigeorgiou also criticised civil aviation for lacking "vision and planning" and said he was standing up for rank-and-file staff to prevent them "victimised" for what happened to the Helios Airways Boeing 737-300 that crashed outside Athens on August 14.
He was sceptical that any police investigation would uncover the whole truth about the crash and said anybody who spoke out against what went on inside civil aviation was either ignored, gagged or risked losing their job because of a confidentiality clause in their contract. The official also suggested the civil aviation leadership and the communications ministry were involved in a cover up.
Nevertheless, he said he had given a statement to police and would testify if called to do so by the crash investigation team.
"I will most probably lose my job for going public due to the confidentiality element in my contract...but I couldn't stand idly by after the crash."
Insult
On the issue of low staffing levels, he said the authority "plucked contract staff out of the corridors to temporarily plug holes".
Hadjigeorgiou also criticised the government for "hoodwinking" European experts over the various deficiencies faced by the civil aviation authority for a number of years.
"I consider it an insult that after a long but failed struggle to upgrade the civil aviation department that we hear disinformation and blame coming from official lips when those at fault should be held responsible."
The revelations caused a political outcry with many calling for an independent investigation into civil aviation and a radical shake up of the authority by making it an independent body.
Opposition Disy, said the allegations underlined the need for an independent criminal inquiry as they have been pushing for from the start.
"This is a shock and after these comments I expect drastic decisions to be taken concerning civil aviation and personnel responsible for flight checks and administrative action," said Edek socialist leader Yiannakis Omirou who described the whistle blowing move as a "shining example".
Head of the Greek crash investigation team, Akrivos Tsolakis, is expected in Cyprus on Monday to talk with Cypriots officials and airline staff in connection with the Helios Airways disaster.
"We owe it not only to the dead but lives put at risk when they board a plane to look at the issue of maintenance which is at the core and involved human life which is the most precious gift," said Diko deputy president Nicos Cleanthous. Akel was more guarded, saying that Hadjigeorgiou's comments must first be studied for their validity but assured that president Papadopoulos' pledge to conduct a thorough crash investigation included a probe into civil aviation practices.
The Cyprus air crash and incidents committee is assisting the Greek team leading the probe.
Tsolakis has already stated there are indications of a "technical anomaly in the aircraft's pressure system".
It also confirmed that the German pilot Hans Juergen Mertens, 58, reported a fault with the aircraft's air conditioning system in the Boeing's electronic compartment to his company shortly after take-off from Larnaca.
EU experts
Two EU experts were on the island this week to assist with the Cypriot end of investigations at the request of the Cyprus government.
Government officials are also looking into a report by French newspaper Le Monde on Tuesday which suggested that Cyprus is one of thirty countries on an international civil aviation blacklist for not meeting required safety measures. A French parliamentary inquiry into airline safety found that as many as 30 countries were not meeting civil aviation safety requirement, in most cases insufficient supervision was the overriding problem due to poor state funding.
Blacklist
French socialist MP Odile Saugues compiled her own unofficial blacklist - based on her evaluation of 111 audits undertaken by the International Civil Aviation Authority (ICAO) - unhappy that ICAO does not name and shame its own members who fail to act on its recommendations.
Saugues said she was struck by the presence of four EU countries on two separate lists - her own and one issued by the United States. Greece is on the US list while Cyprus, Hungary and Portugal are on the MP's list, based on ICAO audits up until 2003.
"One would have thought these countries would have been sufficiently sensitive to the problem of air safety," Saugues said in her 2004 report.
The two previous audits carried by ICAO criticised Cyprus for being deficient in "legislation, technical personnel and the obligation of continuous supervision...these aspects continued (after the 2002 audit)". Cyprus was on the French politician's black list placed alongside Belize, Albania, Mongolia, Niger and Uganda.
A Cypriot police investigation is being carried out against Helios to ascertain if the company was negligent in any way for what happened on flight UZ 522 from Larnaca to Prague via Athens that ploughed into the mountainside northeast of Athens.
The crash was the worst aviation disaster to befall Cyprus or Greece -- those killed were almost all nationals of the close-knit island, excluding 12 Greek nationals and the German pilot.
Helios has continued to fly but said its two remaining Boeing 737s will undergo "complete mechanical checks" in Sweden to "reassure the public".
The first of its two Boeing 737-800s has returned after being given a clean bill of health. The second aircraft is in Sweden and checks should be completed by Saturday.