MALAYSIA Airlines MH370’s disappearance has helped to drive higher safety standards on the air and ground, with AirAsia Group to launch a passport screening system and Inmarsat offering an airline tracking service for free.
The LCC will become the first airline to fully integrate Interpol’s I-Checkit system into its check-in process later this month, to screen all passenger passports against Interpol’s Stolen and Lost Travel Documents (SLTD) database.
I-Checkit screens the passenger’s travel document number, form of document and country code against the SLTD database without transmitting personal information. In the event of a match, AirAsia will refer the passenger in question to local authorities.
Currently in the pilot testing stage, the I-Checkit system will be deployed on the airline group’s entire network of 100 airports across Asia and 600 international flights per day to more than 20 countries worldwide.
AirAsia Group CEO, Tony Fernandes, said: “AirAsia is extremely pleased to be the first airline globally to collaborate with Interpol to implement I-Checkit. The partnership we have created will result in improved passenger security and will support our desire to offer low fares, but with the added assurance that this system and partnership provides.”
Said Interpol secretary general, Ronald K Noble: “AirAsia has established the new standard for airline security by screening the passports of all international passengers against Interpol’s database. After today, airlines will no longer have to depend solely on countries screening passports to keep passengers safe from terrorists and other criminals who use stolen passports to board flights. Like AirAsia, they will be able to do it themselves as well.”
Earlier this week, global mobile satellite communications services provider Inmarsat also announced that it has proposed to ICAO a free global airline tracking service, for immediate implementation.
It will cover all aircraft equipped with its satellite connection or 11,000 commerical aircraft, close to 100 per cent of the world’s longhaul aircraft.
Furthermore the service extends to a ‘black box in the cloud’ service that will stream historic and real-time flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder information to authorised recipients under specific trigger events.
Rupert Pearce, CEO of Inmarsat, said: “Because of the universal nature of existing Inmarsat aviation services, our proposals can be implemented right away on all ocean-going commercial aircraft using equipment that is already installed. Furthermore, our leading aviation safety partners are fully supportive of expanded use of the ADS-C Service through the Inmarsat network. This offer responsibly, quickly and at little or no cost to the industry, addresses in part the problem brought to light by the recent tragic events around MH370.”
IATA last month convened a taskforce to relook the aviation industry’s approach to global aircraft tracking and passenger data, with director general and CEO Tony Tyler pledging: “We cannot let another aircraft simply vanish.” (TTG Asia e-Daily, April 1, 2014).
