AirBaltic
An airBaltic Boeing 737-36Q plane takes off from Riga airport May 13, 2010. The Latvian national airline airBaltic carried 835,700 passengers in the first four months of this year, which is a growth by 16 percent from the same period in 2009, the airline reported. Reuters

How safe are AirBaltic flights? That probably is the question in the minds of passengers of the air carrier, which could apply as well to air travelers in general, after reports came out that a plane of the airline was grounded on Saturday.

The reason for the grounding was that four of the jet’s five crew members failed the alcohol test, reports Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet. The drink-fly limit for flight crew are more stringent compared to road motorists. In the UK, the limit is 20 milligrames of alcohol for every 100 millilitres of blood, while road drivers have a limit of 80 milligrames.

Fortunately for the 109 passengers of the carrier who could have ended up like travelers aboard ill-fated jets, one alert passenger tipped off police before departure over suspicion of inebriated crew, reports The Telegraph.

The passenger’s apprehension were not unfounded because police had the crew undergo alcohol tests which confirmed that the captain, first officer and two flight attendants exceeded the drink-fly limit. As a result, the flight was delayed by five hours as the Latvian budget carrier looked for sober crew members.

Meanwhile, the police took custody of the four drunk crew who were supposed to fly the charter plane full of holidaymakers organised by Star Tour to Chania in Crete from Oslo, Norway. Despite the incident, AirBaltic, through spokesman Janis Vanagds, reiterates, “Zero tolerance means no alcohol. It’s very straightforward – safety is our number one priority.”

Vanagds apologised to AirBaltic passengers for the incident and adds more detailed alcohol tests are being done on the four employees. Appropriate action will be taken after the results of the additional tests are out.

Travelmore reports that the four has been suspended and AirBaltic is preparing to dismiss them because of the damage they have caused. The air carrier also increased the number of daily breathlyser tests and would put in place pre-duty tests for all of its safety-critical workers.

The Federal Aviation Administration, based on a 2010 report, says that incidents like what happened to AirBaltic, are rare. The average failing rate is 12 for 10,000 pilots tested annually.

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