Mumbai, Dec 17 (PTI) City-based Thakur Institute ofAviation Technology (TIAT) plans to launch a course in"type-rating" for A320 aircraft maintenance engineers (AMEs)and has applied to the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA)for approval.
"We want our students to attain certain specialtraining for certifying different types of aircraft. So wehave applied to EASA for its approval to our Airbus A 320type-rating course," said TIAT chief instructer SubhajitMaity.
"Type-rating" is a regulating agency's certificationwhich allows an AME to certify a certain type of aircraft.
Maity said EASA's chief airworthiness manager hadvisited TIAT's Mumbai campus last week and had inspectedvarious processes that are being put in place to commence theproposed course.
"If we are able to meet their parameters, we wil getthe approval by the middle of next year," he said.
"The introduction of the type-rating course at theInstitute will help our students save a lot of costs as atpresent they have to go out for such a training which isexpensive," Maity said.
Set up in 2006, the TIAT currently offers athree-year programme in aircraft maintenance engineering inmechanics and avionics stream besides an EASA-approved AMElicensing course.
A licensed AME performs two types of works on theaircraft--line maintenance and base maintenance.
The line maintenance is the checks that are performedon the aircraft a day or few hours before its departure.
The base maintenance on an aircraft is carried out atthe hangar and goes on for a longer time, sometimes weeks.
AME licence from the Directorate General of CivilAviation (DGCA) allows an engineer to certify the airworthiness of an aircraft. No aircraft can fly without this"certificate release to service" from a senior AME. PTI IASBNM.
This is unedited, unformatted feed from the Press Trust of India wire.