Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, January 3) — The Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) said it will not shy away from any investigation on the technical glitch at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport that affected thousands of passengers on New Year’s Day.
“Open po kami dyan. We are willing to talk with them and show them whatever they want, so nakahanda po tayo at wine-welcome natin yan,” CAAP Deputy Director General Edgardo Diaz said on Tuesday.
[Translation: We are open to that. We are willing to talk with them and show them whatever they want, so we are ready and we welcome it.]
Sen. Grace Poe on Monday said the investigation will begin once all airport issues were resolved.
“Give them time to restore normal flight operations. After which, we will conduct an inquiry and direct them to submit a full report of what caused the supposed glitch and power outage,” said Poe, chairperson of the Senate Committee on Public Sevices.
At a Laging Handa briefing, Diaz said operations were back to normal, adding they continue to coordinate with carriers to mount recovery flights so that affected passengers could reach their destinations.
He also said contingency measures are in place should a similar incident happen again.
Meanwhile, Sen. Joel Villanueva on Tuesday filed Senate Resolution No. 390 in a bid to conduct an investigation into what happened at the airport on Jan. 1.
In the resolution, Villanueva cited Transportation Sec. Jaime Bautista who said there was a need to revamp NAIA’s air traffic management system.
At a press conference on Sunday, Bautista said upgrades would cost over ₱13 billion
Diaz said the equipment, while constantly going through maintenance, was at its “half life.”
“Hindi pa naman completely obsolete, though we need upgrades to make sure na siya ay makatutugon sa lahat ng mga pangangailangan sa ngayon,” he said.
“Maganda pa po ang performance niyan, ang nangyari lang ay nawalan tayo ng power kaya bumagsak ang kanyang operation,” Diaz added. “Pero noong manumbalik ang power, naibalik natin siya sa tamang takbo niya.”
[Translation: It is not completely obsolete, though we need upgrades to make sure it can meet the needs today. The performance is still good, but what happened was we lost power so operations bogged down. But once power returned, it resumed to normal.]
Villanueva added the NAIA mess affected thousands of people, among them 3,000 overseas Filipino workers whose jobs might be compromised as they were unable to return to work as scheduled.
Apart from this, Villanueva said the incident “may also hinder the continuous promotion of tourism in the country” which was hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic.
“A poor air traffic management system will pose further challenges to the recovery of the industry,” he said.
