Boeing urges automatic tracking system installed in planes

Boeing called Monday for equipping planes with automatic tracking system which cannot be switched off, in the wake of the tragic incident of the Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 that disappeared in March of last year.

"While the technology to install a global tracking system for individual planes exist, it was up to the governments and aviation regulators to enforce such a technology," Jeff Johnson, president of Boeing for the Middle East Johnson told a two-day world aviation safety summit in Dubai.

"In the United States military, installed tracking systems in fighter aircrafts are already in use," he added.

The tragic incident of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 which went missing on March 8, 2014 with 239 people on board en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing was the main topic of the forum's first day.

Mohammed Eturki, Executive Vice-President for safety at Saudi Arabia's low-cost carrier FlyNas said "we support an international tracking system that can permanently monitor planes airborne and which the pilot cannot switch off or manipulate in order to avoid that plane hijackers can do so."

However, Elias Sadek, Vice-President for Safety at EgyptAir Holding Company, said he opposes a system which the pilot cannot switch off.

If the tracking system is linked to an error in the plane and causes smoke or malfunction, he said, "the pilot must be able to switch it off and to steer the aircraft manually in order to land with the passenger safely.

"Otherwise the tracking system could trigger the worst case scenario which is more harm to the aircraft and humans on board," Sadek said.

Hussein Dabbas, regional Vice-President for Africa and the Middle East at the global aviation body IATA said he was still surprised that MH370 Boeing 777-200ER plane or any debris or trace of it had still not been tracked.

"We can track mobile phones nowadays so we should be able to track planes. I am puzzled like everyone else," he said.

Safety was of a particular concern in the Middle East, where the aviation growth was the highest in the world. From 2013 to 2033, the regional air traffic growth was poised to reach 6.4 percent annually.