The hasty go-ahead to the new Alitalia, which is called Ita Airways, has already created disruptions, due to the fog that has fallen over Milan Linate airport. Last Friday (22 October) eight Ita flights that had to land in the city airport were diverted to other airports, one in Genoa, seven on Malpensa, where Ita does not even have flights. The flights of all the other companies landed at Linate, while those of Ita did not, despite the fact that the company elected Linate as a «hub for business traffic».
The mess
The reason is that due to the rush to start Ita or due to the inexperience of some executives, someone must have forgotten (or pretended to forget) that new ENAC authorizations are needed even if the company uses the same planes, the same livery. and the Alitalia pilots themselves, who already had all these certifications. The mess is created by the fact that Ita is a new legal entity, a company different from the old company, due to the principle of “economic discontinuity” imposed by the EU Commission. But perhaps someone should have understood that the whole process had to be done in time to get the authorizations before the fog could return with the autumn.
It usually takes six months
“Normally it takes six months to give these authorizations to a new company, since Ita is a start-up it did not yet have them”, ENAC president Pierluigi Di Palma explained to Sole 24 Ore.
The green light came today
But after the chaos in the fog flights the practice was accelerated. In the afternoon of today, October 27, the green light to Ita for landings in low visibility arrived from Enac, up to the minimum required (75 meters, category “III A”) for which Linate airport is authorized. Fabio Lazzerini, CEO of Ita, was informed by a WhatSapp message from the Enac president.
The version of Ita
In the evening, Ita issued the following statement: “Ita Airways today obtained certification from the aeronautical authority Enac to operate with the minimum low visibility belonging to category III A. Ita Airways, by virtue of the credits acquired with the experience of its flight personnel, as well as from the fleet previously certified for these operations, obtained certification in just 12 days. Since obtaining the Coa (aircraft operator certification) last August 18th, the company has exercised all possible actions aimed at obtaining category III A certification ».