No ILS, No ATC, No Margin: The Normalisation of Risk at VIP Airstrips
The tragedy at Baramati should not be treated as an isolated aviation mishap or reduced to a question of pilot judgment in bad weather. It is a window into a deeper and more uncomfortable truth about how VIP aviation operates in India. Accidents in aviation rarely occur because someone suddenly abandons common sense. They occur because systems quietly condition professionals to accept risks they would otherwise reject. Baramati is not an exception. It is a symptom.
Baramati airstrip is, by design and certification, a training and general aviation facility. It was never built or equipped to handle high-frequency VIP jet operations in marginal weather. It has no instrument landing system, no precision approach lighting, no certified air traffic control, no radar coverage, and no dedicated meteorological support. These are not optional upgrades. They are the very tools that create safety margins when visibility drops or conditions deteriorate. Treating such a strip as a routine destination for politically important flights is not flexibility. It is institutional complacency.
The moment a VIP aircraft is planned into such an airstrip, the risk calculus changes. Rally schedules, political optics, security convoys, and public expectations all begin to exert pressure long before the aircraft even descends. This pressure is rarely explicit. No one needs to say “you must land.” The expectation of arrival is enough. Diversion, though operationally safer, becomes politically inconvenient. That imbalance is where safety margins begin to erode.
This is where aviation psychology becomes critical. After one go-around in marginal conditions, best practice strongly favours diversion to a better-equipped airport. Yet history shows that pilots often press on instead. This is known as continuation bias or destination fixation. The aircraft is already close. Fuel is sufficient. The runway is momentarily visible. The crew convinces itself that conditions are just about acceptable. In such moments, the decision does not feel reckless. It feels defensible. That is precisely why it is dangerous.
Marginal visibility becomes easier to rationalise when supported by loose terminology. Phrases like “visual meteorological conditions,” “runway in sight,” and “pilot discretion” are stretched beyond their intent. A fleeting glimpse of the runway environment is treated as confirmation. In reality, safe visual operations require stable, continuous visual reference, especially at airfields with no instrument backup. Momentary visibility is not safety. It is temptation.
What stands out in incidents like this is not just what happened, but what did not. There was no firm advisory to divert after the first unsuccessful approach. There was no hard stop imposed by the system. There was no insistence on disciplined communication or stabilised approach criteria. Aviation accidents often occur not because someone made a terrible decision, but because no one forcefully challenged a bad one.
The deeper issue is that Baramati is not alone. Across India, several small airstrips routinely host VIP movements despite lacking the infrastructure required for safe jet operations in anything less than ideal conditions. Each successful landing reinforces the belief that the risk is manageable. Over time, abnormal becomes normal. Margins shrink quietly until one day they disappear altogether.
Blaming pilots alone is easy, but it is also lazy. Pilots operate within systems. When those systems reward arrival over caution and silence over resistance, individual judgment becomes compromised. The responsibility lies with aviation regulators who allow grey zones to persist, with political travel protocols that prioritise convenience over safety, and with a culture that treats diversion as failure rather than professionalism.
Aviation safety is built on margins. Remove the instruments, remove the authority, remove the discipline, and what remains is hope. Hope is not a safety strategy. When VIP operations routinely erase margins at inadequately equipped airstrips, accidents do not become shocking. They become inevitable.
