NEW DELHI: An Air India pilot, aged about 37, died at Delhi Airport on Thursday.

The young commander was not operating a flight but was there as part of his training to transition for flying another aircraft type.

While pilots of some Indian carriers have cited very high fatigue due to gruelling rostering cycles, the AI pilot had resumed work after Diwali on Thursday.A senior DGCAofficial said: “Captain Himanil Kumar underwent his medical on August 23, 2023, and was declared fit, with his medical validity until August 30, 2024.Further there is no fatigue-related issue with regard to flying duties.

The pilot was undergoing his Boeing 777 full type transition ground technical course from October 3, 2023, converting from Airbus A320 type of aircraft.

He was on leave from Diwali onwards and resumed Thursday for his class, which had a planned B777 aircraft visit, hence was at T3.

All his past medical assessments were fine with no detected underlying medical conditions.”The pilot suffered a cardiac arrest.

CPR was given and he was rushed to a nearby private hospital but could not be saved.

Comments have been sought from AI and are awaited.Pilots of Indian carriers, especially the big ones, have been complaining of stress and fatigue which they blame on their “punishing” rostering that involves back-to-back night shifts and flights being allocated in a way that they are out of home base for days on end.

The DGCA has recently issued a draft of revised flight duty time limitation (FDTL) rules that tries to rein in airlines.

Whether the proposed change is enough remains to be seen.This August an IndiGo had pilot collapsed at a Nagpur Airport boarding gate as he was about to board an aircraft to fly it to Pune.

Just a day earlier, an ex-SpiceJet captain currently working for Qatar Airways had died while flying as a passenger from Delhi to Doha.The “incident report” for Thursday’s “medical emergency case” reads: “At about 11.35 am on November 16, 2023, Air India commander… age about 37 years felt by cardio arrest at level 3 Air India office where CPR was provided by co-staff and immediately shifted to Medanta medical centre where doctor (gave) CPR and first aid but till now he was in an unconscious condition.

Later declared died.