A light training aircraft was damaged while landing at Ratmalana Airport on Tuesday, temporarily closing the runway. The pilot escaped unharmed.
The aircraft was a Cessna 152 belonging to a flight training school that operates out of Ratmalana, Ada Derana reported. Daily Mirror said it was being flown by a trainee pilot and that the accident followed a hard landing.
The pilot walked away without injury, according to Daily Mirror, but the aircraft itself sustained damage and came to rest obstructing the runway. Ratmalana Airport’s runway was blocked as a result, and clearance operations were under way on Tuesday afternoon to remove the aircraft and return the airport to normal operations.
What has not been said
Neither outlet reported the registration of the aircraft, the name of the training school, the pilot’s identity, or how long the runway would remain out of service. No cause has been given beyond the description of a hard landing, and no outlet has reported whether the Civil Aviation Authority of Sri Lanka has opened an investigation — the standard step after an accident involving a registered aircraft.
Daily Mirror filed its report at 2.18 p.m., with Ada Derana following at about 4.29 p.m. As of Tuesday evening, no other verified Sri Lankan newsroom had published its own report of the accident.
Ratmalana’s role
Ratmalana, in the southern suburbs of Colombo, is the country’s main general-aviation and flight-training base and also handles domestic scheduled services. Because it operates a single runway, an obstruction closes the airfield outright rather than diverting traffic to a parallel strip.
The accident comes as the Civil Aviation Authority of Sri Lanka changes hands: Ranjith Rajasinghe, named chairman last week, assumed duties on Tuesday.
