Air Navigation Service, Environment Ministry Clash

SakAeroNavigatsia, Georgia?s air traffic controller, said on August 24 that a stone mine near a key air radar site posed a major threat to its aoperation.

A mining company received a 10-year license for stone mining operations on the outskirts of Tbilisi from the Ministry of Environment last year.

?The operation of a mine here may aqlter the terrain which in turn may affect the radar,? Tamaz Kachliashvili, an official from SakAeroNavigatsia, said.

Chief of the air navigation service, Giorgi Karbelashvili, said ?the official who issued the license should be punished? for potentially adversely affecting the radar.

The Ministry of Environment, however, said that an MoE team had studied the area concerned but found nothing threatening to the radar.

?The closest [mining] point  is 100 meters away from the radar and there are points over 100 meters away from the radar; so as of today there is no threat to the air navigation system,? Giorgi Tskhakaia, chief of the licenses and permits unit at the Ministry of Environment, told reporters on August 24.

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