Air Safety Measure Opens Concerns

The nation's air traffic control technology will move from the World War II era into the 21st century within a few years, making it safer to fly and making flights more profitable for airlines.

But some people worry that pilots are becoming too dependent on satellites and in-flight gadgets and that the cost of outfitting planes could drive some fliers out of cockpits altogether.

"The change is motivated more by economics than by safety," said former National Transportation Safety Board Chairman Jim Hall, who oversaw the investigation of the 1994 crash of USAir Flight 427 in Hopewell. "Safety needs to be the primary driver."

The Federal Aviation Administration's commitment to switch by 2020 from ground radar and navigational guides to a satellite-based system will require all planes in controlled airspace to have GPS receivers, radios, antennas and multifunction displays that can receive and display traffic and weather information. That satellite-based global positioning system is called ADS-B, for Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast.

The system "provides greater efficiency and improved situational awareness for aircraft operating in the national airspace system. It allows pilots and controllers to see the same aircraft position information, which enhances the safety of the overall operation," an FAA spokesperson said.

The spokesperson said the agency is "working to ensure manufacturers bring suitable equipment to the marketplace when it's needed, and that any required upgrades are available at a reasonable cost."

The system would allow planes to fly more direct routes, saving time and costly fuel, and enable more planes to fly closer together.

Mike Voss, executive director of the Alexandria, Va.-based Flight Safety Foundation, said the amount of automated flying increased with the aviation industry's pursuit of reduced separation between planes -- which could increase the number of planes in the sky, boost revenue and reduce delays.

As a result, pilots are becoming less skilled, Voss said. The switch to a satellite-based control system could magnify the problem.

"We could be further reducing the time that the pilot can experience hand-flying the aircraft," he said. "The good news is, we know it. We have to fix this issue with some urgency."

A recent report suggested many pilots already rely too heavily on automated flight controls. The Associated Press reported that although fatal airline crashes decreased dramatically during the past decade, pilots had trouble flying planes or made mistakes with automated flight controls in more than 60 percent of accidents.

Opportunities for airline pilots to maintain proficiency by manually flying planes are increasingly limited, an FAA committee warned. Airlines and regulators discourage or even prohibit pilots from turning off autopilot, the committee said.

Chris Dancy, spokesman for the Maryland-based nonprofit Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, estimates equipment in smaller private planes would run $8,000 or more, on average, if installed today.

"It's enough to make an aircraft owner gulp," Dancy said.

There are ways to spread the cost around.

"I can see where it might be a burden for an individual who owns a plane, but we have 29 people to share the costs," said Gene Whited, president of the ABC Flying Club at Allegheny County Airport in West Mifflin. The club's three shared planes have GPS devices, but lack multifunction displays.

Dan Haggerty, director of maintenance for the 44-member Beaver Valley Flying Club, said most general aviation pilots have GPS devices in their planes or bring portable ones.

"It is such a glorious piece of equipment for navigation," Haggerty said.

Dancy agrees the radar-based system is outdated and needs to be replaced, but wonders, "Will it drive some pilots out of flying? Possibly, even probably, but I can't say to what extent."

The nation's more than 220,000 general aviation aircraft fly more than 20 million hours a year, according to FAA data. The agency forecasts that commercial traffic will grow, from about 787 million passengers to more than 1.2 billion in 2030.