As Federal Aviation Administration Comes Under Fire, the Organization Inappropriately Deflects Scrutiny to Airline Safety
WASHINGTON, April 11 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Aviation expert Darryl Jenkins issued the following statement today:
The news of this week's grounding of hundreds of MD80 aircraft has everyone from aviation executives to stranded passengers to lawmakers debating the balance between safety-of-flight issues and an agency that's suddenly determined to look tough in the wake of a string of embarrassing gaffes.
What should be scrutinized is the Federal Aviation Administration's lack of organization and obvious back-peddling in the last month to avoid government-directed housekeeping of airline regulators. Breakdowns between airlines and the FAA in the last month indicate the organization has no firm directive of how best to regulate the industry. While the FAA should not be treating airlines as their customers, as seen in the current case with Southwest Airlines, there needs to be collaboration between the FAA and airlines to ensure the utmost safety standards for passengers and crew.
The thousands of customers inconvenienced this week are paying for the sins of the FAA and their mistakes in handling Southwest Airlines. American openly admitted that it focused only on the safety issue raised in the directive and not the precise, hyper-technical standards. But the FAA's unnecessary forced groundings of American's MD 80 fleet was a hammer-handed attempt to placate the officials in Congress that keep the FAA in business.
The fact that the FAA previously gave airlines up to 18 months to comply with the safety directive is a clear indication that this was not a threat to safety-of-flight and in no way required airlines to ground aircraft and displace thousands of customers. In addition, during the initial audit, airlines inspected were cleared in compliance with this directive by the FAA regulators -- a clear oversight of the FAA's regulators to pay close attention to the complicated and precise specifications of their own airworthiness directive.
Let's review the events in the last month that have led the industry to its current position:
March 6 -- the FAA comes under fire by the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee for its relationship with Southwest Airlines. Upon being called to court by Congress on this issue, the FAA immediately assessed Southwest with a
March 13 -- Upon the investigation and resulting Congressional hearing becoming public, the FAA instituted a March 26 audit of the 2006 directive related to the bundling of wires in the wheel wells of aircraft -- forcing American, Delta and United to ground planes to ensure compliance.
April 8 -- This week during the FAA hearings in Washington, D.C., policymakers have called the FAA relationship with Southwest Airlines "too cozy" and are further questioning those responsible for regulating airlines, including reassignments of personnel. The organization's response to this questioning resulted in a second public audit and forced grounding of American's entire MD 80 fleet and additional MD80 groundings with Delta, Alaska Air and Midwest Airlines.
Regulating the US Airline industry takes an orderly and methodical approach given the vast number of flights and customers transported each day. This recent pattern of behavior makes it clear the FAA needs to reorganize how it regulates its own policies and procedures for working with the airlines. As for the financial impact to the industry, the FAA should be held accountable for the resulting cost to the airline industry and to hundreds of thousands of passengers inconvenienced in the latest failure to properly regulate the airlines.
About Darryl Jenkins:
Darryl Jenkins is one of the best-known authorities on aviation in Washington, D.C. He was a member of the Executive Committee of the White House Conference on Aviation Safety and Security. His expertise in reservations systems, revenue management, operations, safety management, air traffic control and aviation policy is widely regarded.
Darryl Jenkins has been involved in the airline travel business for 20 years, beginning as a travel agent in 1974. His background in aviation includes consulting work for a number of major airlines as well as extensive literary pursuits. He has authored several books on aviation including: "Managing Business Travel," "The Savvy Business Traveler," "Financial Distress in the Airline Industry," "Failed Partnership," and "The Handbook of Airline Economics."
SOURCE Darryl Jenkins
