What Will EASA do?

IF the European Aviation Safety Agency is going to uphold its own mission “to promote the highest common standards of safety and environmental protection in civil aviation,” it must take strong action when it receives the French Accident Investigators first results.

There’s so much speculation out there regarding what this account will be that it just seems better to wait and see what it says before second-guessing it. Regardless of the details, you know the report is going to talk about 1. lightning and weather 2. pitot tubes; they may also talk about computer issues, composites and the stabilizer/tail fin/rudder also. I doubt they’ll tackle Airbus’s fly-by-wire technology.

The only thing I don’t understand is why Airbus 330’s have not already been grounded pending the results of the investigation. With several recorded incidents of Airbus 330’s suffering near-disasterous incidents and generating data similar to what was received from the AF447 flight, it makes more sense to ground these planes now before another accident occurs. Why are they letting people fly around in a plane that is an accident waiting to happen?

Or are paying passengers the world over just guinea pigs for Airbus to test their craft on until they get it right?

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    Bird Strike Database

    George’s Point of View

    The Federal Aviation Administration had proposed a rule that would have barred bird-strike reports from public release, but in spite of some bumps in the road, the US is opening its “bird strike” database, and the public is going to have access to this database, except for a few personal (privacy) details which will be redacted. There was some initial fear that transparency of the database would deter reportage.

    The NTSB made this announcement. Reports that the database will be available to the public as of friday are all over aviation websites.

    After the notorious Hudson River bird strike, I wonder how passengers are going to respond to the disclosure of this database that has thousands of bird strike reports–

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  • Aviation’s New Ride-Em Cowboy Poster-Child

    George’s Point of View

    Americans are always looking for new anti-heroes, and Steven Slater has slipped into that role for a number of groups, especially those who have to deal with a surly public, who always have to be polite for the sake of their jobs and bite back their equally surly response.

    With the job shortage being what it is, people are feeling the weight of their bills and putting up with their need to take this job and shove it–

    But in a more specific sense, he also stands as a symbol of problems in the aviation industry, inside and out. Air travel means discomfort, the bother, the fuss, and a hundred goading needling annoyances: the rude attendant or passenger, hot plane, lost luggage, uncomfortable airline seat, on top of putting up with being too hot, too cold, too miserable. Steven Slater has a whole world of people out there who applaud him for not being “too polite.”

    Slater is one cowboy who would have never had his ten seconds of fame if Jet Blue had provided what every cowboy needs: a side kick. Where was the in-house support? While you’re on that plane, what an airline attendant says is law. (Just ask the Feds.) If the machine had been working properly, it would be that unruly passenger who would be behind bars. Whoever should have been backing up Slater, wasn’t. Instead of one lone cowboy taking it on the chin, Jet Blue needs to step forward and take care of their own.

    When Steven Slater decided he just wasn’t going to take it any more, and slid off the Jet Blue plane with a couple of beers, he became the poster child for dissatisfied people everywhere, who suddenly put themselves in his rebellious shoes and liked the feeling.

    What is more American than the pursuit of happiness?

    After all, we’re all cowboys.

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    A 380-Just a note

    George’s Point of View

    Airbus wants to do the impossible. Always pushing aviation physics to be bigger than we thought it was possible to be.

    There’s a whole lot of buzz about Airbus’s superjumbo elephantine double-decker, wide-body, four-engine jets with seating for up to 853 people. The families who have lost loved ones at sea–especially those in the recent Airbus flight 447 and the Comoros crash–must feel crushed when they hear about expensive Airbus efforts to make their already huge aircraft series break more size records.

    Maybe Airbus should stop trying to be the biggest plane on the block, and work a little harder on safety. If they were as safe as they are big, there would be 380 families not in mourning today. Yes, 380. Here’s the biggest irony.

    There were 152 fatalities in the Airbus crash in the Comoros. There were 228 fatalities in AF 477. Does anyone else find it macabre and frightening that that adds up to 380? I’m not a numerologist, but that’s awfully disturbing–

    Airbus needs to rethink their entire aviation philosopy, stop making these monstrous death traps, go back to the drawing board, and correct the defects of the planes they already have in service.

    If they had done so already, there would be at least 380 mothers, fathers, and children still alive.

    Or they should be responsible, and ask that their planes be grounded until they are made safe.

    Airbus needs to stop throwing money at air shows, and start compensating the families of those that have died or been injured due to design flaws of Airbus planes.

    Yes, even the much vaunted new jet has niggling problems surfacing all of the time, but the flaws in the Airbus 380 skywhale behemoth are being downplayed by the powers that be.

    Issues have been found with all of these systems:

    • a braking system fault
    • a plethora of system nuisance warnings based on alleged over-sensitivity
    • weight growth during development
    • fuel tank indication
    • nose wheel steering

    This is just what has come to light so far.

    Please, let’s go back to the drawing board Airbus, for the sake of your human family. There is nothing, nothing, nothing you can do to bring joy back to 380 families who remain wounded, broken, with holes in their lives that can never be filled, lives that have been deformed by damage that can not be undone. Airbus, you want to do the impossible, be ever bigger. How about doing something in the realm of the possible? Let your heart be big. Step up to the plate, and compensate the grieving, who are suffering from lives lost in Airbus planes. This is beyond the physics of aviation and above the laws of man. It’s the right thing to do.

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    Slovakia Plants Explosive on Dublin-bound Flight


    Click to view full size photo at Airliners.net
    Contact photographer Diego Ruiz De Vargas

    What: Danube Wings Boeing 737-400 en route from Poprad/Tatry Slovakia to Dublin
    Where: The entire flight
    When: Jan 2nd 2010
    Who: Number aboard not released
    Why: A Slovakian agency decided to test their security by slipping 9 packages of explosives into innocent passengers’ luggage. Eight of those packages were found.

    George’s Point of View

    ONE of those packages—85 grams of RDX plastic explosive— made it all the way to the innocent Slovakian-Irish passenger’s HOUSE, where suddenly Irish forces evacuate their entire neighborhood (reportedly evacuating several apartment buildings and shutting down a couple of intersections) to retrieve that one package of live explosive from his apartment on Dorset Street. Stefan Gonda, a 49-year-old Slovak electrician working in Ireland, must have been really surprised at that knock on the door. On the other hand, maybe not, since he’s from Slovakia and may be used to such thoughtless, stupid, ridiculous, dangerous, psychotic behavior from his government.

    How do they justify endangering a plane full of innocent passengers on a commercial jet? RDX is considered unstable–it can light without a detonator. What if there had been turbulence? What if the temperature had dropped to make the compound even more unstable?

    One head has already rolled for this. The head of the Slovak border and foreign police Tibor Mako resigned. Was he the one responsible or did he throw himself on his sword? Is there more to this?

    I find it difficult to believe that anyone would use real passengers as guinea pigs, put real explosives on an actual international flight. If Ireland has a legal chip on its shoulder the same way the US does, there’d be an International lawsuit pending.

    The Slovokian ministry claims no one was endangered.

    Excuse me?

    85 grams of RDX plastic explosive aboard a plane. Irish forces evacuated the neighborhood to retrieve it…but hey, on a volatile oxygen pumped package like an airplane, no problem.

    It’s hard to believe they call that branch of government “intelligence.” Talk about an oxymoron.

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  • Putting Aviation Out of Biz, Breaking the Camels Back: Walk Softly and Build a Massive Deficit

    We don’t usually talk about politics here, but it is hard to completely ignore Obama’s proposal to eliminate a tax break for business-jet owners. (The proposal extends the tax-depreciation schedule for business jets to seven years from five years.) I am not anti-Obama, at all, but it is what it is.

    We believe the consequences of that tax break will not make much money for the government, but it will have repercussions in the aviation industry. Catch phrases have cropped up, terms like “demonizing private aviation” and “engaging in class warfare.” Obama does not seem to be aware of that (to use an old catch-phrase) “trickle down” economics. The tax break is incentive for corporations and private owners to purchase new jets. The proposal does attack aviation, which * employs 1.2 million people and generate $150 billion in economic activity.

    How can a depreciation allowance for private jets prevent the rich from paying enough taxes to finance government child safety programs? Where is the logic behind the theory? It is obvious if you look at the results: what is actually involved is a politician courting public opinion, because the majority of Americans can’t afford jets, and will gladly agree to a tax on rich folks, i.e. them. Most Americans aren’t going to take a long view of how a tax will affect an entire industry. They’re just relieved that there are taxes coming out of some other guy’s pocket.

    But the tax will affect an entire industry, those 1.2 million people working in aviation, building planes and buying them. Those unbought private jets don’t get built, don’t get sold, don’t get flown, don’t get maintained, don’t get stored in aviation hangers. That means a lot of jobs for a lot of pilots, a lot of small charter lines, mechanics and support crews.

    With tax proposals like this one, one wonders if Obama’s long range goal is gunning for the aviation industry to look like Detroit after the exodus of the automotive industry.

    How can business owners stay in business and create jobs when the government is steadily chipping away at the foundations of business?

    *Statistics according to General Aviation Manufacturers The General Aviation Manufacturers Association represents over 65 of the world’s leading manufacturers of fixed-wing general aviation airplanes, engines, avionics, and components. In addition to building nearly all of the general aviation airplanes flying today, GAMA member companies also operate aircraft fleets, airport fixed-based operations, pilot training, and maintenance facilities worldwide

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  • FAA: The New Iceberg

    George’s Point of View

    There’s a lot that is said in the world about gatekeepers. If you haven’t heard about them, you’ve run into them. They’re the low level filter that keeps the riff raff out, in positions that look plebeian but which wield far more authority than their level on the hierarchy would suggest. That’s the guy at the door who won’t let you in. If you’re hitting the trendy night spot, he’s the one whose thumbs up — or thumbs down–decides your fate. It’s the secretary that let’s your call go through. It’s the one at the ticket office who lets you in on the really good seats to the fight. Those are the gatekeepers you see.

    The ones to watch out for, though, are higher on the feeding chain. They’re the ones who appoint the gatekeepers. Usually they have some kind of agenda, but you’re not going to see them, or their agendas, because the main thing about them is that they’re the part of the iceberg that you don’t see. They’re very good at staying underground, until something comes along like the Titanic.

    So picture this:

    Your job is inspecting planes. You’re sort of the gatekeeper for the plane. IF you say yes, it flies, then, well…it flies. If you say no, the plane goes back to the drawing board. Your whole purpose is to be discriminating–to keep out the riff raff. You keep the “plane” bakers from serving the planes before they’re “done.” You catch what problems there be, so there won’t be a disaster down the road. Imagine if you report a problem with a plane, and instead of getting commendations from the powers that be for your superlative discernment, you get shunted off to a desk, and the powers that be rule in favor of the airline. And then a year later, the plane you had issues with causes a disaster which you may have been able to prevent.

    This is all under investigation, and it may all be smoke and mirrors and finger pointing.

    It may be something more.

    I’m talking about inspector Christopher J. Monteleon whose story is in the New York Times.

    Monteleon got moved to a desk for doing his job. The situation seems to have been the catalyst for a whole lot of professional trouble for him. What if someone had paid attention to his concerns? Would the Bombardier Dash 8 Q400 been given more refinements? Would changes have been made that could have made it safer?

    Then, Monteleon complained that the Office of Runway Safety “was using skewed methodology to understate the severity of safety concerns.” He wasn’t monitoring a flight that was subjected to dangerous icing that was being flown by a poorly trained and exhausted pilot. But maybe his is the kind of eye that would have made someone somewhere insert an extra page in the manual to cover the situation that would have saved 49 lives.

    Maybe his contribution would have made no difference at all to the tragic Colgan/Buffalo NY flight.

    But I’m looking past Monteleon and this particular incident to the bigger picture. I’m looking at his superiors who for some reason discounted the advice of their own expert. His bosses may not have liked the squeaky wheel, but his JOB was to do the squeaking. Apparently they wanted him to shut up, and stop getting in the way of the airline business. Apparently someone in the FAA forgot that the FAA does not work FOR the airlines. Their directive is to regulate civil aviation to promote safety–NOT commerce.

    I am wondering if there is a part of the FAA iceberg that needs to be brought into the light. I suspect that Mr. Monteleon agrees with me.

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