A brazen attack on air safety is underway — here’s what’s at stake

At the end of July, the National Transport Safety Council (NTSB) held a three -day general hearing to investigate the mid -air collision in January, DC, which killed 67 people. After the session, it was an inevitable conclusions.

First, the disaster should have been prevented through the current safety rules. Secondly, governmental organizers responsible for air safety have become reluctant to enforce these rules, especially when this means defending industry demands for more flights and lower costs.

Instead of repairing the institutional cheese of the regulatory state, the Trump administration moves to its undermining. The crisis in aviation safety has finally reached its head specifically at the moment when the wrong people are responsible for it.

There is an old axiom in flying: the blood regulations are written. There was a lot of it. Between 1960 and 1990, more than a thousand people died all over the world in commercial airlines every yearAlthough flying sizes were less than the tenth of what they are today. The pilots flew a lot. The safety of the cabin was ignored. Aircraft manufacturers are not known as basic material science. Pay innocent passengers price.

Since then, the new safety standards and the continuous improvement culture of fatal accidents have reduced 90 percent. The security belt bases prevent people from absorbing airlines in Alaska 1282 when a portion of the fuselage exploded in the middle of the air last year. The trained aircraft flight attendants evacuated passengers from aircraft that actively burn twice this year without one death (despite the fact that in both cases, some passengers stopped to recover their manual luggage). The pilots have avoided multiple collisions in the air and on the ground since January 1.

Success in safety lacks the scene: it depends less on the personal heroism than it is to follow the rules. But it works.

When the rules are ignored, the disaster follows. The NTSB investigation in the above accident found Reagan National has found a set of problems that no one disturbed. The basic safety equipment has not succeeded. The pilots were unclear about the appropriate procedure. Air traffic monitoring was described and overcame the size and complexity of traffic. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) allowed the movement of the helicopter to pass directly to the bottom of the aircraft to land in Reagan National, although this traffic scheme has led to thousands of calls nearby every year. The excuses were a lot, and the solutions are few.

Jennifer Humandi, NTSB president, Jennifer Humandi, shouted: “Sixty -seven people have died.” “Fix it. Do better.”

Her words are completely enveloped in flight safety today. There are a lot of critics, but a few of the problems of the problem. And as it asks the courage of courage, opposing the virtues of the post -director of the value of shareholders and freedom of companies.

Take the new FAA president, Brian Bidford, former CEO of Frontier Airlines and Republic Airways (and at a time TV star like his new president Sean Dove and his president Donald Trump). Although the public confidence in flying, it has already started an attack on the RFK JR. On the founding safety regulations just to make airlines more profitable.

During his confirmation, Bidford indicated that he was open to cancel two specific rules. The first requires a flight pilots to accumulate 1500 hours of experience before they can earn a Air Air Transport license (ATP). It was passed after Colgan Air 3407 in 2009, which was attributed to a pilot error due to insufficient training. The second is the compulsory age of 65 for pilots. This was set in 2007 to match international safety standards.

Under the Star “Just asking questions”, “arbitrary” standards are called and not supported by data. He also said that they contributed to the experimental deficiency, a claim that he had repeated nearly a decade.

It is wrong in advantages: multiple studies by academics and organizers have confirmed that “the preventive effect of flying experience” increases over time, and that most accidents occur before pilots reach 1100 hours of experience. On the contrary, the experimental performance begins to deteriorate tangible until after the age of 63, and pilots over the age of 65 years are at risk of “helpless events” that make the accident more likely 10,000 times.

But it is less concerned about the facts, which is about disrupting the labor market in ways it has never been able as Corporate CEO.

Under Bidford’s leadership, the reputation was notorious for the “inferior” wage structure. In 2016, the year in which the Federal Aviation Administration authorized a record number of new Airlines pilots, Republic faced a major problem in employing and keeping pilots to the point that it declared bankruptcy. In a competitive market, the Bidford strategy did not succeed.

But as a FAA official, Bedford can bend the market to its will. Removing watches will dump the market with new pilots who will get wages for beginners. Ironically, raising the retirement age will create cheap workers as well. Since other countries still have mandatory limits, pilots over 65 years old will not be able to fly on international roads. Instead, they can only accept low -wage domestic roads on smaller aircraft. Both junction will effectively create wage cuts at the level of industry through the organization-a preferred trick for the Trump administration.

It is not surprising that the pilots themselves oppose both proposals. Less than five percent of pilots support the minimum age, or completely remove it. Chelsea “Sole”, Solinberger, a pilot of “Miracle on Hudson”, bombed Bidford for his position at a base of 1500 hours for its safety.

“Bryan Bedford for Faa puts the integrity of our aviation safety system at a very danger,” he wrote in a post on Instagram. “Bidford indicated that he would reduce regulations and allow airlines to organize themselves. That’s crazy.”

Despite these objections, Bidford was confirmed by voting 53-43. This was the narrowest margin for any FAA official in history; Most officials, including his direct predecessor, Michael Whitaker, have been confirmed unanimously.

The airlines have taken his exciting setting as a sign that the “minimum” safety regulations can now be reduced to a minimum.

In June, US Airlines obtained approval to reduce employment levels in aviation facilities on some of its new 787-9 aircraft. The US -based airlines usually set a sufficient number of those present so that each one can cover one emergency exit in the event of evacuation. In this reduced scheme, one flight host will be responsible for each of the emergency exits at the back of the economic degree – a section of the plane that reaches 124 passengers.

Sarah Nelson, who represented 55,000 flying in 20 airlines as an international president of the CWA, said that the employment guidelines were identified half a century ago and has not been touched since then.

“We have an organizational agency that did not keep pace with the facts of the cabin.” freedom. “Seats are closer together, more people on board the plane more than ever, and more complications in the cabin.”

Air flight attendants should also perform a wide range of emergency duties, from using fibrillation to monitor potential security threats. As the first respondents to fly, it is extended to the capacity as it is. Reducing its levels below minimal will make almost impossible to perform their functions.

Ultimately, Nelson is not only about one plane type. It is about a precedent. Historically, as soon as a major airline reduces employees, Wall Street demands that others follow his example in order to reduce costs. If the entire industry follows the progress of Americans, it will be the clearest indication so far that those in power are more interested in the datir margins than they do about the safety of passengers.

To be clear, perhaps the organizational decline will not cause more planes from the sky. But it will create real risks.

These risks such as Aeroflot 1492 may appear in 2019, as the slower evacuation of the expected 41 deaths. Or it may seem like an unorganized and late reaction to India Airlines’ disruption 171 of the severe aviation organizer in India, which allowed the theories of misinformation and conspiracy. Or it may seem to be the high levels of exhaustion between pilots, flight attendants and air traffic monitors who must replace the individual effort of hollow institutions that no longer support them.

In short, the attack on the regulations will reduce the safety margin everywhere, and the erosion of confidence in air travel – all of this in order to leave the industry its margins.

Nelson says this is ready to give up safety standards in the name of profits is wrong for flying.

“It is constant pressure and a downward cycle. It is shocking, but it is not surprising.”