The Acting Chairman of the NTSB, Mark V. Rosenker, recently emphasized the importance of airline industry training.

"The safety of this industry is critical, and there is work to be done," said Acting Chairman Rosenker, at the 2006 World and Regional Airline Training Conference. 

"The government and industry must remain vigilant of the importance of good training in accident prevention."

In his speech, he stated that there have been numerous tragic major airline accidents throughout the years in which inadequate training in the areas of operations and maintenance was causal or contributory. Fortunately, major aviation accidents involving fatalities are becoming a rare event in the United States, but there is still much work to be done, both in this country and throughout the world.

Through its accident investigations, the Safety Board has become more aware that we are in an age when aircraft are getting larger, aircraft systems are getting more complex, and flight crews have been reduced by one-third. 

A fundamental tenant of any training program must be to ensure that flight crews master all normal, abnormal, and emergency aspects of flight operations. 

Rosenker noted that advances in technologies have created new challenges.  While advanced flight management systems training appears to take a bigger slice out of minimum training requirements, teaching and training basic airmanship skills must remain a core competency of the training curriculum.

"We need to always seek ways to make the aviation industry safer, whether through improvements in training curriculum or maintenance training devices, and by embracing new technology in the aviation training industry. 

The aviation industry is constantly pushing the envelope of technology, and we must make sure that we update our training requirements and approaches to keep up with the technology," Rosenker said. 

FMI: www.ntsb.gov