Doesn't Name Airlines... But Headlines Tell The Story

Last week, FAA Acting Administrator Robert Sturgell noted the agency's massive audit of airline safety inspections and procedures found a 99 percent compliance rate with airworthiness directives among US airlines. Now, a bit more information on that remaining one percent has come to light.

The FAA is investigating four carriers the agency found lacking it their procedures to adhere to maintenance inspections, according to The Associated Press. Two of the unnamed airlines are under FAA microscopes regarding wire bundle inspections; one had not submitted a compliance plan; and the fourth failed to complete mandatory scheduled inspections.

Though the agency did not name the carriers outright, it isn't very difficult to connect the dots... as in recent weeks American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, United Airlines, and Southwest Airlines have taken various, much-publicized measures to correct maintenance shortcomings, often resulting in cancelled flights as planes were pulled from service to check compliance.

The FAA's sudden, apparently reinvigorated pursuit of airline safety came after two inspectors blew the whistle on the too-friendly relationship between FAA officials tasked to oversee maintenance compliance at Southwest Airlines, and that carrier's management. Minnesota Congressman James Oberstar, who has spearheaded Congressional hearings on the matter, termed that relationship "a culture of coziness," which apparently resulted in FAA inspectors allowing Southwest to skirt mandatory fuselage fatigue inspections on its older Boeing 737 models.

During hearings before Oberstar and the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, congressional investigator Clay Foushee said he was outraged by what he heard from former FAA inspectors Charalambe "Bobby" Boutris and Douglas Peters, who blew the whistle on the situation at Southwest.

"Those are the guys and girls who are qualified to see what is out there in the system," Foushee said, reports The Dallas Morning News. "And if they bring something back and it gets minimized or suppressed, and they try to take it to the higher-ups and they suffer professionally, that is an appalling situation."

Foushee credits the investigation at Southwest for placing pressure on the FAA to audit maintenance practices industrywide. Acting Administrator Robert Sturgell denies the congressional investigation played a role, and defended the agency's move toward analysis of data reported by the carriers to spot safety concerns.

FMI: www.faa.gov