ATA-Oriented/One-Sided Story Contains Numerous Inaccuracies

News/Analysis By James Richard Campbell, ANN Editor-In-Chief

A Thursday morning USA Today/MSNBC story on funding for GA airports has ignited a firestorm of reactive indignation from GA persons, GA business industry leaders, and GA associations. Factually inaccurate/incomplete, at best, the poorly documented story seems deliberately aligned with ATA Uber-Boss James May's continuing attacks on the General Aviation industry... and indeed, only GA-opposed sources and quotes were used to paint a picture of a GA industry that has little public value, is populated by persons of privilege, and seems to suggest that the monies devoted to GA would be better served by using it on airline interests, instead.

Statements by AOPA staffers, to ANN, confirm that they did attempt to reach out to USA Today prior to the publication of this story, and ultimately conducted a 30 minute interview, though they were subsequently NOT quoted in the USA Today story and only minimally quoted in the ATA-heavy NBC piece.

Some see this as the first shot across the bow by ATA in their aggressive and continual attempts to pillage the GA industry by suggesting the redirecting of GA funding to airline interests by painting GA as wasteful, inconsequential, used by a priveleged few, and not deserving of the public funding it receives. In the meantime, this myopic position has been put forth by an industry that continues to display some of the most wasteful practices in the business community, and whose customer service rep has degraded to a point where most airline's concept of customer service is laughed off as, at best, abysmal. ATA has been lobbying the media heavily with inflammatory statements about their woes, and the evils of GA, and seems to be targeting media outlets that depend heavily on airline ad revenue to extend their propaganda throughout the general media sphere.

Sadly; this continued series of attacks finds little favor among the pilots, service personnel, and other aviation personnel who came up the aviation ranks via sport, general and business aviation and not only understand the value of non-airline aviation, but have personally been a part of the amazing ways that GA continues to impact the nation.

"Disgusting," is how one Airline Captain ranks the ATA's stand against GA in an email to ANN over the ATA statements quoted by USA Today. Other statements on the topic have used "colorful" language that we choose not to reproduce in this publication.

This appears to be the first salvo in the wave of attacks against GA by the ATA, under the direction of President Jim May (pictured above)... whose documented misdirection, inaccuracies, and false statements have plagued GA for a number of years. As the airline industry continues to see its fortunes subside, and problems mount, GA keeps on being targeted in an attempt to redirect public anger over bad service, out-of-control fees, late arrivals and departures and the growing number of stories that involve systemic incompetence or passengers held hostage on airliners seeking gate access or departure clearances. Also, since the airline industry seems no closer to resolving its many short-comings; industry pundits (including those of us at ANN) strongly suspect that the most recent attacks on GA are but the beginning of a renewed "CYA" exercise by ATA.

Stay tuned... we expect more on this topic... and soon.

FMI: www.gama.aero, www.airlines.org, www.usatoday.com/travel/flights/2009-09-17-little-used-airports_N.htm