Is 2009 is becoming a record year for Airplane/Airliner crashes?
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As 2009 has unfolded, we have read about several high-profile airline crashes, many of which resulted in fatalities and serious injuries. While accidents are nothing new, the combination of the Internet, the 24-hour news cycle and an insatiable desire by the media, and consumers, for front-page news has brought them to the public consciousness.
And the public is not the only one listening.
Federal Aviation Administration chief Randy Babbitt recently called for the need to “step up professionalism” in citing crashes that occurred due to preventable negligence. “The biggest factor I think for all of aviation is the need to step up professionalism in the workplace,” Mr. Babbitt said in prepared remarks. “It’s definitely there in the vast majority of the aviation workforce, but it’s not uniform throughout the industry.” 1
There are few professions where the consequences of lack of professionalism on human life are greater than with flying an airplane. Throw in bad weather, long commutes, inexperience, low wages, sleep deprivation and antiquated rules, and you have a recipe that is sure to produce some disasters.
That’s why Randy Babbitt has it right. Professionalism, in all aspects of a flight – from mechanics to air traffic control to pilots – is crucial to maintaining air travel’s excellent safety record and reputation.
This isn’t the first time that the air travel industry has needed to step up the accountability. In 1996, following two crashes that killed more than 300 people, a White House commission told the airline industry and its regulators to slice the domestic rate of fatal accidents 80 percent over 10 years. 2
In 2007, after cutting the domestic fatal accident rate by nearly 65%, former administrator of the FAA Marion C. Blakey proclaimed, “This is the golden age of safety, the safest period, in the safest mode, in the history of the world.” 2 To get to that point, adjustments were made, including to the alarm system that warned, too often falsely, of an imminent collision with a mountain; and changing the approach system at a major domestic airport.
It was put best by John Cox, an Air Line Pilots Association safety representative for 20 years, who told the New York Times in 2007: “It’s not one thing. It’s a series of small things.” Meaning the biggest changes weren’t rocket science, just small issues found in everyday operations, he said, which were corrected before an accident could occur. 2
In 2009 and beyond, the call for professionalism should be heeded by doing the little things right, and there are a few areas that can be looked at to bring the vast minority of aviation industry personnel up to snuff.
Checking the Weather
Could professionalism be as simple as checking the weather? Recent reports show that literally throwing caution into the wind is not the best policy.
Earlier this year, an ATR-72 turboprop plane carrying 68 passengers and four crew members slid off the runway at Koh Samui airport in Thailand. The aircraft slammed into an old air traffic control tower, killing Captain Chartchai Punsuwan while his co-pilot remains in a critical condition in hospital. Seven passengers were injured. According to early reports, the plane was attempting to land in a storm, and heavy rain and strong winds may have played a role in the accident. 3
It was just one of a string of weather-related airplane emergencies this year. Two people were hurt when a Detroit-bound Delta Air Lines plane was “hammered” with severe weather, a spokesman said, and was forced to land in Kentucky. And at least 28 passengers aboard Continental Flight 128 were injured as the plane flew from Rio de Janeiro to Houston. The flight made an emergency landing in Miami. 4
Between 1994 and 2003, there were 4,167 weather-related accidents, according to a report by the Federal Aviation Administration’s National Aviation Safety Data Analysis Center. Of those accidents, 1,717 show no record of a weather briefing. 5
If the weather is monitored than maybe fewer risks should be taken if a flight is potentially going to land during a thunderstorm.
Sleep Deprivation
In a National Transportation Safety Board safety study of US major carrier accidents involving flight crew from 1978 to 1990, one finding stated: “Half the captains for whom data were available had been awake for more than 12 hours prior to their accidents. Half the first officers had been awake for more than 11 hours.” 6
This may seem like a tired argument since the study’s last subjects were analyzed nearly 20 years ago. But consider that many of the current rules for pilots’ work schedules haven’t changed in nearly 50 years. 7
And commuter flight rules may need the most attention. Passengers probably have no awareness that the pilot and crew of their plane may be on their sixth flight of the day, and that before the first of those six flights, the pilots and crew weren’t tucked in a comfortable bed but packed into a dark “crash” house with several other commuter airline crew members trying to sneak in a couple hours of shut-eye. 8
There could be as many as 1,000 such houses in the United States in cities like Pittsburgh, Newark, Houston and Chicago. Joe Williams, a spokesman for Pinnacle Airlines, parent company of Manassas-based regional carrier Colgan Air, said that Pinnacle supports "the right of our pilots to live where they choose. . . . Some pilots choose crash pads, and some choose to move to the area where they are based." 8
Airplane crew members bemoan low pay as a reason for the need to use a crash house, and some industry people agree.
According to a Washington Post story, "The sad truth of this industry is that [air travel] has been and remains one of the great bargains for the consumer," said Bill Swelbar, a researcher at the International Center for Air Transportation at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "When adjusted for inflation over the last 30 years, fares are down some 50-plus percent. And that just does not make for a sustainable business model. It doesn't make a model that allows them to compensate their people well, like they have in the past." 8
Mr. Babbitt told the Wall Street Journal that "It's absolutely unsafe to think" that commuter cockpit crews can fly as many hours as long as pilots who may fly one long-range route during the same day. 9
The results of this sleep deprivation can be fatal. Studies show exhaustion can impair a pilot's judgment in much the same way alcohol does. Overtired pilots can focus on a conversation or a single chore and miss other things going on around them, including critical flight information. 7
Additionally, studies show that the average adult needs seven to eight hours of sleep to function at maximum capacity. Without this sleep, doctors say, accidents, depression, anxiety and cardiovascular problems can occur. 10
But there is hope on this point. An advisory committee on pilot fatigue delivered its recommendations to the Federal Aviation Administration in late summer, though the FAA asked for them not to be made public. Though to counter that point, it has been reported that since 2002, the National Transportation Safety Board has made 16 safety-related recommendations of the on-demand flight industry, but that the FAA has not implemented any of them. 11
Time will tell if this go-round will produce results.
Follow the rules
On Aug. 8, a small airplane and a tourist-carrying helicopter collided over the Hudson River in New York killing all nine people aboard both vessels.
On Sept. 16, it was reported that the mid-air crash could have and should have been prevented.
The pilot of the plane read back the wrong radio frequency to an air traffic controller but wasn’t corrected by the controller, a federal safety official said. The air traffic controllers tried to warn the plane’s pilot that he was approaching the helicopter but couldn’t reach him because they were on two different radio frequencies. 12
It was reported earlier that the air traffic controller was on the telephone at the time of the crash and that the controller’s supervisor also wasn’t in the building, as required, at the time of the Aug. 8 crash, the FAA said in a statement in mid-August. The FAA placed the employees on administrative leave. 13
In his remarks on professionalism, the FAA’s Mr. Babbitt cited specifically the February crash of a Pinnacle Airlines Corp. Colgan unit plane near Buffalo, N.Y., which killed 50 people, and a 2006 accident in Lexington involving Comair with 49 fatalities as examples of inexperienced pilots who didn't follow basic operating standards. The captain in the Colgan crash had failed three in-cockpit exams, called “check rides,” before he came to the airline. 14
“Whether you have a wrench in your hand, whether you sit at a yoke or carry a clipboard, wear a headset or work in the galley, I'm not seeing consistent professionalism," Mr. Babbitt said. 15
Merriam Webster defines a professional as someone who is “characterized by or conforming to the technical or ethical standards of a profession.” Which means something as basic as recognizing an incorrect code could have saved nine lives.
Risky Business
Even the most prepared pilots face risk when they take to the skies.
South Florida resident Bruce Barber was meticulous when it came to flying. His business partner, Eric Elliott, described him as “always ahead of the activity. Every possible piece of gear you could have on a plane, he had,'' including three GPS systems and a storm scope. 16
Another friend said of Mr. Barber: “He was a very safe pilot -- very cautious. If there was going to be bad weather, we left earlier or we didn't go. In the last six months, he got a new radar system. He was very fussy about that plane.'' 16
Yet on Sept. 20, flying his small personal aircraft, Mr. Barber, his wife, son and friend perished in a crash that still doesn’t have a cause.
The industry does have tools for helping pilots become more aware of For the 13th year in a row this fall, Bombardier’s safety seminar, Safety Standdown, challenged “pilots and crew to expand their understanding of the human factors involved in aviation accidents. Knowledge Ace refers to the concept of using the acquired information to minimize the possibility of human error,” said Rick Rowe, chief pilot of Learjet, in BART International magazine. “Knowledge-based training integrated with skill-based training is our greatest defense against error, bridging the gap between what the industry gets and what it needs. New for this year’s event were a Smart Pilot workshop and Mind and Body Wellness - a workshop examining cardiovascular risk factors among pilots and crew. 17
In the end, the responsibility to maintain professionalism will fall on many shoulders. Flight crews know their work schedules and it is ultimately their responsibility, like anybody with a job, to come to work ready to go. The FAA needs to put modern, relevant rules in place that jibe with what science and research has shown are the most tiring or non-tiring flights. The airlines have to make tough choices with an eye on their bottom lines of hiring more crews or risk over-taxing existing crews. And the passengers, ultimately, may face the choice of paying higher fares to fund the extra crews that may end up saving their lives.
Citations
1. www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601110&sid=ajzpzsoVMJfU
2. www.nytimes.com/2007/10/01/business/01safety.html
3. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8182962.stm
4. www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2009-08-04-turbulence_N.htm
5. www.asias.faa.gov/aviation_studies/weather_study/wbrief.html
6. http://aeromedical.org/Articles/Pilot_Fatigue.html
7. www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32648418/ns/travel-news/
8. www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/03/AR2009080302837.html
9. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124950069377208687.html
10. www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/03/04/sleep.stress.economy/index.html
11. http://mobile.wsvn.com/news/articles/national/MI129871/
12. www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5i7snJnN8kUVlX69sAmaPg4IPi6aQD9AOJVA02
13. www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=anrLkbMmv5qc
14. www.nytimes.com/2009/06/16/nyregion/16colgan.html
15. www.usatoday.com/travel/flights/2009-09-14-faa-buffalo-crash_N.htm
16. www.miamiherald.com/news/broward/story/1245084.html
17. www.bartintl.com/content/faa’s-randy-babbitt-ntsb-chairman-and-nbaa-president-slated-open-safety-standown