FAA Inspectors Become Whistleblowers

FAA Inspectors:  Southwest Tried to Hide Safety ProblemsFrom Drew Griffin and Scott Bronstein
CNN Special Investigations Unit (CNN) – Southwest Airlines tried to keep serious problems with its maintenance program hidden and pressured the Federal Aviation Administration to keep out an inspector who noticed the problems, according to two FAA inspectors who blew the whistle on the airline.The FAA is seeking a $10.2 million penalty against Southwest Airlines, one of the nation’s busiest airlines.Bobby Boutris and Douglas Peters told CNN Wednesday they brought information about Southwest’s lack of compliance with mandatory inspection protocols to their supervisors, but the FAA did nothing. Boutris said the airline tried to have him removed from the inspections.“My supervisor called me into his office … and told me he had had a meeting with the director of quality assurance and the AD [airworthiness directive] compliance leader from Southwest Airlines, and he had requested my removal from the inspection,” Boutris said. Linda Rutherford, Southwest’s public relations vice president, wouldn’t comment on the inspectors’ allegations, noting that company Chairman Herb Kelleher and CEO Gary Kelly would be testifying Thursday before a House panel convened to look into the issue.“Out of respect for the congressional hearing process, we will present testimony there, both oral and in writing, that addresses many of the questions being asked,” she said. “Out of respect for the committee hearing process, we need to let those questions wait for the committee.”Don’t MissFAA takes risks with shoddy oversight, experts say FAA: Airlines 99% compliant on ‘air-worthiness’ FAA looking to see if airlines made safety repairs Southwest resumes normal operations CNN was unable to reach the FAA for a comment Wednesday night, but earlier in the day, acting administrator Robert Sturgell would not discuss specifics of the Southwest matter.“We had a breakdown in the system with Southwest Airlines. It was a two-way breakdown,” Sturgell said, without elaborating.Boutris and Peters, along with representatives from the FAA, are also scheduled to testify at Thursday’s House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, which conducted an investigation after the two inspectors brought forward their concerns. Peters said he doubted anything would have changed if he and Boutris had not spoken up.“Bobby and I were not happy with the state of Southwest Airlines’ maintenance program,” Peters told CNN Wednesday. “We weren’t happy. And we saw the airline was at risk due to the lax oversight. And because of this, we just weren’t willing to accept anything other than sweeping change.” Watch Boutris ask: Why didn’t FAA ground Southwest planes? »In early March, CNN obtained documents from the House committee investigation that alleged the discount airline kept dozens of aircraft in the air without mandatory inspections — and in some cases, with defects the inspections were designed to detect.Boutris and Peters said FAA managers knew the Southwest planes were flying illegally and did nothing about it, according to the documents.The inspectors wrote that Southwest, which carried more passengers in the United States last year than any other airline, flew at least 70 planes without a mandatory inspection on the rudder unit, part of the steering mechanism, some of them as much as 30 months beyond the mandatory rudder inspection.The airline also flew at least 47 planes beyond a mandatory inspection of the fuselage, or skin, of the planes for possible cracks, the inspectors said. When the inspections were carried out, six of the planes were found to have possibly dangerous cracks, they said.Speaking with CNN Wednesday, Boutris questioned why the airline did not immediately ground those 47 planes when they learned they were out of compliance.“It is sad that an FAA inspector has to become a whistle blower in order to do his job,” Boutris told CNN. “And the job is — that we were hired by the taxpayers — to ensure the airlines provide safe transportation for the flying public. It shouldn’t have to come to this.”Boutris and Peters are seeking protection via the federal whistle blower protection program.After the initial revelations, the FAA proposed a $10.2 million fine — its biggest ever against an airline — against Southwest for flying Boeing 737s without mandatory checks for fuselage cracking. Later, the agency ordered its inspectors to ensure airlines were complying with 10 airworthiness directives — orders to check or correct a known unsafe condition — and to expand the review to include more directives thereafter.Sturgell, speaking at a news conference Wednesday, said the audit showed 99 percent compliance with federal airworthiness directives. There is room for improvement, said Sturgell, adding he is proposing several initiatives to strengthen the reporting role and regulatory process.The new reporting system is to be in place by April 30, he said. All About Federal Aviation Administration • Southwest Airlines Inc.

Pilots Say Cockpit Dangers Being Ignored

Pilots:  Cockpit Dangers Being IgnoredBy Drew Griffin and Kathleen Johnston
CNN Special Investigations UnitFORT WORTH, Texas (CNN) — Regulators have largely ignored a series of dangerous incidents in which cockpit windshields in commercial airliners shattered in midflight, sometimes forcing emergency landings, according to an American Airlines pilots’ group.A pilot who spoke to CNN said the cockpit window on his plane two years ago “shattered like a spider web.”Since 2004, at least 10 windshields have had problems on Boeing 757s, mostly the result of wiring problems with windshield heaters that cause smoke to fill the cockpit and sometimes make those windshields crack, according to the National Transportation Safety Board. Four incidents have been on American Airlines planes, the NTSB says.An American Airlines flight from San Juan, Puerto Rico, to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, made an emergency landing January 30 after the cockpit filled with smoke. The inner pane of the co-pilot’s window shattered as the plane came in to land in Palm Beach, Florida. One of the crewmembers was injured by glass, and six passengers were treated for smoke inhalation.Another pilot said he had a similar experience on a 757 more than two years ago but did not want to be identified for fear of retaliation. Watch a report on the pilots’ claims »“Our entire windshield shattered like a spider web, and at that point in time, my other pilot and I donned our smoke goggles and oxygen masks for fear that the pane on the window was going to fail,” he said.Members of the Allied Pilots Association, which represents American Airlines pilots, say the company and the FAA have known for four years of this problem and done nothing.“In 2004, there were two 757 incidents,” said Todd Wissing, a pilot and APA safety committee member. “The NTSB investigated and made safety recommendations to the FAA.”But he said those recommendations were not acted upon, and he charged that safety lapses are occurring because the FAA is too close to the airlines.“We depend on the FAA to have oversight of our company’s operation and, in fact, the whole operation,” he said.“And we’re disappointed when we see evidence that they haven’t.”Shattered WindowsAnderson Cooper explores all the angles
Tonight, 10 ET see full schedule » The evidence they point to is a February 1 e-mail from an American Airlines executive saying the January incident was the first he knew of involving an “internal window pane failure.” Read the whole e-mail »“We should gather the FACTS of how many failures we had and in how many flights very quickly to counter the NTSB and give us and the FAA some ammo to counter this,” Robert W. Reding, executive vice-president of operations at American, wrote in the e-mail in response to an alert by then-spokesman John Hotard entitled “PBI incident to be NTSB poster child.”But American Airlines spokesman Tim Wagner said the e-mail simply meant: “Let’s get our facts together. We [American] believe this way and it appears the FAA believes this way too.”Wagner said the union is complaining publicly because it is in contract negotiations. The pilots say that safety should come first and that any repairs would probably be costly, so there is no financial incentive for them to blow the whistle.He said it is still unclear whether windshield incidents before the January Palm Beach emergency were caused by the same problem with the windshield heater.Don’t MissNTSB: Safety recommendations Air marshals missing from most flights Records: Southwest Airlines flew ‘unsafe’ planes “American is intent on providing information to ensure that the precise cause of the incident, which may differ from other similar events on other 757s, can be addressed and remedied appropriately. When the FAA has determined a remedy, we will comply with its directive.”The FAA, only now, has issued a proposed airworthiness directive for inspection and corrections to windshield heaters, not just on 757s but also on Boeing 767s and 777s.“We will work with the manufacturer to provide a solution for operators, if the existing solution is not adequate,” the FAA said in a statement to CNN.But the FAA did not address why it has taken this long to address the problem since Boeing flagged it as an issue as early as 2004, the first time the NTSB also took notice.A safety recommendation sent by the NTSB to the FAA in September gives details of the problems, many linked to the wiring of the windshield heaters. The recommendation also mentions promises by Boeing to send out service bulletins and pledges by the FAA to make the Boeing suggestions mandatory.But NTSB Chairman Mark Rosenker wrote, “The Safety Board is very concerned that the [directives] originally scheduled to be issued as early as September 2004 still have not been issued. The Board considers any kind of fire and/or smoke in the cockpit to be a serious issue that could affect other aircraft systems, lead to a loss of visibility, provide a distraction, or incapacitate the crew and possibly lead to an accident.”Boeing said it was looking in to the matter. “It sounds like a maintenance item,” a spokeswoman said. Efforts by CNN to get additional clarity on Boeing’s statement were unsuccessful.Critics in Congress have claimed that the FAA is too cozy with the industry and too confrontational with the NTSB.The latest concerns about planes follow a CNN report last month that an FAA supervisor allowed Southwest Airlines to postpone required safety inspections. After that report, Rep. James Oberstar, D-Minnesota, questioned whether FAA had changed from a watchdog to a lapdog.He said there was “a pendulum swing away from vigorous enforcement of regulatory compliance, toward a carrier-friendly, cozy relationship with the airlines.”Oberstar is holding a hearing on FAA oversight Thursday. CNN’s Todd Schwarzschild contributed to this report.All About American Airlines Inc. • Air Travel • Federal Aviation Administration • U.S. National Transportation Safety Board

FAA Claims Airlines 99% Compliant on “Air-Worthiness”

 WASHINGTON (CNN) – The first phase of an audit by the Federal Aviation Administration shows that airlines are 99 percent compliant with mandatory air-worthiness directives, the agency’s acting administrator said Wednesday. The FAA is seeking a $10.2 million penalty against Southwest Airlines, one of the nation’s busiest airlines.Four U.S. airlines are under investigation for failing to comply with federal aviation regulations, Robert Sturgell said. “The special audit that began March 13 showed us that the system we have in place is effective,” he said at Reagan National Airport.Sturgell noted, however, that improvements could be made, and said he is proposing several initiatives to strengthen the reporting role and regulatory process.The audit began after the air safety watchdog ordered its inspectors to reconfirm that airlines are complying with U.S. regulations in the wake of revelations that Southwest Airlines continued to fly more than 100 aircraft without certain mandatory inspections. “We had a breakdown in the system with Southwest Airlines. It was a two-way breakdown,” Sturgell said without elaborating.Sturgell spoke on the eve of a congressional hearing looking into the Southwest revelations. He and representatives from Southwest will testify at the hearing, along with two FAA inspectors who made the initial allegations and said that the agency was aware of the problems.Don’t MissFAA takes risks with shoddy oversight, experts say FAA looking to see if airlines made safety repairs Southwest resumes normal operations Southwest grounds 44 planes FAA inspectors: Southwest tried to hide safety problems Every year, the FAA issues about 250 air-worthiness directives on more than 83 airplane and engine models, requiring airlines to correct potential safety problems, according to the agency’s Web site. According to Sturgell, inspectors examined almost 2,400 directives in the first phase of the audit, including those addressing maintenance programs, and found a rate of compliance of about 99 percent. That makes this the “safest period in aviation history,” he asserted. The other 1 percent involved record-keeping errors and seven instances with four airlines in which compliance could not be established. He didn’t list the airlines, saying the incidents are under investigation.The audit, which involves 117 carriers, has been focusing on improving communications and tracking mechanisms, Sturgell said. Among the improvements is a safety issues reporting system that will give inspectors and employees a “new avenue” for raising safety concerns, he said. The system will be in addition to the hot lines that allow administrators and employees voice complaints anonymously.The new reporting system is to be in place by April 30, he said.Nicholas Sabatini, the FAA’s associate administrator for aviation safety, said the agency’s inspectors found 34 discrepancies during phase one of the audit. Of those, 27 were resolved, and work is under way to resolve the others, he said.  All About Federal Aviation Administration • Southwest Airlines Inc.