JUSTIN WASTNAGE / MAASTRICHT
Meeting with Eurocontrol this week could lead to establishment of combined bureau for Benelux nations and Germany
The Netherlands is to recommend the creation of a combined air accidents investigation authority with Belgium, Germany and Luxembourg at a meeting with Eurocontrol this week.
The four countries currently cede control of parts of their air traffic management (ATM) to the Eurocontrol upper area control centre in Maastricht, which is to provide each country's air accident investigators with detailed voice, air traffic control and radar analysis data from new systems.
Pieter van Vollenhoven, chairman of the Dutch transport safety board, is to suggest replacing Benelux and German national authorities in a review of future strategies this week with Victor Aguado, director general of Eurocontrol.
Van Vollenhoven says the European Commission is "planning to turn the spotlight on independent investigations this year" and is set to recommend the merging of smaller countries' agencies in a bid to eliminate repetition of routine investigations and to streamline operations.
"Germany and the Benelux countries should be the first to launch an integrated investigation bureau," he adds. Van Vollenhoven, who previously headed the military air accidents investigation office at the Netherlands air defence command at Zeist, is to present his plan for review by members of the European Transport Safety Council. The council is then expected to present its recommendations for an integrated accident reporting agency to the April meeting of the European Action Group for ATM Safety (AGAS), which was set up last September in the aftermath of the July mid-air collision in Germany (Flight International, 8-14 October 2002). AGAS says a major blockage in managing European ATM safety is the lack of consistent incident reporting across Europe.
Aguado says European nations need to "concentrate air traffic data in one place and learn from each other's accident experience so as to not repeat mistakes".
Other recommendations likely to be presented to the AGAS meeting include revised rules on the use of the traffic collision avoidance system and runway incursions.
Source: Flight International
