FAA today said 30 airlines failed to respond with written commitments to use best practices as part of a "Call To Action" scheme launched by administrator Randy Babbitt earlier this year.
Babbitt's requests of carriers was driven by enhanced scrutiny of US airlines following the fatal crash of a Colgan Air Bombardier Q400 in February. During public hearings after the crash questions were raised about pilot fatigue and training at regional airlines.
In June Babbitt asked 105 airlines for a formal written commitment to participate in voluntary safety initiatives such as the Aviation Safety Action Program (ASAP) and Flight Operations Quality Assurance (FOQA), and develop effective data analysis to effectively use the information collected.
Additionally Babbitt asked carriers to commit to published a code of ethics, establish professional standards and ethics committees and to develop peer audit and review procedures.
He also included labour groups in his request, asking them to support safety risk management meetings between FAA and mainline and regional carriers.
Today FAA released the list of carriers that did not respond, but Babbitt points out that several of those airlines not responding in writing already have FOQA and ASAP programs in place.
"And some carriers may simply be too small or have too limited operations for FOQA programs to be practical," says Babbitt. "The fact that carriers haven't responded or are too small to have certain programs in place will be taken into consideration when performing FAA surveillance activities.
FAA's administrator warns that "the operators and labor organizations who have not responded need to understand the American public will ultimately judge their reluctance to adopt proven safety practices, not just the Federal Aviation Administration".
Source: Air Transport Intelligence news
