A look at the1997 White House ‘Safer Skies’ challenge to reduce
commercial aviation fatal accident rates by 80% in ten years

On 1 October 2007, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) will know how close it came to meeting the formidable challenge of improving the aviation safety record over a 10-year period. The goals were twofold: to reduce commercial fatal accidents by 80%, and to reduce overall accidents in all areas.

The FAA used Fiscal Years 1994-1996 to establish a baseline for 10 year fatal accident reduction calculations. The baseline included those fatal commuter airline accidents with over 10 seats that, as of 20 March 1997, began flying under Part 121 rules plus all Scheduled Part 135 (less than 10 seat) operations, mostly general aviation aircraft in Alaska and rural areas.

Beware the claim not substantiated with data. Case in point, the very first statement in the Annual Safety Review 2006 released last month by the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA). “Flying is the safest form of transportation,” it boldly asserts, offering not a shred of evidence in support.

The National Air Traffic Controllers Association (NATCA) continues to be dismayed by the fact that the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) permitted only one controller to be on duty in the tower at the time of the Comair flight 5191 accident on 27 August 2006 (the midnight shift), and that the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) did not issue any recommendations addressing specifically the issue of tower staffing (see Air Accident Digest, 4 September 2007, p. 1, “Pilots Faulted in Comair Crash”).