09 APR 2009 _______________________________________ *EU Adds Benin, Kazakh, Thai, Ukrainian Airlines to Blacklist *No survivors as Aviastar 146-300 crashes in Indonesia *Turkish 737 mistakenly lands at Georgian military airport *INSIDE WASHINGTON: NASA safety survey a mystery *ECAST Issues Best Practice Material on SMS EASA *Need for bathroom on flight leads to felony charge *NTSB To Hold Flight 1549 Hearing In Early June *************************************** EU Adds Benin, Kazakh, Thai, Ukrainian Airlines to Blacklist April 8 (Bloomberg) -- The European Union banned all Benin- based airlines, six Kazakh carriers, a Thai operator and a fourth Ukrainian one from flying in the bloc under the latest changes to a list of unsafe carriers. The 27-nation EU said the ban on all airlines certified in the western African country of Benin is justified by the "negative results" of an audit by the International Civil Aviation Organization. The other newly barred carriers are Kazakhstan's Air Company Kokshetau, ATMA Airlines, Berkut Air, East Wing, Sayat Air and Starline KZ, Thailand's One-Two-Go Airlines and Ukraine's Motor Sich Airlines, according to the EU. This is the tenth update of a blacklist first drawn up by the European Commission in March 2006 with more than 90 airlines mainly from Africa. The ban already covers carriers from nations including Angola, Gabon, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Liberia, Rwanda, Indonesia and North Korea. "Air passengers are entitled to feel safe and be safe," EU Transport Commissioner Antonio Tajani said in a statement today in Brussels. All carriers must "conform to internationally required levels of air safety." Airline crashes in 2004 and 2005 that killed hundreds of European travelers prompted EU governments to seek a uniform approach to airline safety through a common blacklist. The list, updated at least four times a year, is based on deficiencies found during checks at European airports, the use of antiquated aircraft by companies and shortcomings by non-EU airline regulators. Operational Ban In addition to imposing an operational ban in Europe, the blacklist can act as a guide for travelers worldwide and influence safety policies in non-EU countries. Nations that are home to carriers with poor safety records can ground them to avoid being put on the EU list, while countries keen to keep out unsafe foreign airlines can use the European list as a guide for their own bans. With the latest changes, Benin becomes the ninth country where all the local airlines face the EU ban. The other eight nations are Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Indonesia, the Kyrgyz Republic, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Swaziland. ************** No survivors as Aviastar 146-300 crashes in Indonesia None of the six occupants of a British Aerospace 146-300 aircraft has survived after the jet crashed while operating a domestic service. The aircraft was being operated by Jakarta-based Aviastar. While the identity of the aircraft is unconfirmed, Flight's ACAS database lists the carrier as having only a single 146-300. This is an 18-year old airframe, last listed as owned by Aviastar, with serial number E3189 and registered PK-BRD. It had been flying from Jayapura, on the northern coast in the Papua region, to Wamena in the mountainous central region. A senior safety executive at Aviastar tells ATI that the carrier operates a daily flight on the route and that the accident occurred at 06:45 local time. He says the aircraft was "not far away" from Wamena Airport and that, according to eyewitnesses, was "about to land" but "went around again". During the circuit, he adds, the aircraft disappeared. He says it was carrying six occupants and that "all of them were killed". There is no confirmed information on weather conditions or the type of approach being attempted at the time. Aviastar, which specialises in charter services, was established in June 2000 and acquired the 146-300, an ex-Flybe aircraft, about two years ago. Wamena is almost inaccessible by other forms of transport, says Aviastar, which states that its operations include transport of rice and other cargo from warehouses in Jayapura. Source: Air Transport Intelligence news ***** Status: Preliminary Date: 09 APR 2009 Time: ca 07:00 Type: British Aerospace BAe-146-300 Operator: Aviastar Mandiri Registration: PK-BRD C/n / msn: E3189 First flight: 1990 Crew: Fatalities: 4 / Occupants: 4 Passengers: Fatalities: 0 / Occupants: 0 Total: Fatalities: 4 / Occupants: 4 Airplane damage: Written off Airplane fate: Written off (damaged beyond repair) Location: 7 km (4.4 mls) from Wamena (Indonesia) Phase: Approach (APR) Nature: Ferry/positioning Departure airport: Jayapura-Sentani Airport (DJJ/WAJJ), Indonesia Destination airport: Wamena Airport (WMX/WAJW), Indonesia Narrative: Reports indicate that the plane crashed into Gunung Pike Mountain while on approach to Wamena (WMX). The airplane was to pick up the Governor of Papua at Wamena but failed to arrive. Witnesses reported seeing smoke bilowing from the mountainside. Conficting media reports say either two, four or six occupants were killed. (aviation-safety.net) *************** Turkish 737 mistakenly lands at Georgian military airport Georgia's civil aviation administration has confirmed that a Turkish Airlines aircraft erroneously landed at a military airport in the country's capital today. According to the administration the Boeing 737-800 - registered TC-JFT - landed 4nm southeast of Tbilisi International Airport, at the Vaziani base. The military base, whose runway has a similar heading to Tbilisi's, was bombed during the Russian assault on Georgia in August last year. "It's the fifth time in Georgia for a landing the wrong runway," says the Georgian administration in a statement. The Turkish aircraft was carring 69 passengers. It is unclear what type of approach the aircraft was conducting, and whether the choice of approach was influenced by findings from the Turkish Airlines 737-800 crash at Amsterdam in February. Source: Air Transport Intelligence news **************** INSIDE WASHINGTON: NASA safety survey a mystery Years after thousands of pilots told NASA about their in-flight safety experiences and NASA shut down the survey without divulging any findings, the pilots' views remain a mystery. A congressional investigation to be released Thursday offers little new insight into what the pilots said during the telephone survey or what it might reveal about safe skies. NASA cut off the interviews in 2004 and chose not to analyze the results. The Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, said the unprecedented $11 million telephone survey was sound in its design but plagued by resistance from federal aviation regulators and shortcomings in its implementation. The results, which include pilots' experiences with bird strikes and other safety events, are so complicated they couldn't be analyzed without more costly and extensive research, said the GAO report, which was obtained by The Associated Press before being made public. At this point, the survey has outlived its usefulness to air travel today, the GAO said. The saga of what was formally called the National Aviation Operations Monitoring Service demonstrates how taxpayer money can buy a lot of government activity and end up without much to show for it. Congress asked the GAO to review and analyze NASA's project last year after the space agency tried to keep its results secret. The interviews ran from 2001 to 2004. "This was a well-designed project that failed because it was executed without proper agency oversight and didn't have the support it needed from its primary customer - the FAA," said Rep. Bart Gordon, D-Tenn., chairman of the Science and Technology Committee, which requested the GAO study. Rep. Jerry Costello, D-Ill., chairman of the House Transportation Committee's aviation subcommittee, said it was "a perfect example of how good ideas and resources are wasted due to poor planning." NASA began meticulous preparation as far back as 1997 to create a scientific survey for tracking air safety problems and accident precursors. A NASA contractor conducted 25,000 interviews with airline pilots and 5,000 with private pilots, asking them dozens of questions about safety incidents they encountered. NASA had hoped the FAA would accept the survey to complement other government monitoring. But FAA officials challenged its validity when preliminary results indicated bird strikes and other events occurred more frequently than FAA's tracking systems showed. They contended the pilots' answers were subjective. The GAO said it was not surprising that pilots reported hitting birds more often because aviation researchers have estimated 80 percent of bird strikes are not reported to the FAA's voluntary system. A US Airways jet crash landed in the Hudson River on Jan. 15 after a collision with large birds. The GAO concluded that interviewing pilots was a valid way to identify air-safety issues. If revived, the survey would need clearer planning, sampling and analysis, and collaboration with the FAA and industry, as well as cost-benefit review to see if it was relevant, the report said. The NASA survey came to light in 2007 when the AP disclosed that NASA had axed it and was refusing to release the results on grounds that the information was sensitive and could hurt the airlines' image and profits, or somehow identify pilots who were promised anonymity. Former NASA Administrator Michael Griffin told Congress the project was poorly managed, didn't meet the space agency's standards and was not meaningful to air travelers. Lawmakers said air travelers should know what the pilots reported. Pulling conclusions from the survey results now, as Congress asked, would require complicated adjustments, the GAO said. For instance, the interviewees likely did not represent U.S. pilots at large because NASA used a public registry that withheld pilot names on request, resulting in unknown bias. In light of costs to address such technical complexities, Congress changed its directive for the GAO to analyze the information. The agency instead focused on the methodology and ways to improve any future survey. http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jKO38hKOG37Omy4Iv7Bi9q_L98 bQD97EPSDG0 *************** ECAST Issues Best Practice Material on SMS EASA In order to support organisations in its implementation of Safety Management Systems (SMS), the European Commercial Aviation Safety Team (ECAST) issued best practice material for industry and civil aviation authorities. This material is the result of the work of the ECAST Working Group on Safety Management Systems and Safety Culture. Its aim is to help stakeholders to meet ICAO standards and future rules of the European Aviation Safety Agency for Authority and Organisation Requirements, Part Organisation*. The ECAST work focused on four main areas, where guidance was considered as most useful: Review of reference material and safety culture, providing an overview of current SMS initiatives and guidance on the concept of safety culture, considered as an enabler of SMS; Organisational structures, offering guiding principles and examples of organisational structures suitable for SMS implementation; Hazards Identification, providing concise and useful material and references on definitions (hazard, risk, etc.), and on hazards identification processes, methods, and techniques; Risk Assessment, presenting a suitable risk assessment method (Airline Risk Management Solutions - ARMS) for air operators and other organisations such as maintenance and Air Navigation Service Providers. These documents can be freely downloaded from easa.europa.eu/essi/ECAST_SMS.htm. They have also been published on www.skybrary.aero. http://www.amtonline.com/article/article.jsp?siteSection=1&id=7894 *************** Need for bathroom on flight leads to felony charge ATLANTA (AP) - A man rushing to get to the restroom on an international Delta Air Lines flight has been charged with assault, accused of twisting a flight attendant's arm. Joao Correa of Concord, Ohio, says he had a bathroom emergency but his path was blocked by a beverage cart during the March 28 flight from Honduras to Atlanta. He asked if he could use the lavatory in business class, but was told no. Federal Aviation Administration policy requires passengers on international flights to use the restroom in their seating class. Authorities say the 43-year-old man is accused of pulling and twisting the flight attendant's arm. He was arrested when the plane landed in Atlanta and charged with assault. Correa was released after two nights in jail, pending a hearing. Information from: The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, http://www.ajc.com ****************** NTSB To Hold Flight 1549 Hearing In Early June Will Review Ditching Safety, Bird Ingestion Standards The National Transportation Safety Board will hold a public hearing on June 9-10, 2009, as part of its ongoing investigation into the ditching of a US Airways Airbus A320 into the Hudson River in New York City in January. The hearing will be held at the NTSB's Board Room and Conference Center in Washington, DC. The purpose of the hearing will be to gather additional factual information for the investigation. It will be chaired by Member Robert M. Sumwalt who, along with Safety Board investigators, will hear from those the Board calls to testify on the following issues: Training of crew members on emergency procedures Certification requirements for the Airbus A320 related to the structural integrity of the airframe during ditching Bird ingestion certification standards for transport-category turbofan engines New and developing technologies for detection of large groups of birds and procedures to avoid conflicts with birds in the general vicinity of airports A list of the individuals expected to testify will be released closer to the date of the hearing. There were no fatalities among the 155 passengers and crew onboard the plane, which ditched in the Hudson shortly after takeoff from LaGuardia on January 15 following an encounter with a large flock of geese. FMI: www.ntsb.gov, www.usairways.com aero-news.net **************** Curt Lewis, P.E., CSP CURT LEWIS & ASSOCIATES, LLC