Flight Safety Information December 23, 2011 - No. 259 In This Issue The New Frontier in Air Safety UPS pilots suing FAA; don't want to fly tired CAAP findings on Parañaque crash (Philippines) 10 Facts about Portable Electronics and Airplanes Navy crew of 5 from Nevada unhurt after helicopter crash during mountain training The New Frontier in Air Safety Skies Are Now So Safe on U.S. Flights That Experts Turn Focus to 'Surface Threats' By ANDY PASZTOR (WSJ) Here's some good news for anyone boarding a plane this holiday season: Flying on U.S. airlines has become so safe that experts increasingly believe the biggest remaining risk of an accident is when the wheels are on the ground. A Continental 737 jetliner veered off a runway at Denver International Airport in December 2008. Gusty winds and pilot training were blamed. Airline industry and government officials said this month that to improve safety on scheduled flights by U.S. passenger and cargo carriers, they are focusing more on countering hazards present before takeoff and after touchdown. These "surface threats," to use the industry lingo, include ramp collisions, pilots who blunder onto the wrong runway-potentially into the path of a speeding jet-and planes running off wet or snowy airstrips. Airline pilots have long said that maneuvering big planes around complex and bustling airports, often at night or with poor visibility, is one of the most challenging parts of their jobs. Flying on U.S. airlines has become so safe that experts increasingly believe the biggest accident risks are when a plane's wheels are on the ground. After a string of harrowing near-collisions on runways at various airports, the Federal Aviation Administration in 2007 called for action to prevent recurrences. Since then, the annual numbers for the most serious category of such tarmac incidents have dropped significantly. Now, these and other risks on the ground again are receiving emphasis among U.S. experts. That's largely because over the past few years, safety programs have achieved remarkable success in reducing airborne risks. Joint industry-government efforts have made once-deadly problems such as navigation errors, fuel-tank fires, weather-related crashes and engine malfunctions a rarity. There were no fatalities on U.S. commercial flights in 2011. The year before, the only deaths were two pilots who perished in a U.S. cargo plane that caught fire and crashed in Dubai. "America's skies are the safest they have ever been," said Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood in a press briefing on Wednesday. As a result, reducing dangers on the ground is essential to continuing safety improvements. "We've learned how to operate planes very, very well in the air," said Richard Healing, a former member of the National Transportation Safety Board. Now, "runway events are much more likely to pose a major hazard than in-flight problems," he said. Terra Firma Some recent incidents: January 2010: US Airways commuter jet rolls off end of runway in Charleston, W.Va., smashing into safety zone at end of strip. December 2010: American Airlines Boeing 757 slides off runway in Jackson Hole, Wyo. April 2011: Wing of taxiing Air France A380 superjumbo jet smashes into tail of Comair commuter jet at Kennedy International Airport in New York. Source: government and industry data. The picture for "general aviation," which includes private and some corporate flights, is much darker. More than 450 people died in U.S. general-aviation accidents last year, amounting to one fatal accident for every 100,000 flight hours. From the late 1990s to the end of the last decade, the fatal-crash rate of U.S. scheduled carriers fell by more than 80%, with no fatalities at all in some years. Improvements in the U.S. have exceeded the ambitious goals established during President Bill Clinton's administration. Advances in cockpit technology have all but eliminated traditional threats such as jets flying into mountains in bad weather or slamming into the ground because of sudden wind changes on approach. Such safety enhancements are estimated to save the industry more than $600 million annually in aircraft losses, lawsuits, higher insurance rates and other fallout from high- profile crashes. In a briefing this month, Ken Hylander, the top safety official at Delta Air Lines, and Peggy Gilligan, the FAA's top safety official, told reporters the goal by 2025 is to cut today's remarkably low accident risk in half, down to one fatality per some 22 million flights. By some measures, that is dozens of times as safe as That would amount to less than a single death over roughly two and a half years, a period in which more than 1.4 billion passengers would have boarded scheduled flights by U.S. airlines. "Like all good goals, these are rather aggressive," said Mr. Hylander, who recently was named co-chair of the main airline industry-government safety team. "The question really becomes, how do we get to the next step?" With no fatal crashes of scheduled U.S. airliners in four of the past five years, and other, longer-term measures also showing steady declines, safety experts now focus on new approaches to anticipate and counter incipient hazards. Industry-government efforts are whittling away at subtle threats, often to ground operations, that previously garnered less attention. So-called runway incursions, or two planes mistakenly ending up on the same strip, "most likely account for the largest single safety problem in front of us," said Mark Rosenker, another former safety board member. Government and airline officials also are reworking the way they calculate risk. Instead of the prior emphasis on rates of fatal accidents, experts have started to talk publicly about statistics that highlight a much tougher standard: individual fatalities per millions of flights. Today's safety efforts depend on expanding databases documenting the full gamut of close calls before they turn into accidents. As part of that effort, at least 37 U.S. airlines, seven more than 18 months ago, are now encouraging pilots to voluntarily file reports about all types of safety lapses, with assurances there will be no punishment. Safety experts have access to more than 100,000 such reports, along with some 30,000 voluntary incident reports filed by air-traffic controllers nationwide. Back to Top UPS pilots suing FAA; don't want to fly tired WASHINGTON (AP) - United Parcel Service pilots went to court Thursday hoping to make the government include them under new rules designed to ensure airline pilots aren't too sleepy to fly. Their union, the Independent Pilots Association, filed a lawsuit against the Federal Aviation Administration one day after the new rules for passenger airline pilots were announced. Cargo carriers are exempt from the rules. The union wants the court to tell the FAA to reconsider including them, too. The FAA has said forcing cargo carriers to reduce the number of hours their pilots can fly would be too costly when compared with the safety benefits. Imposing the rules on cargo airlines like Federal Express or UPS would have added another $214 million to the cost, FAA officials said. "The FAA's only basis for excluding cargo rests on a cost benefit analysis," William Trent, general counsel to the pilots' association, said in a statement. Trent said two factors that the FAA cited as exacerbating the risk of pilot fatigue - operating at night and crossing multiple time zones - are more common in cargo operations than in passenger airlines. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has said he plans to invite top officials from cargo airlines to meet with him next month to urge them to voluntarily follow the new rules. "One size has never fit all when it comes to crew rest regulations," said Norman Black, a spokesman for Atlanta-based UPS, in a statement. "UPS believes the FAA has recognized this fact and made an appropriate decision in its new rule." Safety advocates urged the FAA for over two decades to update pilot work rules. Researchers say fatigue, much like alcohol, can impair a pilot's performance by slowing reflexes and eroding judgment. The new passenger airline rules would limit the maximum time a pilot can be scheduled on duty to between nine and 14 hours; limit scheduled flying time to eight or nine hours; and further limit hours for pilots flying overnight. The cargo carriers that are exempt do much of their flying overnight, when people naturally crave sleep. Back to Top CAAP findings on Parañaque crash (Philippines) MANILA, Philippines - Human error coupled with mechanical failure are the two most probable causes of the Beechcraft Queen Air crash in Paranaque City last December 10 that resulted in the death of 14 people, the Aircraft Accident Investigation Board announced on Thursday. In a briefing held at the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) head quarters in Pasay City on Thursday, Director General Ramon Gutierrez disclosed that the twin- engine cargo plane still had one engine running at the time of the incident and that it was very probable that the pilot was not able to perform the proper emergency maneuvers which resulted in its deathly plunge to a heavily populated shanty town in Baranagay Don Bosco, Paranaque. According to Gutierrez, their investigation revealed that shortly after the aircraft took off from Runway 13-31 of the airport, the left engine suffered what seemed to be fuel starvation that later caused it to feather and stop spinning. Gutierrez added that several witnesses recounted that they heard one of the engines sputtering before it banked steeply to the left then plunged to the ground. The AAIB investigation showed that the pilots of the aircraft, Capt. Timothy Albo and Capt. Jesse Kim Lustica, encountered problems with the left engine upon reaching 200 feet forcing them to radio the Manila Control Tower and request for emergency landing status. http://www.mb.com.ph/articles/345752/caap-findings-para-aque-crash Back to Top 10 Facts about Portable Electronics and Airplanes By Larry Greenemeier As the recent flurry of articles about why portable electronic devices are restricted during air travel makes clear, the conclusion to be drawn from the information available is a very complicated: "We just don't know." For this reason alone airlines err on the side of caution, asking people nicely (and sometimes not so nicely) to turn off their gadgets during takeoff and landing. Here's what we do know, or at least here's what makes sense and comes from reputable sources, including the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA): 1. Radio-frequency emissions from cell phones, laptops and other electronics can occur at the same frequencies used by aircraft communication, navigation and surveillance radio receivers. These emissions could cause fluctuations in navigation readouts, problems with other flight displays, and interference with air traffic communications. 2. It's less risky to let passengers use portable electronics (with the exception of cell phones) at cruising altitudes above 3,000 meters* because the flight crew would have more time to diagnose and address any possible interference than they would during takeoff or landing. 3. Because passengers bring such a variety of portable electronics onboard in so many different states of function or disrepair, the FAA can't assure that none of them will interfere with flight instrumentation. The agency thus tells carriers to prohibit their use completely during critical phases of flight. 4. The FAA has begun allowing flight crews to use tablet computers including iPads in the cockpit. But this is not as surprising as it might sound: Crews have actually been using portable computers called "electronic flight bags" since the early 1990s to replace printed aircraft operating manuals, flight crew operating manuals and navigational charts. 5. Portable voice recorders, hearing aids, electric shavers and heart pacemakers do not need to be shut off at any time during a flight because their signals don't interfere with aircraft systems. 6. For any gadget not specifically mentioned by FAA rules, an airline must demonstrate that this device doesn't interfere with aircraft operation before it is allowed on board. 7. The U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has banned the inflight use of 800 MHz cell phones since 1991 to keep cell networks from interfering with airplane instrumentation. (Before that cell phones were banned because they didn't fit in the overhead luggage compartment or safely under a passenger's seat.) 8. The FCC and FAA work in tandem to ban cell phones on airplanes. Even if a cell phone were to meet the FAA's safety requirements, an airline would need an exemption from the FCC rule for that cell phone to be used inflight. Likewise, if the FCC rescinds its ban, the FAA would require an airline to show that the use of a specific model of phone won't interfere with the navigation and communications systems of the specific type of aircraft on which it would be used. 9. RTCA, Inc., a Washington, D.C.-based federal advisory group, concluded that the FAA should keep its inflight restrictions in place after the group studied electromagnetic interference from cell phones and Wi-Fi transmitters in laptops from 2003 to 2006. At the same time, RTCA also published detailed processes that carriers and electronics makers can follow to certify such devices for inflight use if desired. 10. Airlines may offer inflight Wi-Fi between takeoff and landing. The FAA doesn't restrict the use of Skype or other Internet calling software. (Airlines, however, have banned them for the sanity of their crew and passengers.) Source: Scientic American Back to Top Navy crew of 5 from Nevada unhurt after helicopter crash during mountain training FALLON, Nev.(AP) - All five members of a Navy helicopter crew are reported to be unhurt after crashing during a training mission on the edge of the Sierra Nevada. The Sikorsky MH-60S based at the Naval Air Station in Fallon, Nev., went down Thursday morning near the Mountain Warfare Training Center in Bridgeport, Calif. KOLO-TV in Reno reports that all five members walked away from the crash and none required hospitalization. The cause of the crash remains under investigation. Curt Lewis, P.E., CSP CURT LEWIS & ASSOCIATES, LLC