Flight Safety Information September 29, 2016 - No. 192 In This Issue GA Groups Urge NTSB To Set Record Straight on GA Safety Air rage is taking off around the world, say airlines Gogo plans to speed up its aircraft internet system: COO 2 pilots killed in Swiss military helicopter crash in the Alps Investigators say Malaysian jet was downed over Ukraine by a Russian missile NASA to help China improve air traffic management The UN plans to launch its first space mission five years from now GRADUATE RESEARCH SURVEY ERAU Crisis Communication & Media GA Groups Urge NTSB To Set Record Straight on GA Safety Twenty-one aviation organizations are urging U.S. NTSB chairman Christopher Hart to convey that general aviation is one of the safest modes of transportation. Last week, the organizations wrote to the chairman expressing concerns about a recent NBC news segment that highlighted NTSB data to question general aviation safety, the groups said. The organizations noted that from 2008 to 2014, general aviation aircraft accidents resulted in 3,628 fatalities. This compares with 277,310 automobile accident fatalities; 38,343 fatalities on motorcycles; 5,561 on bicycles; and 5,831 fatalities in recreational boating accidents. "As you know, just two years ago, the general aviation accident rate dropped to nearly one fatal accident for every 100,000 flight hours," the organizations added. "Given the hundreds of thousands of flight hours each year it is understandable that aviation accidents receive significant media attention because they are so infrequent given the enormous amount of private and business flying in the U.S." The associations stressed that the NTSB has an "inherent responsibility" to provide a comprehensive view of safety trends and outline the improvements in general aviation safety over the years. https://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/business-aviation/2016-09-28/ga-groups-urge-ntsb-set-record- straight-ga-safety Back to Top Air rage is taking off around the world, say airlines BY JOAN LOWY, ASSOCIATED PRESS A Delta jetliner (foreground) is de-iced while an American Airlines plane (rear) takes off at Reagan National Airport in Washington, D.C. Photo by Gary Cameron/Reuters WASHINGTON - Incidents of unruly passengers on planes are increasing, and more effective deterrents are needed to tackle the problem, a global airline trade group said Wednesday. There were 10,854 air rage incidents reported by airlines worldwide last year, up from 9,316 incidents in 2014, according to the International Air Transport Association. That equates to one incident for every 1,205 flights, an increase from one incident per 1,282 flights the previous year. Incidents have been rising almost consistently since 2007, when the association began tracking the issue. That year airlines reported 339 incidents to the association. A majority of incidents involved verbal abuse, failure to follow crew instructions and other anti-social behavior. Eleven percent included physical aggression toward passengers or crew or damage to the plane. Alcohol or drugs were a factor in 23 percent of the cases. In the vast majority of incidents involving drugs or alcohol, the substances were consumed before boarding or imbibed secretly on board, the association said. Training staff in airport bars and duty-free shops to sell alcohol responsibly, including avoiding offers that encourage binge drinking, can cut incidents by half, the association said, citing an initiative by Monarch Airlines at London's Gatwick Airport. Airlines already have strong guidelines and crew training on "the responsible provision of alcohol," the association said. A woman in England pleaded guilty in June to assaulting an easyJet pilot. Prosecutors said she punched the pilot in the face after he deemed her too intoxicated to fly. In another case, a male passenger allegedly urinated on fellow easyJet passengers as they were waiting to deplane after landing at Edinburgh. Six men involved in a drunken brawl during a Jetstar flight from Sydney to Thailand in July were ordered off the plane after it diverted to Indonesia. Incidents have been rising almost consistently since 2007, when the association began tracking the issue. An American Airlines pilot tackled one passenger to the floor after he tried to force his way off the plane as it taxied to the gate in Charlotte, North Carolina. "You don't put your hands on my flight attendant!" the pilot can be heard yelling on a video taken by another passenger. The unruly passenger was arrested and charged with being intoxicated and disruptive. Charlie Leocha, president of Travelers United, an advocacy group for airline passengers in Washington, said he knows of no changes in the way alcohol is sold in airports or on planes that would account for the increase in the rate of incidents. But he noted that the increases correspond with efforts by airlines to squeeze more passenger seats onto planes by shrinking legroom and seat width. "We've always had alcohol sold at airports, we have always had alcohol served on aircraft," he said. "The only difference today is that people now have less space and they are required to interact more intimately with other passengers." Other recent incidents include a Los Angeles-bound Delta Air Lines flight diverted to Tucson, Arizona, escorted by two Air Force fighter jets, after a passenger refused to return his seat. The following month, the FBI and Hawaii state sheriffs arrested a 35-year-old man who allegedly bit a flight attendant on a Hawaiian Airlines flight from Pago Pago in American Samoa to Honolulu. Airlines also want more countries to ratify a 2014 treaty that closes gaps in laws for dealing with unruly passengers. So far, only six countries - Bahrain, Congo, Dominican Republic, Gabon, Guyana and Jordan - have ratified the pact. "More are needed in order to have a consistent global approach to this issue," said Alexandre de Juniac, the association's director general. http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/air-rage-incidents-reported-airlines-rise/ Back to Top Gogo plans to speed up its aircraft internet system: COO In-flight internet provider Gogo Inc said on Wednesday it is building a faster version of its air-to-ground system for business and commercial aircraft that will ease a bandwidth bottleneck when it becomes available in 18 months. The service will provide speeds of 100 megabits per second to an aircraft, about 10 times more than Gogo's existing system, Chief Operating Officer John Wade said in an interview. Shares of Gogo were up 2.3 percent in afternoon trading to $12.64. Based on Gogo's cellular telephone technology, the system uses unlicensed radio spectrum, beam-forming directional antennas and other improvements to increase speed, Chief Technology Officer Anand Chari said in the same interview. Passengers will be able to stream to their own tablets or laptops. "You don't need a seatback system," Chari said. The system builds on Gogo's existing network of 250 cellphone towers. Airlines that already use Gogo's air-to-ground system, including Delta Air Lines Inc , United Continental Holdings Inc and American Airlines Group Inc , will need to install a new modem box and additional antenna on each aircraft, a process that takes one day, Chari said. Because of its relatively small size, the air-to-ground system is aimed at business aircraft, regional commercial planes and jetliners that will not travel much outside the United States or over larger bodies of water, Wade said. Gogo has about 7,000 business and 2,500 commercial aircraft using the system. Large aircraft that operate internationally and over oceans can achieve similar 100 mbps speeds with Gogo's satellite-based system using Ku band technology, known as 2Ku, Chari said. Gogo has orders to install 2KU on 1,200 aircraft. Gogo's current air-to-ground system sometimes struggles to provide seamless service even for low- intensity applications such as email. In contrast, passengers will be able to stream video over the internet using either the Ku band or the enhanced air-to-ground systems, said Chari. The enhanced air-to-ground service has not been formally offered to customers yet, Wade said, but airlines that have seen it were excited about the capability. Starting in 2018, Gogo expects airlines to install it on up to about 800 planes a year, the deployment rate for the existing service, Wade said. Gogo's 2Ku satellite system, which uses providers such as Intelsat SA , SES SA and Eutelsat , will provide free Netflix streaming on Aeromexico flights, Wade said. http://www.reuters.com/article/us-gogo-airlines-idUSKCN11Y1RE Back to Top 2 pilots killed in Swiss military helicopter crash in the Alps A Swiss Super Puma helicopter crashed Wednesday in the Alps, killing the two pilots and injuring a flight assistant, the head of Switzerland's air force said. The accident happened around midday in the remote Gotthard Pass in the Tessin region near a hospice that stands at an altitude of 2,100 metres (6,900 feet). The Blick newspaper published a photo it said was sent in by a reader showing smoke billowing from flaming wreckage. The incident was the latest in a series of Swiss military crashes. A Swiss Air Force F/A 18 slammed into a mountainside this month moments after an air traffic controller assigned the pilot too low an altitude at which to fly. The pilot died. That crash was the third by an F/A 18 in the past three years. A Swiss F-5E air demonstration fighter jet collided with another plane and crashed into a pond in the northern Netherlands ahead of an air show in June. The European Aviation Safety Authority grounded some Super Puma helicopters in June following the discovery of metal fatigue in the gearbox of an H225 model that fatally crashed in Norway in late April. http://www.dailysabah.com/europe/2016/09/28/2-pilots-killed-in-swiss-military-helicopter-crash-in-the- alps Back to Top Investigators say Malaysian jet was downed over Ukraine by a Russian missile MH17 Dutch-led criminal investigators said Wednesday that they had solid evidence that a Malaysian jetliner was shot down in 2014 by a Russian-made Buk missile that was moved into eastern Ukraine from Russia. Wilbert Paulissen, head of the Central Crime Investigation department of the Dutch National Police, said communications intercepts showed that pro-Moscow rebels had called for deployment of the mobile surface-to-air weapon and reported its arrival on July 17, 2014, in rebel-controlled territory in eastern Ukraine. The missile was launched the same day from farmland in the rebel-held area of Pervomaiskiy, 5 kilometers from the eastern Ukrainian town of Snizhne, the investigation found. Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was blasted out of the sky from an altitude of 33,000 feet, killing all 298 people aboard, Witnesses there reported an explosion and a whistling sound and a patch of field was set on fire. From that and other evidence collected by investigators, "it may be concluded MH17 was shot down by a 9M38 missile launched by a Buk, brought in from the territory of the Russian Federation, and that after launch was subsequently returned to the Russian Federation," Paulissen told a news conference Wednesday in the Dutch town of Nieuwegein. The conclusions of the investigative unit - which includes police and prosecutors from the Netherlands, Ukraine, Belgium, Australia and Malaysia - were consistent with previous reporting by the Associated Press, which established soon after MH17's destruction that a tracked Buk M-1 launcher with four SA-11 surface-to-air missiles had been sighted the same day in the rebel-controlled town of Snizhne near Pervomaiskiy. A separate investigation by Dutch officials last year concluded that the Amsterdam-to-Kuala Lumpur flight was downed by a Buk missile fired from territory in Ukraine held by pro-Russian rebels. Dutch police spokesman Thomas Aling said the joint investigation findings differ in that they are designed to be solid enough to be used as evidence in a criminal trial. Where and when a trial might take place is still to be determined, Aling said. "The next question, of course, is who was responsible for this," Dutch chief prosecutor Fred Westerbeke said. He said investigators have identified 100 people they want to speak to who are believed to have been involved in the transport of the Buk launcher or its use. Moscow officials have consistently denied allegations that pro-Kremlin rebels in eastern Ukraine were responsible for downing the passenger plane. The Russian Foreign Ministry reacted quickly to the release of the international investigation's findings, calling the probe "biased and politically motivated." See the most-read stories in World News this hour » Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova also said the Dutch-led investigation has ignored evidence offered by Russia and allowed Ukraine to manipulate the evidence and shape anti-Russian conclusions. On Monday, the Russian military said it has new radio-location data that showed the missile that downed the Boeing 777 did not originate from rebel-controlled territory, and said it would turn that data over to investigators. Ukrainian officials countered that the Dutch-led team's findings prove Russia's complicity in the tragedy. "A new and very important element in today's report is the information about the route by which the weapon came from Russia to Ukraine and was removed in the opposite direction through part of the Ukrainian-Russian border that was controlled only by Russia and their militants," Ukraine's foreign ministry said in a statement. "This again points to the direct involvement of the aggressor state in the downing of the aircraft." The Russian maker of the Buk air defense missile system also contested the conclusions of the investigation. Mikhail Malyshevsky, an advisor to the director of the state-controlled Almaz-Antei consortium, said Wednesday that an analysis of the plane's shrapnel-ridden fragments show that it couldn't have been downed by a missile launched from a rebel-controlled area in eastern Ukraine. He said the missile likely came from an area that Russian officials have previously described as Ukraine- controlled. The Joint Investigation Team has faced extraordinary challenges. The site in Ukraine's Donetsk region where the plane was brought down was located in an active war zone. During the days following the downing, pro-Kremlin militants limited access to the crash site. Eleven containers crammed with debris from the jetliner were ultimately brought to the Netherlands. A research team took soil samples in eastern Ukraine and established the location of cellphone towers and the layout of the local telephone network to verify intercepted phone calls from the militants. Forensic samples were taken from passengers' and crew members' bodies and luggage, and satellite data and communications intercepts were scrutinized. The team also appealed for information from witnesses who may have seen the missile launch. About two-thirds of the passengers aboard MH17 were Dutch nationals; the crew members were Malaysians. Malaysia proposed setting up an international tribunal to try those responsible for the plane's destruction, but Russia vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution in favor of a tribunal. http://www.latimes.com/world/la-fg-malaysia-jet-20160928-snap-story.html Back to Top NASA to help China improve air traffic management NASA has signed an agreement with the Chinese Aeronautical Establishment (CAE) to cooperate on research that will help China's airports improve their management of air traffic, the U.S. space agency said late on Wednesday. China is the world's fastest growing aviation market but passengers often have to cope with long flight delays. Its aviation authorities routinely name and shame airports for poor management, slapping them with penalties such as bans on new flights. The memorandum of understanding will see the two agencies use data from Chinese airports to identify potential efficiencies in air traffic management, with a view to improve air transportation automation for U.S. and Chinese aviation operations in the country. NASA said the agreement's details were discussed during NASA administrator Charles Bolden's visit in August, when he met with the CAE and the Civil Aviation Administration of China. "China is expected to see a substantial increase in air travel in the near future," Bolden said. "Our ability to work closely together will help to improve predictability of ground delays so air carriers can better plan departures to increase efficiencies. That will have a positive impact on U.S. carriers operating in China and the global aviation community." In July, the official news agency Xinhua said China plans to invest as much as 50 billion yuan ($7.49 billion)to develop its air traffic management system. http://www.reuters.com/article/us-nasa-china-air-traffic-idUSKCN11Z07K Back to Top The UN plans to launch its first space mission five years from now Developing countries will get the chance to fly payloads in microgravity The United Nations will launch its first-ever space mission aboard Sierra Nevada Corporation's Dream Chaser spaceplane in 2021. The news was announced yesterday at the International Astronautical Congress in Guadalajara, Mexico. "THE POSSIBILITIES ARE ENDLESS." The goal of the mission is to give developing nations that don't have their own space programs the chance to fly payloads in microgravity. The United Nations Office of Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) is accepting proposals "on anything from developing materials that resist corrosion in space to studying climate change and food security," Motherboard reports. Developing countries get first dibs, but the mission is open to all UN member states. The payloads will be selected by UNOOSA in 2018 and will be launched into low Earth orbit - up to about 1,200 miles above Earth - in 2021. "One of UNOOSA's core responsibilities is to promote international cooperation in the peaceful use of outer space," Simonetta Di Pippo, director of UNOOSA, said in a statement. "I am proud to say that one of the ways UNOOSA will achieve this, in cooperation with our partner Sierra Nevada Corporation, is by dedicating an entire microgravity mission to United Nations Member States, many of which do not have the infrastructure or financial backing to have a standalone space programme." THE CHANCE TO FLY PAYLOADS IN MICROGRAVITY The Dream Chaser is a 30-foot-long reusable spacecraft with small wings designed to land gently on runway. The company that makes the Dream Chaser, Sierra Nevada Corporation, was recently awarded a NASA contract along with Orbital ATK and SpaceX to resupply the International Space Station between 2019 and 2024. The contract revitalized the company. A previous version of the Dream Chaser designed to ferry astronauts to the ISS was rejected by NASA, which instead chose Boeing and SpaceX for the job. After that, Sierra Nevada had to lay off "dozens of employees," according to The Washington Post. The UNOOSA is currently looking for sponsors to fund the mission. The countries that send the payloads to space will also be asked to cover some of the costs, based on how much they can afford, according to a UNOOSA press release. The ultimate goal of the UN mission is to make space - a valuable environment for science experiments - more affordable to nations that might not otherwise have access to it. "The possibilities are endless," said Di Pippo. http://www.theverge.com/2016/9/28/13098630/united-nations-space-mission-developing-countries- climate-change-food-security Back to Top GRADUATE RESEARCH SURVEY Dear Airline colleagues, I would be very grateful if airline staff among you accept this invite to complete my short online survey on "exploring the influence of emotionally intelligent leadership on airline safety culture". https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/EI-INTEL The survey is an element of my final project which explores how safety leadership who utilize or exhibit emotional intelligence leadership qualities can influence the organisations safety culture. Safety leadership in this context is taken as all management and supervisory staff who act as, or should act as safety leaders in their teams. I am researching to see if the leadership qualities of each individual safety leader can impact safety culture. Emotional intelligence markers are embedded in 10 of the survey questions. The survey contains an introduction and explanatory page, followed by 14 questions and should only take 8 to 10 minutes. If you would like to make any comments on the project, or have any questions, please contact me at Patrick.Morris.1@city.ac.uk. Thank you in advance and best regards. Pat Morris. MSc Student, City University of London. Curt Lewis