What to Do About the FAA : The federal agency blew it; overhaul is needed

It is time for Congress and the Clinton Administration to shape up the Federal Aviation Administration. If that means cleaning house at the top, or even putting others in charge of airline safety, so be it. Today’s hearing before the House subcommittee on technology, environment and aviation would be a good place to start.

A 46-page report issued Tuesday by two top officials of the FAA and the Department of Transportation included the startling and frightening finding that the agency lacks the ability to spot and avert potential threats to safety. The implications for public confidence in the nation’s commercial aviation system are enormous. It confirms what critics have charged for years, that the agency is too slow to move on issues affecting the well-being of pilots, crews and more than 500 million airline passengers each year. Such laxity is unacceptable.

The report was prompted by extensive publicity--which began with The Times’ reportage on a crash in Santa Ana that killed five people--given to the FAA’s mishandling of the problem of wake turbulence caused by the Boeing 757 passenger jet. Astonishingly, the agency ignored warnings that smaller aircraft flying behind the 757 could be affected by what amounted to “horizontal tornadoes” coming from each wingtip of the 757. Only after the Santa Ana crash, preceded by one in Montana that killed eight, did the FAA institute new policies this year that required smaller planes to stay an extra mile--four miles instead of three--behind 757s on final airport approach. It is unconscionable that the agency failed to alert pilots to the problem far earlier; it might have saved lives.

There is a tension between the agency’s missions: ensuring safety and promoting the airline industry. Spacing planes farther apart means fewer landings at desirable times, more delays and more unhappy passengers. Still, the extra-mile requirement was less than the National Transportation Safety Board’s call for a distance of six miles. And the FAA’s concern about the effect distancing requirements might have on Boeing’s economic health further suggested conflicting allegiances.

An improved air-traffic control system might allow smoother traffic flow, but the FAA has mismanaged the automation of the current system so badly that the project is billions of dollars over budget and delayed by years.

It is true that the airline industry has a good safety record. But now it is apparent that not only did the FAA mishandle the 757 problem, it also cannot mount coordinated responses to safety problems. At a minimum, the FAA must get rid of those who failed to warn pilots of the dangers of the wake turbulence. And the nation’s airways need a better safety monitor--either a reformed FAA or another agency.