2 Airlines Halt Flights, Citing Safety Issues : Travel: American Eagle, Kiwi suspend some service due to pilot training concerns. And the FAA probes sabotage aboard 5 jumbo jets in New York.
Two airlines suspended flights because of safety concerns Friday, and federal officials said that a separate investigation was under way into five instances of sabotage aboard one company’s jumbo jets at Kennedy International Airport--all adding to an increasingly nervous Christmas travel season.
Some travel agents reported passengers expressing fear and resistance to booking commuter flights in the wake of two crashes in six weeks that killed a total of 83 people.
On Friday, American Eagle grounded flights in Chicago serving 10 Midwestern cities as pilots demanded more training before taking off in icy weather. Reservation agents sought to place travelers on other airlines.
At Newark International Airport in New Jersey, Kiwi International Airlines voluntarily suspended most of its service Friday because of FAA questions about the carrier’s pilot training records. The suspension will continue until Kiwi can persuade the FAA that its training meets government standards.
The FAA did allow Kiwi’s 6:10 p.m. flight to West Palm Beach, Fla., to leave Newark after the crew proved it had the required training, said FAA regional administrator Arlene B. Feldman.
Meanwhile, the FBI said that five Boeing 747 jets belonging to Tower Air were sabotaged at New York’s Kennedy International Airport in November. The sabotage wasn’t subtle, and sources close to the investigation said the damage appeared to be the work of a disgruntled employee rather than terrorists.
The damage was discovered after ground crews received false readings from cockpit instruments during preflight checks. In each instance, wires were cut.
At Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, American Eagle announced it was halting service until Jan. 4 between Chicago and the following cities: Champaign and Peoria, Ill.; Ft. Wayne and South Bend, Ind.; Columbus and Toledo, Ohio; Lansing and Traverse City, Mich.; and Green Bay and Madison, Wis. American Eagle also canceled some of its flights at Kennedy, starting Friday.
The airline said it was acting after representatives of the Allied Pilots Assn.--one of four unions representing pilots at American Eagle--questioned the level of cold weather training that pilots recently assigned to Chicago and New York had received.
The pilots were scheduled to fly Swedish-built Saab 340 aircraft after the FAA ordered French- and Italian-built ATR-42 and ATR-72 aircraft grounded during icy conditions. The FAA acted a month after an American Eagle ATR-72 crashed on Oct. 31 in Indiana, killing all 68 on board.
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On Tuesday, an American Eagle Jetstream Super 31 crashed as it was approaching Raleigh-Durham International Airport in North Carolina, killing 15 people, although weather was not immediately suspected as a cause.
American Airlines spokeswoman Mary Frances Fagan insisted Friday that the Saab 340 pilots--who normally fly more southerly routes--were amply trained for cold weather. The airline hopes to resume service Jan. 4 with pilots from the three other unions, Fagan said, noting that “the difference is that their union leadership has not raised the safety issue,” Fagan said.
APA President James G. Sovich said the majority of the pilots in his union have had no recent experience flying in winter weather. He said the only preparation management gave them was a 400-page insert in their flight manuals along with some information on how to navigate around O’Hare--all handed to them Wednesday night.
However, the pilots neither “requested nor demanded” the flight suspensions, Overman said. The union did not think the airline needed to shut down to address the pilots’ concerns, he said.
“We’re not talking about weeks of classroom instruction--just something more thorough than what they received,” he said.
For passengers, it meant long lines Friday.
Meanwhile, in Nashville, Tenn., an American Eagle Jetstream Super 31 commuter plane landed with one of two engines out Friday as it returned for maintenance following an emergency landing in Knoxville, Tenn., a day earlier.
Mechanics could not determine why the engine went out, said Don Bedwell, an American Eagle spokesman. The plane was being flown to Nashville with just two crew members aboard. The flight Thursday was carrying six passengers.
In New Jersey, Kiwi’s suspension disrupted service on routes linking Newark, Chicago, Atlanta, portions of Florida and Puerto Rico. The airline, which was started two years ago by former employees of Eastern, Pan Am and other carriers, said it hoped to resolve the dispute with the FAA shortly.
“We have never blown a tire, overshot a runway or scratched a plane in over 23,000 flights,” said Bob Iverson, the company’s chief executive officer in a fax that was sent to travel agents. “Our pilots average nearly 20 years of experience as commercial aircraft pilots and the 1,000 employee/owners of Kiwi stand behind their flying records.”
Tower Air, which serves Israel, South America, Europe and India as well as portions of the United States, said its own personnel “detected and corrected cut wires . . . in five instances during early November in which we suspect the cuts were deliberate.”
Sources said most of the wires were cut in obvious places, in some instances disabling the planes’ in-flight entertainment systems. Two of the planes that suffered other damage were cargo aircraft. In one of the incidents, 19 wires were severed.
Since discovery of the sabotage, security has been tightened and no further damage has been reported.
The FAA, FBI and the Port Authority Police Department, which has jurisdiction over Kennedy, are conducting a joint investigation.
Goldman reported from New York, Beckham from Chicago.
