Finding Right Fit in Airline Safety

The loss of 342 lives in U.S. airline disasters since May 11 has sparked a frenzy of concern and calls for everything from heightened airport/aircraft security and safety to far better federal oversight of the industry.

Federal officials are considering, for example, periodic safety rankings for U.S. airlines, perhaps as early as next year. Such a system might measure accident rates, maintenance records and effectiveness of security measures.

Airlines are judged now on such matters as on-time performance, consumer complaints and lost luggage. Safety rankings would be considerably more difficult to establish. The Federal Aviation Administration’s own statistics show that a particular carrier could be portrayed as being among the best in one period and then among the worst shortly thereafter. So what will be the bottom line? One air carrier, for example, had no fatalities over a specific period, making it unsurpassed in that regard, but it had the highest nonfatal accident rate among major air carriers for the same time frame.

* Too Much Emphasis on the Israeli Example? Critics suggest that the United States should develop a system that is right for the nation, and that the often-cited stringent measures that a small and security-conscious nation such as Israel requires of its terminals and state airline might not fly here.

* Better Technological Solutions Available? The United States may be placing too much hope on unproven technical solutions in one area while not utilizing proven technology in another. Yes, America lags behind European countries in the use of detection equipment for plastic explosives. But some of those nations employ the U.S.-manufactured Egis system, not yet certified for use in the United States because of performance problems. Another system used in Israel, England and Japan is being tested here, but it too has bugs. Meanwhile, there are far more sophisticated models of the so-called black box flight-data recorders than those on TWA Flight 800, which exploded in midair July 17. The better ones can record 1,000 aircraft characteristics, rather than the 18 of the TWA boxes, but few U.S. carriers use them.

* What About Airports? Two weeks before the TWA explosion, the Transportation Department’s inspector general finished a report on how undercover government agents were able to breach security at four of the nation’s largest airports in 1995 and 1996. Carrying fake bombs, they managed to penetrate areas that would have allowed them access to planes.

In addition, it’s true that few background checks are run on airport ground crews.

All of these issues will have to be tackled for the United States to design an air travel security and safety system that is the proper fit. The challenge will be to avoid rushing to solutions. American aviation has never been asked to consider so much in so short a time and get it right.