Report Knocks FAA’s Handling of Hazardous Materials Cargo

The government needs to do a better job of monitoring and inspecting hazardous materials shipped aboard airlines, a report released Friday by the Transportation Department’s inspector general said.

How well the Federal Aviation Administration oversees the shipment of dangerous cargo came into question after the 1996 ValuJet crash in the Florida Everglades, which killed 110 people. The accident was blamed on a fire caused by an illegal shipment of oxygen generators in the cargo hold.

Since then, the report said, “the FAA’s enforcement of hazmat regulations has been in flux.” It criticized the agency for reviewing paperwork to make sure shippers and air carriers were properly declaring hazardous materials without conducting covert tests to be certain that airlines handled them properly.

FAA spokeswoman Diane Spitaliere said the FAA took action to strengthen the hazardous materials program well before the report was issued.

The agency checks to make sure that employees who handle hazardous cargo are properly trained, Spitaliere said. However, it can’t conduct covert inspections because the law doesn’t allow hazardous materials labels on packages that don’t contain such material, she said.

The report, by Assistant Inspector General Alexis Stefani, said the FAA also took too long to enforce hazardous materials cases.

More than 11,000 cases were investigated from 1999 to 2003, resulting in $35 million paid in fines.

But it takes the FAA more than a year to investigate hazardous materials violations, and the fines collected are only 41% of the penalties proposed by inspectors, the report said.

The agency is developing new ways to speed action on cases and working with air carriers to voluntarily report hazardous materials violations, Spitaliere said.

The report acknowledged that the FAA’s oversight of hazardous shipments has improved since the ValuJet crash.