Flight Safety Information

May 18, 2010  -  No. 097

In This Issue

Delta pilot charged with bringing gun to Atlanta airport
As Attention Wanders, Rethinking the Autopilot
Air-Safety Watchdogs to Dissect Pilot Error
Fake pilot who flew for 13 years without licence fined £1,700
US proposes former FBI staffer to head TSA
The 10th Annual Course...Aircraft Fire & Explosion in Accidents, Combat
 & Terrorist Attacks

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Delta pilot charged with bringing gun to Atlanta airport
A 32-year-old Delta Air Lines pilot was arrested after screeners allegedly found
 a loaded handgun in his carry-on luggage as he tried to pass through security at
Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, according to Atlanta police.

Matthew Lamar McDaniel of Atlanta was released on a $5,700 bond from the Clayton
 County Jail within hours after he was booked in on Saturday, according to jail 
records.
Delta spokeswoman Susan Chana Elliott said McDaniel was off duty at the time and
 said she did not know why he was at the airport. She said the pilot had been with
Delta for three years and that his job status was unchanged while the airline conducted
its own investigation.

"He can fly," she told the AJC.
McDaniel had a Taurus .38 special loaded with five rounds as he tried to pass through
the T north security checkpoint, the police report said. It said the weapon was 
"not artfully concealed."
McDaniel, who had a permit to carry a concealed handgun, according to the report,
told police he had "cleaned out his girlfriend's vehicle and forgot he placed [the]
weapon in [his] bag."
He could not be reached for comment.

It is generally illegal to carry a loaded firearm into secured areas of the airport,
Chana Elliott said.
She said many have been arrested for accidentally doing so. "This happens to lots
of people," she said. "They forget to take their guns out of their cases."

There is one exception to the ban: Some pilots have enrolled in a federal program
that allows them to carry a gun into the cockpit, Chana Elliott said. She said she
did not know whether McDaniel was enrolled in that program and she said that even
if she did know, she wouldn't be able to divulge such information "for security 
reasons."
Pilots who are in that program can only carry a gun into secured areas if they are
on duty and if the weapon is stowed in a secured bag, airport spokesman John Kennedy
said.
He said it is currently illegal to carry a concealed weapon in unsecured areas of
the airport as well, though that could change soon.

A 2008 Georgia law allowed owners of licensed firearms to carry guns on public transportation
and in parks and restaurants. Gun advocates contended that the law applied to unsecured
areas of airports, but airport general manager Ben DeCosta declared Hartsfield-Jackson
a "gun-free" zone. The case went to federal court, and the gun advocates lost last
year in the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

This year, the Georgia General Assembly tackled the issue again, passing legislation
that would allow gun permit holders to carry weapons in nonsecure areas of an airport.
Kennedy said Monday that as far as he knew, Gov. Sonny Perdue had not signed the
 bill.

"Currently, it's against the law: No guns are allowed at the airport," Kennedy said.
He added one caveat:  It is legal to check a gun onto a flight so long it is unloaded
and in a special locked case.
The conceal carry issue has caught the attention of federal lawmakers.

A New Jersey senator has introduced a bill that would counter the legislation on
 Perdue's desk, the AJC reported last week.
Democratic Sen. Frank Lautenberg's proposal would make it illegal to carry a firearm
into any nonfederally regulated area of an airport, including baggage claim and 
ticketing areas.


http://www.ajc.com/news/atlanta/delta-pilot-charged-with-528918.html
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As Attention Wanders, Rethinking the Autopilot


By CHRISTINE NEGRONI

A captain returned to the cockpit after taking a bathroom break and found the first
officer facing away from the instruments and talking to a flight attendant. Unnoticed
was the fact that the autopilot had disconnected and the plane was in danger of 
stalling.


The incident is one of more than a dozen in an airline industry report in which 
the pilots failed to properly monitor the flight, the automation or even the location
of their airplane. The report, which came out in 2008, is getting new attention 
in light of the most conspicuous recent example of pilots not paying attention: 
the Northwest Airlines flight that overshot its destination and traveled on for 
another 150 miles before turning back to the airport last October.

Whether these incidents are symptoms of a larger problem in the cockpit is the subject
of a debate among aviation experts: are airliners so automated that pilots are becoming
complacent?
The issue will be on the agenda at a three-day conference in Washington beginning
on Tuesday, when the National Transportation Safety Board considers pilot and air
traffic controller professionalism. "We at the N.T.S.B. are continuing to see accidents
and incidents like the Northwest 188 event," said a safety board member, Robert 
L. Sumwalt. "Here it shows we have proof that pilots are still not adequately monitoring
the aircraft flight path."
The problem of pilots losing track of some aspect of a flight is not new. It has
 been around, in fact, almost as long as the technology that allows computers to
 perform some pilot functions. In 2002, Mr. Sumwalt was one three authors of a paper
that claimed pilots failed to adequately monitor what the airplane was doing in 
one-half to three-quarters of the mishaps reviewed. That report was carried out 
after several incidents, including one in 1996 when the pilots of a Continental 
Airlines plane failed to make sure the landing gear had been properly lowered before
landing.

"Humans are not good monitors over highly automated systems for extended periods
 of time," said Mr. Sumwalt, who was a pilot for 24 years at Piedmont and then US
Airways. "We want to acknowledge that you can't expect someone to be extremely vigilant
for five or seven or three hours."

Not all experts agree. The Federal Aviation Administration said that neither the
 Northwest flight nor other incidents examined by the airline industry indicated
 a bigger problem.
"If we had any suspicions or trend lines, we would be making efforts to bring some
change about," the agency administrator, J. Randolph Babbitt, said in a telephone
interview. Mr. Babbitt said the F.A.A. was more concerned that pilots, confused 
by the complex automation, were losing track of what the airplane was doing.
But the Northwest pilots were on their laptops, Mr. Babbitt said, doing work unrelated
to the flight, a prohibited activity. "It doesn't have anything to do with automation,"
he said. "Any opportunity for distraction doesn't have any business in the cockpit.
Your focus should be on flying the airplane."

Automation is generally considered a positive development in aviation safety because
it reduces pilot workload and eliminates errors in calculation and navigation. "The
introduction of automation did good things," said Key Dismukes, chief scientist 
for aerospace human factors at NASA. But it changed the essential nature of the 
pilot's role in the cockpit. "Now the pilot is a manager, which is good, and a monitor,
which is not so good."
Hugh Schoelzel, the vice president of safety at Trans World Airlines - a carrier
 acquired by American Airlines in 2001 - said most pilots had at one time or another
lost track of where they were in flight. "Anyone who says they haven't is either
 being disingenuous, or hasn't been paying attention," he said.

The episode in which the returning captain had to act quickly to save the airliner
from a near stall was discovered by the Commercial Aviation Safety Team, an airline
industry group, as it reviewed thousands of reports filed by pilots to NASA's Aviation
Safety Reporting System to see if automation caused pilots to mishandle problems
 or to become confused or distracted. The group's study, which ran from 2005 to 
2008, highlighted 50 events in the five years prior to 2005. In 16 of them, the 
pilots' failure to monitor the automation or the location of the aircraft was cited.

"I'm inclined to say it's the very reliability of something that takes us out of
 the loop," said Mr. Dismukes, who has written about the effects of automation on
safety. "You may know, 'Never turn your back, always check,' and people may have
 that intention. But it's hard to maintain that in practice when you're not physically
controlling the aircraft."

Finding the balance between too much technology and too little is crucial, according
to William B. Rouse, an engineering and computing professor at the Georgia Institute
of Technology. "Complacency is an issue, but designing the interaction between human
and technical so the human has the right level of judgment when you need them is
 a design task in itself," Mr. Rouse said. "When the person has no role in the task,
there's a much greater risk of complacency."

Some airline pilots confirm this. "We've all been there, not intentionally, but 
because you get distracted from the task at hand," said a captain at Continental
 Airlines who did not want to be identified because he was not authorized to speak
to the media. Complacency is very subtle, he said, "No light comes on to tell you
that you're being complacent."

At its meeting this week, the transportation safety board will hold discussions 
of the actions of pilots and air traffic controllers in two accidents in 2009 - 
the crash of Colgan Air Flight 3407 in Buffalo and the midair collision between 
a general aviation airplane and a sightseeing helicopter over the Hudson River.

Those accidents along with the Northwest incident all occurred within seven months
of each other and not long after the Hudson River landing of US Airways Flight 1549
that turned the pilots of that flight into icons of professional airmanship.

Chesley B. Sullenberger III, the captain of the US Airways plane, said in an interview
that it would be wrong to use his success in safely bringing down that plane to 
criticize pilots who make mistakes like those on the Northwest plane.

"Something in the system allowed these well-trained, experienced, well-meaning, 
well-intentioned pilots not to notice where they were, and we need to find out what
the root causes are," he said. "Simply to blame individual practitioners is wrong
and it doesn't solve the underlying issues or prevent it from happening."
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/18/business/18pilots.html?hp
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Air-Safety Watchdogs to Dissect Pilot Error
By ANDY PASZTOR

Federal aviation-accident investigators on Tuesday plan to focus on what many consider
the most vexing safety problem confronting airlines: unprofessional behavior by 
some pilots.

Prompted by a rash of fatal crashes, harrowing runway incidents and near midair-collisions
over the past few years, the National Transportation Safety Board will convene a
 three-day public forum highlighting the dangers of inattentive cockpit crews and
air-traffic controllers.

But there is no easy fix. Usually, the NTSB tries to plug holes in air safety by
 recommending tighter government regulations and airline rules. However, in trying
to improve pilot behavior, safety experts will need to cajole pilots, air-traffic
controllers and even union leaders to take on greater responsibility to police themselves
and their colleagues.

"Being attentive and having the right kind of attitude in the cockpit is very hard
to regulate," Deborah Hersman, the safety board's chairman, said in an interview.
It requires "discipline, leadership and creating the right culture at all levels."

The hearings will touch on everything from a veteran air-traffic controller who 
allowed his children to briefly issue radio instructions to aircraft to fatigued
 or distracted pilots who stalled perfectly functioning planes or ran them off the
ends of runways. Other pilots engaged in prohibited personal banter when they were
supposed to be paying close attention to checklists.

A parade of academic, industry and government experts is expected to stress that
 voluntary safety compliance efforts-going beyond mandatory government and industry
rules-are essential ingredients to improving the long-term safety of air travel.
 How to make that happen, however, stumps safety experts.

The safety board and the Federal Aviation Administration already have proposed ways
to improve selection and training of pilots. The FAA is encouraging pilots, and 
more recently controllers, to voluntarily report mistakes or systemic problems before
they cause accidents. The agency also is now proposing wide-ranging updates to pilot-fatigue
rules.

But this week, the safety board and the FAA want to shine a light on how pilots,
 on their own, can do more to ensure the highest standards of conduct.

"The largest piece may actually be the most elusive," FAA chief Randy Babbitt told
an industry training conference last month. "Professionalism is our most important
issue," he said, adding that all industry participants must "create an organizational
environment where professionalism is fostered."

For instance, pilot union officials continue to stress the importance of eliminating
non-pertinent discussions during critical phases of flight such as takeoffs, descents
and landing. There also is widespread talk throughout the industry of possibly reviving
training courses-which were popular in the 1990s-intended to help newly-minted captains
learn leadership and command skills.
Compared to U.S. carriers, many Asian and European airlines place far greater emphasis
on command principles for captains. With proportionately fewer U.S. commercial pilots
coming from the military than 10 or 20 years ago, many safety experts argue that
 U.S. training programs must help captains be more effective team leaders.

Since the 2009 fatal crash of a Colgan Air turboprop approaching Buffalo, N.Y., 
union leaders, regulators and safety experts have been wrestling with the dangers
of pilots who regularly fly long distances-even across the continent-to report to
work. While the safety board has urged stepped up scrutiny of possible fatigue problems,
so far, FAA has stayed away from mandating restrictions or safeguards

Industry groups representing major U.S, airlines and the smaller commuter airlines
they partner with are scheduled to hold the first full-fledged joint meeting this
summer focusing on safety issues.
"It will be up to [the regional carriers] to convey to us how things have changed,"
Ms. Hersman said.

Further down the road, the safety board said it plans to hold a public session examining
how major carriers could help raise the safety bar at regional partners or other
 affiliates they work with.

http://online.wsj.com/
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Fake pilot who flew for 13 years without licence fined £1,700

A Swedish pilot who flew passenger jets for 13 years without a licence has been 
fined £1,700 and banned from flying for 12 months.

Salme has been compared to Frank Abagnale.
Thomas Salme, 41, was arrested in March as he was about to fly 101 passengers on
 a Boeing 737 from Amsterdam's Schipol airport to Ankara in Turkey.

Officers acted after a tip-off suggested that Salme had once had a commercial pilot
license, but it had expired and it never qualified him for passengers flights. He
had accumulated 10,000 unlicensed hours in the air.

He admitted doctoring his expired pilots licence and was fined 2,000 euros (£1,712)
and was last month banned from flying for a year by a Dutch court, although the 
court noted he had never caused an accident in the 13 years.

Salme told German magazine Focus that a friend who worked for Scandinavian airline
SAS let him use their flight simulator at night when the rest of the training centre
was closed.
"I'd train there for two or three hours at a time- at least 15 to 20 times over 
one and a half years," he said.
"I got the crackpot idea to apply as a co-pilot at a real airline so I made myself
a Swedish flying permit with a logo out of regular white paper."

"It wasn't laminated, and looked like something I'd made at home."
He added that forging the ID was "surprisingly easy."
Salme has been compared to Frank Abagnale, the American who conned people into thinking
he was a pilot, and was portrayed by Leonardo DiCaprio in Catch Me If You Can. Salme
has denied the two are similar.
Following his fine, he said: "The moral point of view is that I feel ashamed that
I did lie but I didn't ever feel, not once, feel that I put passengers in an unsafe
position.
"I feel my name is all over the world, my punishment is more than 2,000 euros.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/ [http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?et=1103416018418&s=6053&e=001BBHQnk1f6RU7cbfil5tX3c_9sccyg5Cp-9AdGfqBz2dLwfV_0y2FFloLtWwDprxzbjltUBDgUpeF5zLxbWONBqlGsLsO5eULzAeTJh0oZUhI4dSdK-mqLQ==]


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US proposes former FBI staffer to head TSA

US President Barack Obama plans to nominate John Pistole, a Deputy Director of the
US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), as Assistant Secretary for the Department
of Homeland Security responsible for overseeing the Transportation Security Administration.

Pistole has the advantage of having already gone through the Senate confirmation
 process. The previous two candidates withdrew their nominations after questions
 were raised about their backgrounds.

"The talent and knowledge John has acquired in more than two decades of service 
with the FBI will make him a valuable asset to our administration's efforts to strengthen
the security and screening measures at our airports," Obama says in a statement.
 "I am grateful that he has agreed to take on this important role and I look forward
to working with him in the months ahead."
Pistole has extensive experience in counter terrorism and counter intelligence activities
with the FBI. He worked as a field supervisor of white collar crime and civil rights
and helped lead a working group on information security, addressing security and
 vulnerability issues.

Source: Air Transport Intelligence news

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The 10th Annual Course
Aircraft Fire & Explosion in Accidents, Combat & Terrorist Attacks
This spring, BlazeTech will offer the above professional course from May 25th to
 28th, 2010 in Woburn, MA.

The course is organized into four one-day modules that are stand-alone yet complementary:
·
Day 1 Vulnerability to Combat and Terrorism: physico-chemical characterization of
key threats and the aircraft response to them; and survivability and vulnerability
issues.
·
Day 2 Fluids-Related Fire and Explosion: flammability of fuels, oils and hydraulic
fluids, fuel tank explosion and inerting, SFAR 88, engine burst and fires, and post
crash fires.
·
Day 3 Materials-Related Fires:  flammability of polymers and composites, flammability
of assemblies (acoustic insulation, seats) and cabin, cargo and hidden fires, fire
detection and suppression, and passenger evacuation.
·
Day 4 Accident Investigation:   Investigation process, fire and explosion patterns
recognition, reconstruction of timeline and pathline, other forensic tools and human
factors.
Depending on your needs you may register for any or all days.
The course will provide a cohesive integrated presentation of fundamentals, small-
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For further information and an outline of the course, click on:
www.blazetech.com/firecourse.html
If you have any questions, please feel free to contact:
Albert Moussa, Ph.D., P.E.
BlazeTech Corporation
29B Montvale Ave.
Woburn MA 01801-7021
781-759-0700 x200
781-759-0703 fax
www.blazetech.com
firecourse@blazetech.com
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