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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Following Crash, Faa Under Fire Again

Associated Press

When the skin peeled back on the fuselage of an Aloha Airlines jet during a 1988 flight, it revealed a problem unforeseen by the airlines, aircraft manufacturers and their overseers in the government.

The commercial air fleet was aging beyond anyone’s expectations. Planes designed to be obsolete in 20 years were approaching their third decade of service. New maintenance procedures and oversight were needed.

It took the Federal Aviation Administration two years to issue those orders.

An FAA plan to establish a computerized directory to target old jetliners for greater scrutiny languished more than another three years.

“The effectiveness of FAA’s inspection initiatives to monitor the aging aircraft fleet is questionable,” the General Accounting Office warned in a 1993 report.

Today, with the directory finally in place, the FAA’s ability to monitor the health of old aircraft, the maintenance of newer jets and the training of pilots and mechanics remains under question.

Limited by budget, training and time, the agency’s 2,600 inspectors spend only a third of their time overseeing maintenance, mostly by reviewing paperwork. Only a handful of the more than 1,800 aged aircraft undergo detailed examination.

“One of the things that the inspectors don’t do enough of, they tell you, is go out and visually check out where the maintenance is being done,” said Steven Calvo, senior evaluator with GAO.

In the aftermath of the ValuJet tragedy, the FAA is once more in the hot seat. The agency is targeted for investigation by its parent agency, the Department of Transportation. Its officials face grilling in Congress.

Such criticism is not new. FAA procedures have been questioned for decades. Its inspection system and training programs have been the subject of one white paper after another.

In 1987, 1989 and again in 1991, the GAO reported to Congress that the FAA lacked complete and accurate information on what its own inspectors were doing.

A 1993 report complained that FAA staff was not getting the help it needed to evaluate the latest technologies.

Two weeks ago witnesses appeared behind screens to tell a Senate subcommittee that FAA inspectors were overworked and undertrained.