| Page 2 of 2 < |
American Accused of Shoddy Maintenance
American Airlines chief Gerard J. Arpey wrote to Transportation Secretary Mary Peters that safety was never at issue.
(Ron Heflin - AP)
TOOLBOX
   Resize
COMMENT
 Discussion Policy
 CLOSE
Comments that include profanity or personal attacks or other inappropriate comments or material will be removed from the site. Additionally, entries that are unsigned or contain "signatures" by someone other than the actual author will be removed. Finally, we will take steps to block users who violate any of our posting standards, terms of use or privacy policies or any other policies governing this site. Please review the full rules governing commentaries and discussions. You are fully responsible for the content that you post.
Who's Blogging  |
In its report, the FAA blamed American's groundings on the carrier, saying that the airline did not do a thorough job of complying with the mandate despite an 18-month window to finish the work. The FAA said its inspectors found "serious and unacceptable failures" in complying with the requirement: Bundles were not properly tied, and insulation was not properly installed. The inspectors also discovered "instances of chafing between wire bundles and other surfaces," a problem that could lead to arcing and sparking, the FAA said.
The carrier grounded its planes and cancelled 457 flights over two days to inspect and repair the bundles.
By March 27, the airline told regulators that it had fixed the problems and had started flying the jets again, the FAA said.
Two weeks later, inspectors rechecked the work. "The revelations of the subsequent inspections were totally unexpected," the FAA said.
FAA inspectors found that 16 of 17 MD-80s were not in compliance with the safety mandate, regulators wrote.
American, which characterized the problems as technical in nature, and Boeing immediately proposed fixing several problems with the bundles but taking 60 days to fix everything else, the FAA reported.
FAA inspectors did not support that plan because "American had failed to demonstrate its ability to comply . . . on several occasions," the regulators said in their report. American then parked the planes.
During the four days of groundings, FAA inspectors found that 207 of 351 jets did not comply with safety rules, the FAA noted.
Although it criticized American's work on the wire bundles, the FAA said the carrier "was able to demonstrate" compliance with 59 other safety mandates that were audited by inspectors.
For its part, American said the bundle issue was never a safety hazard and accused the FAA of miscommunication. Regulators, the airline argued, initially supported a plan to gradually fix the wiring to limit the potential impact on customers.
FAA officials "expressed appreciation for American's prompt action to address these new issues," the carrier's chief executive, Gerard J. Arpey, wrote to Peters.
But FAA officials quickly changed their position, Arpey said. FAA officials later told a lawyer and an executive of the carrier that they considered the compliance problems so extensive that the carrier would have to ground the jets, Arpey wrote.
Arpey then grounded the jets, even though he and other executives believed that "the safety of our MD-80 fleet was never at issue," he said.
