Gore, FAA to Unveil Solutions to Aviation Problems

WASHINGTON —  Intensified efforts to solve a variety of problems affecting commercial aviation safety will be announced today by Vice President Al Gore and top Federal Aviation Administration officials, aviation sources said Monday.

“By targeting and preventing the leading causes of fatalities and injuries--by expanding engine inspections and by improving pilot warning and detection systems--we will significantly reduce the number of airplane crashes,” Gore’s prepared remarks say.

In recent years, the FAA has been sharply criticized for its alleged failure to deal promptly with important safety issues.

Aviation sources in Washington say that the agenda to be unveiled during the news conference at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport will focus on two specific problems--the high number of crashes in which pilots fly a mechanically sound plane into the ground, and crashes caused by the explosive failure of airplane engines.

In an effort to reduce the number of so-called “controlled flights into terrain,” the FAA plans to mandate the installation by the year 2001 of an improved on-board radar system that warns pilots when they are dangerously close to the ground.

Current systems--already mandatory on transport aircraft--scan the ground directly below the plane and usually give a pilot about 10 seconds’ warning that a crash is imminent.

The improved systems look ahead as well as down, giving pilots as much as a one-minute warning.

The most notable controlled flight into terrain in recent years involved Korean Air Flight 801, which crashed into a hill last summer while preparing to land at an airport in Guam. Cockpit records show that the current radar alarm on board the plane worked, but the pilots largely ignored it. The crash killed 228 of the 254 on board.

The FAA said it also would look at ways to anticipate and correct malfunctions that can lead to so-called “catastrophic engine failures,” in which jet turbine engines disintegrate with devastating effect.

The most recent of these occurred in July 1966, during the attempted takeoff of a Delta Airlines MD-88 in Pensacola, Fla. Debris from an exploding engine burst through a wall of the fuselage, killing two passengers and severely injuring two others. The pilot aborted the takeoff, and there were no further injuries.

The aviation sources say Gore will list several other problem areas that will receive special attention in coming months. These include planes that stray onto runways on which other aircraft are taking off or landing, planes that crash in inclement weather, violations of approved takeoff and landing procedures, recalcitrant passengers who create safety problems on planes and the need for special safety seats for infants and small children.

None of the issues to be discussed today appear relevant to the catastrophic crash of TWA Flight 800 off Long Island, N.Y., in 1996 that killed all 230 on board. Investigators say a fuel tank explosion brought down that plane, but it has not been determined what touched off the blast. The FAA, charged with regulating the aviation industry and making sure that safety programs are developed and adhered to, has been accused repeatedly of failing to do its job.

Last year, for example, the National Transportation Safety Board said that the FAA’s failure to come up with adequate safety programs and properly monitor maintenance programs were a major factor in the 1996 crash of a ValuJet plane in the Florida Everglades that killed 110 people.

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Jackson reported from Washington and Malnic from Los Angeles.