Disastrous Elected Individual
A deeply concerned aviation professional shared an article regarding our next FAA administrator: Trumps Pick Has A History Of Lowering Air Safety Standards. While people often ask me if I support DEI initiatives for pilots, I always say we must employ the most qualified people, especially if they are touching safety. This leads me to question, how qualified is an Airline CEO to run the FAA?
I listened to Delta’s CEO Ed Bastian’s deposition and learned how little he knew about safety. When Ed was asked if he was familiar with the acronym SMS, he said, “Safety Management Systems, I believe.” When asked what his understanding of SMS was, he said, “I’m not a pilot or a technician,” and “I don’t know the components off the top of my head, I have no idea.” He did not even know that he was the accountable executive to the program, and then stated, “I don’t know what accountable executive means.” SMS is a Federal Regulation. How much does a CEO actually know about safety? More so, will they promote the highest level of safety, even if they say they will?
FAA History
The FAA was initially enacted to promote the viability of Air Travel. Those running airlines put profit over safety and planes crashed. People died. Thus, the FAA was tasked to ensure safe travel. This was a double-edged sword. How do you serve two masters?
Michael Huerta, was the FAA administrator when the MAX was being produced and we all know what happened there. He found his way to Delta’s board of Directors, a highly lucrative position. Steve Dickson was Delta’s SVP and he found his way to the FAA administration despite violating federal regulations at his airline, to include duty time violations and retaliation against an employee for bringing safety concerns forward.
Airlines For America
Airlines for America (A4A) says, “President Trump made a superb choice in nominating Bryan Bedford to be FAA administrator.” Of course they did!!! Do you know who America for Airlines is? They are a trade association lobbying group comprised of Airlines. When they say their purpose is to “foster a business and regulatory environment that ensures safe and secure air transportation and enables U.S. airlines to flourish, stimulating economic growth locally, nationally and globally.” I call bullshit on the, “ensures safe and secure air transportation,” part of that statement. The rest, regarding economic growth is directly related to the profitability of the airline.
A4A is a lobbying group of airline’s run by airline executives whose fiduciary responsibility is to the stockholders of their airlines. Not safety. Members include: Alaska Airlines, Inc. (AS), American Airlines, Inc. (AA) Atlas Air, Inc. (5Y), Delta Air Lines, Inc. (DL), Federal Express Corporation (FX) Hawaiian Airlines (HA), JetBlue Airways Corp. (B6), Southwest Airlines Co. (WN). United Airlines, Inc. (UA). UPS Airlines (5X)
ALPA even expresses concerns. Captain Jason Ambrosi, ALPA National President and Delta Captain, says, “We have concerns about the nominee’s past efforts to lower pilot training and safety standards and we look forward to hearing his assurances that he will maintain the current requirements,” The part of Captain Ambrosi’s assertion that concerns me deeply is “hearing his assurances that he will maintain the current requirements.” He can assert all he wants, but the truth is, this new FAA administrator will more than likely do anything to ensure those airlines he works for will get the legislation they want, safety be damned. This is my opinion based upon a preponderance of experience.
Conflict of Interest
LinkedIn: Bryan Bedford is the President of Republic Holdings.
- President Republic Airways Holdings, Inc.Republic Airways Holdings, Inc.Jul 1999 – Present · 25 yrs 9 mos
Mr. Bedford’s airline success over the years depended upon American, United and Delta. He provided their codeshare operations. This is nothing but monopoly in real life with airlines. In the game of monopoly there are “Chance” cards. Anything can happen. In the game of airline monopoly the chance card that you are playing Russian Roulette when you step on a plane is there for the taking. Pull the card that says, “Your pilots just crashed your plane. Good news, you lived. Go back ten spaces.” Or worse yet, you died and are out of the game.
2 Comments
Abso-freaking-lutely not! Disastrous Elected Individual is spot on. I fear for our industry and our lives if free reign is given to the marketplace. I know what I can control at the controls in the cockpit, but how can I know that my aircraft has been properly built, maintained and inspected? This is NOT meant as a slight at all of the fantastic mechanics and technicians who build and keep us flying, but we only need to look at Boeing to see what happens when profits are put before safety.
Doug, I don’t know this man, but I do know there should be checks and balances. And this is not one of them. We need someone to look out of the public, not at the profitability of the airlines.