Transcripts For CSPAN3 House Transportation Subcommittee Hearing On Aviation Safety - Panel 1 20240714

Come to order. The chair be authorized to declare recess during states hearing, that objection is to order, subcommittee hearing to ask questions and objections so ordered. Good morning and thank you, to todays witnesses for joining the subcommittees hearing today on the state of aviation safety. Recent tragedies at home and abroad have shed new light on what is required to ensure the safety of the traveling public. In addition to the integration of new entrants drones into the National Airspace they also present safety and security challenges. The last congress they of 2018. Bipartisan legislation was setting a Solid Foundation to improve the safety of the nations airports, pilots, crew and passengers. Todays hearing is an opportunity to get the publics perspective on current risks and challenges facing our Aviation System and necessary safety improvement. This testimony will also shape priorities as we continue our investigation into the boeing 737 max and the oversight of the faas implementation into last years faa reauthorization bill. For the sake of time im just going to speak first about panel number two and shift to the first panel, later this morning we will hear from the second panel and this fall the committee will discuss implementation of the faa reauthorization act. Later in todays hearing a subcommittee will hear from witnesses on that seven panel who were in the front lines of aviation and are critical in ensuring and the testimony will help us prioritize issues on the safety of that legislation. So for the ntsb when they testify the recommendations out lined, we particularly want to hear about part 135 flight ops and ensuring the integration of safety technologies, as Congress Works to improve the pipeline for the next generation pilots debate continues on strong training pilot rules, after the cold and crash. Congress cannot undermine our safety rules, simply respond if there is a Pilot Shortage im interested continues to delay the implementation of the mandate to require at least 10 consecutive hours of rest, for Flight Attendants between duty periods so i want to hear from the professional association of Flight Attendants about the immediate and longterm impacts of that inaction. As evidenced by reset events recent events, specialists can set shed more light about that role safety inspectors and engineers must process and the improvements that are necessary to ensure the safety of us aircraft. And lastly , gehsmann davis and ferguson and i introduced the fair and open skies act to avoid the regulation of the home countries or otherwise undermine labor standards. So when we get to the panel i would appreciate the Transportation Workers Union as well as in support of this bill, we would like to hear more about the importance of maintaining a strong labor protection on safety. Now i want to turn to the first panel. The issue of the 737 max has not , is not just about stakeholders in the aviation industry, this committee is a public body and therefore has the responsibility to hear from those most impacted which unfortunately includes at times of tragedy. Todays first panel, mr. Paul jarreau and mr. Michaels to mow who both lost family and the Ethiopian Airlines flight 302 or et 302 crash which itself claimed the lives of 157 people. Chair and i asked this to give a voice to the 157 victims of that tragic accident. Mr. And mr. I cant imagine the immeasurable grief that you and your families are experiencing. On behalf of the entire committee, from members here today and for those who cant join us, i want to extend our sincerest condolences to both of you and your families and all the families. During this very difficult time. And we appreciate your willingness to come testify in front of our committee. Your testimony is a crucial reminder of the International Role of the Aviation System and these crashes occurred on us made us assembled and us regulated airplanes. The faas actions in this communitys efforts clearly have implications for travel around the world. A majority of the victims from et 302 and lion air 610 were not americans. And therefore it is only right to hear from someone who can better represent the Global Community impacted by this tragedy. So i wanted to thank you for coming in from canada last night , thank you for meeting with us with rank and member last night, and i want to as well recognize , is in the audience, she lost her brother matthew. As well. And there are of course many other family members who are not here but are certainly represented in our thoughts, our prayers, and in todays testimony and with that i want to turn to the Ranking Member jared graves for opening comment. Thank you mr. Chairman and thank you for holding this here man today this hearing today. First and most important the i want to express my condolences on behalf of everyone here for the loss that you have experienced and i appreciate the time and dedication that you have committed yourself to to ensuring that every single Lesson Learned from this can be extracted and most important way that no one ever has to go through this again. There are some amazing statistics about aviation travel, we could sit here and talk about how, since 2000, no, since 1997, there has been a 95 reduction in aviation accident and you can look at the World Health Organization statistics talking about how there are 1. 35 Million Deaths and up to 50 million injuries annually due to road crashes and in comparison there was one death for every 3 million flights in aviation. So we could sit back and say look, the statistics are great and things are going well but that is absolutely, absolutely not appropriate and we are going to continue to ensure that we learn every single thing that we can because the hundreds, over 300 lives that were lost and the experience that you are going through is completely unimaginable to me. We met last night and i made a commit to you that the process that was used to certify this aircraft will not in any way be used to underground these aircraft and i look forward to hearing from you, i know you have committed an extraordinary amount of time to ensuring that every single thing that we can learn from this, every single step in this process can be thoroughly examined to ensure that as we move forward that no other family has to go through this again. And i just want to reiterate the commitment that we made. We are going to take every Lesson Learned no matter how painful, no matter the change that it requires and ensure that appropriate solutions are put in place, not just for this aircraft but for all aircraft moving forward. And ensuring that these Lessons Learned are shared with the international community, we have a number of stakeholders that are here today. Pilots, we have some service tech nations, the Flight Attendants and others represented, a lot of other stakeholders that have important perspective. I want to thank you very much for being here today, your strength and power has been absolutely amazing through this. And thank you for being here as well, it was great to meeting with you last night and i look forward to hearing from your testimony. Thank you, chairman deposit . Thank you mr. Chairman, again thanks to the families that are here today for having the bravery to testify and to persevere as we move forward. Weve lost 346 lives into flights in five months. And that is why it is so fitting that you are here today to represent those lives, those families. I have been on this subcommittee a long time and back when i was first on the subcommittee we had what we called the tombstone mentality. At the faa. Too often we were chasing after an accident to figure out what steps should have been taken, what should have been required, what went wrong. And i tried for a number of years to say, you know, youve got this archaic mandate from the 30s that was moved over from the Civil Aeronautics Board to the faa, that you both promote and regulate the industry. That was when it was a industry. It is a maturing entered street i would say and i think there is a conflict but i was told no there is no conflict. And we were doing an faa bill and i offered an amendment to strip Promotional Authority but i lost here in the committee. And then, it was not in the senate bill either. But then value jet went down. And suddenly it was, there are some problems here. With oversight, maintenance, subcontracting, all these things. And i got a phone call as i remember, saying the amendment you offered . And i said the one that was rejected, well where would we put it in the bill . And i got about 90 of what i wanted in that bill to strip faa of its promotional duties. And focus them on what they are supposed to be doing which is keeping people safe. And it took a number of years really, like the agency has memories and there were people there, it took a while but weve been doing pretty well. And then along comes oda and when it was first offered i said i dont understand how this is going to work and what is the firewall between boeing a person who works for boeing and the boeing person who works supposedly in the Public Interest for the faa. I voted against it when it first went forward but then when we got around to reauthorization it seemed like it was working pretty well. We knew we didnt have enough faa inspectors to do proper oversight, we raised concerns about that during reauthorization. But now, we see that there is very significant questions being raised in this matter, the committee is involved in a very indepth investigation in addition to other investigations in the Justice Department and Inspector General and others, and the undertaking to how this all happened. And we will be hearing from boeing in the future when we finish, weve received a trove of documents and we are pouring through them. So that is a work in progress. But we are here today, to talk about some concerns that are ongoing and hear from the families. There are a few other things in that bill that the faa has stonewalled, Flight Attendant rest, fought for that for years, got it in the bill, we held it against the wishes of some of the airlines and those in the senate, and we persevered but now the faa is low walking that and saying we cant do that until 2020. I understand one of the airlines is pushing really really hard. To not allow Flight Attendants to get proper rest. Secondary barriers . We got that in. We know now, which i guess a lot of it, we hadnt thought about that you hardly ever have a new type. There is a 50yearold plane and it is still the same type. And the industry tried to say we will only have secondary barriers in new types. New types of planes. I fly a lot and the Flight Attendant behind with her arms crossed is not much of an obstacle to getting into the flight deck. So again, we are pushing hard to make certain that the faa goes forward, there are others that werent properly addressed, lithium batteries. Weve already lost two freighters to lithium better fires, lithium battery fires. They are not properly overseen by the faa, some problems with the state department and other issues, they dont have the drug testing or Alcohol Testing or background tests. And then finally, of course the stupid Government Shutdown and all the damage that caused at the faa, the obstruction it caused at the faa and we had legislation that would rectify that that would draw on the Airport Improvement Fund which has 90 billion in it and not have more dumb shutdowns from the faa. So there is still work to be done in this and the committee will leave no stone unturned as we go forward to make things better and safer in the future, thank you mr. Chairman. Making member thank you mr. Chairman for calling the hearing and i want to join my colleagues in expressing sincere condolences to the family and to the friends of the victims in both lion air, and Ethiopian Airlines flight 302. None of us can truly understand the pain and sorrow that they are going through and we thank you for being here today to share your perspective as we continue to review the impacts of these two terrible tragedies. There is no doubt in my mind that all of us share the same goal of seeking the safest Aviation System and seeking to improve it in the United States and all over the world for that matter. Our efforts in this regard have to be constant, they have to be consistent and they have to be constructive. This means mitigating risk and developing contingencies in all areas and to this and im pleased that we have someone here from the ntsb as well as labor organizations, these unions represent the men and women who are operating, maintaining and servicing us airlines as well as those regulating and inspecting airlines every day. They are going to assist us in understanding the state of aviation safety in the us and abroad and i also look forward to testimony from many other stakeholders from the federal aviation the illustration directly on the state of aviation safety that is coming up in the future. In a future hearing. Again i want to thank family members for being here and express my condolences and with that i healed back. Thank you, we now move to testimony, just for community members, mr. Will be testifying and mr. Will be here in support and may be available to answer questions as well as mr. , and misses link misses will be testifying. So be sure that you are talking into the microphone that is turned on, if it is pointed at your chin that is probably better for the sound and as well, although we tend to limit to five minutes, in agreement to talking to mr. Hes going to go over five and we are not going to hold him to a fast five, we will let him testify until he is done. Mr. Recognized. Thank you chairman larson and defazio and Ranking Members for allowing me to testify today. The boeing 737 max crashes killed my wife, my three children, my mom in law and 341 others. Today i speak not only with my voice but the voices of my departed family, my mom in law and the other 341 victims. My wife carol was a dedicated homemaker and a fulltime accountant who wanted to change the world, through Cultural Education in marginalized populations of kenya. My sixyearold son ryan was a super intelligent boy who was fascinated by the galaxy and inspired to be an astronaut. My fouryearold daughter delighted everyone. My ninemonthold daughter ruby and my mom in law was a retired teacher of over 40 years who had shaped the world of young men and women, through her teaching and counseling. I think about their last six minutes alive. My wife and my mom in law knew they were going to die, they had to somehow come for the children during those final moments. Knowing they were all their last. I wish i was there with them. It never leaves me that my families flesh is there in ethiopia mixed with the earth and also pieces of the aircraft. In canada, Independence Day was celebrated on july 1. I stayed buried in my little house in my grief, hearing the sounds of celebration and fireworks in the sky. But all i could think about was the 737 max traveling and eventually diving to the ground killing my whole family and 152 others. If my wife, my children, and my mom in law were alive, they would have enjoyed all family activities on canada day. Every minute of every day they would be all around me full of life. I miss them. Every minute of every day. On april 4, three weeks after the death of my family, and what i have since learned was a shameful pattern of behavior by boeing and airplane manufacturers, boeing shifted the focus from the roof, the root cause of the crashes which was a design flaw and started talking about foreign pilot error. And is an insult to humanity. Boeing and their apologies want to shift from their single minded quest and place it on foreign pilot who, like domestic american pilots, were left in the dark boeing. Would they have used the term domestic pilot error if the crash happened in the United States . The term foreign pilot error is utter prejudice and disrespect to pilots and boeing customers across the world. Boeing used this fallacy of foreign pilot error to avoid the grounding of the 737 max after the crash of lion air flight 610 on october 29 last year. That decision killed my family and 152 others in the crash of Ethiopian Airlines flight 302 in the crash of Ethiopian Airlines flight 3024 months later. The faa should have known that the failure to have critical Safety Systems could cause crashes and death. They recklessly left boeing to police itself. Because it is too different from the original plane, we demand that similar training be required. The fabrication must take place in combination with the fix for the Safety System. The faa clearly needs to fulfill safety obligations. The us should only confirm boeing should not be allowed to act like a mere Investment Company extracting wealth to supercharge the holding returns at the expense of safety and quality. Their leadership should change in favor of engineering safety focus. Other other Warning System deity the faa needs to have such systems in place. If boeings conduct continues another plane will dive to the ground killing me, you, all your children, all your members, all other members of your family, it is you who must be the leaders in this fight, and this fight for aviation safety in the world. Future hearings of this committee should include those technical dissenters, safety engineers and families. You hear multiple testimony from pilots and unions, we the victims families need to continue to be included in these hearings. Thank you for allowing me to speak today. Thank you. For your testimony, your moving testimony and your recommendations. We will now move to questions. And we will go one at a time, im not sure if all members have questions for you but i will start and i know youve come with some recommendations for the committee to consider. And i wanted to ask you, specifically about your written testimony and the issue of the changes that weve made about 14 years ago, we call it the oda, the Organization Designation authorization. And i want to give you a chance to amplify your written testimony, your oral testimony with your written testimony. And can you explain in your mind the change that you think the committee ought to be making and why it ought to be making any changes to that authority . Michael wants to answer and i will supplement later. Thank you mr. Chairman. We as families have become not experts but we do have some opinions and we are in touch with a lot of the families from both crashes all over the world and will continue providing input and recommendations, its not just us but all the families because we want to include all of them. And our understanding at this point, and ive talked to boeing safety engineers who have been in the system back in the der program, and through the transition to oda, it was explained to me like this. There have always been timeline pressures and financial pressures but under the older der program when, of course, boeing still paid these engineers but they reported to the faa, there were two lines of authority, two chains of command. One up through the faa side and one through the boeing side. And the Safety Culture could put a stop to things if something looked wrong. After the oda system, and im not sure this is entirely clear from the black and white text of reading about the systems, after the oda system there was only one chain of command up to boeing, it was very difficult for the Safety Culture to stop something and that was a big change. Group think was encouraged, being creative in fault tree analysis, thinking about what could go wrong and documenting it and get revenge against it, you were encouraged not to be terribly creative or you might have to find another, they might encourage you to go find another place to work, elsewhere maybe in the company. So that is our understanding of going back to oda, the dual chain of command, but there may be others. Anything to add mr. . Yes, essentially what we are saying is we think oda program, boeing has oversight of itself. Thank you. Im going to turn to mr. , recognized. Thank you. When i get an Opening Statement i talked about statistics. You both being here today and the conversations that weve had to make it clear that these arent statistics, these are lives, these are family members and its something that is a message that cannot be overstated to us, again, i want to thank you for your strength. I want to thank you for your resilience and your commitment to ensuring that no family has to go through this ever again. And it doesnt matter if we get to 99. 9 improvement. If there is one life, if there is one injury, we need to keep striving to make sure that we get to perfection. And i just wanted to say again, any process to ungrounded this aircraft as far as im concerned will not be allowed to resemble the process that was allowed, for these accidents to occur. I cant even call them accidents, these disasters. So thank you very much both for being here and i want to remind you that my door is open, my phone is open at any time and i look forward to continuing the dialogue with you. Thank you very much for your recommendation. You. Thank you. The chair recognizes mr. Deposit over five minutes. Thank you mr. Chairman, i read your entire testimony, very thoughtful and compelling. And you are an investment professional, one of your observations is about the pressures from wall street, the concerns regarding how executive compensation is determined on stock price. And stock buybacks. Would you like to comment on that a little bit since you abbreviated your testimony for oral purposes, which we appreciate . But would you like to perhaps elaborate on that a little bit or make that point . Sure, thank you. When companies repurchase their own stock, they try to send a message out there to the investors that we are bullish about our own company, we believe that our Financial Performance is good. And it seems that since the ceo obviously before that they still had the witty to Purchase Program going on but since he took over the dollar values of the repurchase of the stock went up. And i do believe it was 2017 when they started selling the seven the set 37 the 737 maxis. So they were growing and revenues were growing, they decided we has a good amount of retained earnings so we can throw the money out there and the stock price obviously, when you sell those, the stock price will keep going because eventually investors will keep buying stock. And the beneficiaries of these are actually the executives because they benefit from equity compensation, that is the exercise of stock options. We also saw them, you know, raising their revenues and Earnings Guidance and obviously this was based on the expectations of the sale of the 737 max. We saw them increased dividends. Usually you see a company that increases dividends, and at the same time continues to repurchase their own stock. When that happens, then the company is so bullish about their own achievements, they just want the stock to keep growing. So, thank you for that, so the money that they used for repurchasing, it is not constrained anyway, they could spend that money on personnel or plant equipment or anything else, is that correct . Well, yes. And i really felt that when the board of directors authorized the repurchase of stock, 20 billion, that is just a couple of months ago, about six months ago. That was barely 2 months after the crash of lion air flight 610, so at that point they knew that there were safety concerns with their jet and they should have invested on safety. Instead of repurchasing stock. I recently read, and this is something we are looking into, a news story where they were laying off senior engineers and hiring contractors, some paid less than 10 an hour in dispersed locations around the world which is obviously hard to supervise and integrate in developing software for this airplane. And that, when you talk about the amount of money that they had on a discretionary basis that they could use for bonuses, or dividends, or buybacks, it raises some real concerns. So thank you for expanding on that. I yield back mr. Chairman. Thank you. What we have now going forward, a few members have questions. And so we are going to go a little out of order in that regard but miss david from kansas is vice chair of the subcommittee. Thank you mr. Chairman, and to the Ranking Member, of the committee, first i want to start off by saying thank you to everybody who i know is in the middle of a grieving process right now, for being here. This is an intimidating place to be in general, and to take the time to come and force everyone who sits on this committee and all of us who sit in congress, to stop and think about, we hear a lot about stakeholders and certainly everyone who gets onto a plane is a stakeholder in this. So your voice is just as important here as the people who are in the industry making money and running businesses. So i appreciate, i appreciate you. And as someone who is on this committee, i am very committed to a thoughtful review of the entire process that is going on for us, the responsibility that we have as members of congress is not just to legislate but also to perform oversight functions to keep people safe. And when i read through your testimony there are two things i would love to hear, both of you speak about actually, one, you talked a little bit already about what we, who we should hear from, that the testimony should be from the engineers and from executives and whistleblowers and everybody. I would love to hear you talk a little bit more about that in the context of how do we make sure that you have the trust of the industry . Because so much of this is built on trust and this is where we see a breakdown of that trust, the fact that you have to talk about earnings and statements and in your professional capacity of understanding that stuff into a conversation that really centers on how do we keep people safe, is i think part of the trust conversation. And the other thing that, when i read your testimony, the fact that you said that boeing has never reached out to the families really stuck out to me and i would like to hear you comment on that publicly because i think that is really important. Well, yes, ill answer the second question first. Boeing, they have been in front of cameras acknowledging their mistakes in the installation of , obviously they dont talk about the flaws in the designs of the 737 max, and they have apologized to the families in front of cameras. Now, they know who the next of kin of these victims are. But they have not come to us and they have not apologized in person. The airlines sent letters to us, not to apologize but to offer their simple these and their messages of condolences. So the expectation is, it is hard to trust boeing with their apologies given that they have not reached out to us. And i do believe that they did that in the days leading up to the Paris Air Show because it is for commercial reasons. I believe it is a publicity stunt that they just appeared on cameras to apologize to the families. I think the families are in agreement that boeing, their apology to cameras has not been apologies to the families. We were in ethiopia, our family, after the crash and the Ethiopian Airlines sent letters, they invited us in and were reaching out directly. So it was very much warmer. And this recent offer of 100 million seems like a pr stunt to us, they never reached out to families to discuss what the needs of the families are. And on future hearings, the technical dissenters should be heard from, those who dissented from a per from a group think, if the committee has identified any the public should hear them not just investigators. Any whistleblowers who may have been fired and maybe have a gag order pursuant to a settlement who have complained about safety issues with regard to the 737 max, they should be called to testify with protected subpoenas so the public can hear what they had to say and what their experiences, and the Aviation Software writers, do they have the same level of engineering Safety Culture that the regular engineers, aviation safety engineers who are getting more software these planes and in this case it took control of the plane and pushed it into the ground. We need triple redundancy in every part of the system as they merge with software and hardware and the software writers do they really have that kind of culture . We need to hear who wrote that software and what they have to say and what their culture is. And to just reinforce what mike said, for this committee to have achieved its objective, and that objective is to do a thorough investigation as to what happened, within boeing and the fda, faa, the weakness in their internal oversight processes, about a jet that is flawed, was designed, satisfied and allowed to fly. Then we need to hear from the technical dissenters, from the engineers as well. I will just close by saying thank you again. Both of you, for coming here and being the voices that are sharing with the members of congress what we need to do to make sure that the trust of the folks who are getting onto planes exists. Thank you. Thank you. Just a moment, mr. Lynch and ms. Craig, five minutes mr. Chairman thank you for holding this hearing and i thank the ranking there is as well, thank you both for coming here, and giving voice to your loved ones who cannot speak for themselves. I also want to thank misses , nadia, michaels wife for spending about an hour with me after the last hearing and talking about her daughter sonia. I know that and are here, and i know that is here on behalf of her brother matt who also perished. I want to thank you all, first of all for being willing to come here and express your grief and trying to hold us all accountable. Boeing, the faa and congress. For our responsibility in this. I also want to thank you for your courage, in during your tragedy and your loss, turning it into something that might benefit the general public by making this real, by putting this on us and holding our feet to the fire to make sure that we take every step possible to correct this situation. Going forward. In my earlier conversations with nadia, michael and i know this is something mr. Js raised as well. In our last hearing we heard from capt. Sullenberger regarding the retraining of pilots during the recertification process and once that certification process begins, if and when this 737 max eight is allowed to resume flights. And there is a controversy or some difference of opinion of whether the training for those pilots or retraining for those pilots should be conduct did by simulator or, which is what capt. Sullenberger recommended, or whether it should be allowed to occur by computer. A simple computer program. And i know that nadia had some strong opinion on it. I think there is a need to make sure we get this right and i know that inadvertent lady we have delved into some of the issues. I see some of the recommendations that youve made here in your opening testimony. What are your thoughts on the requirement that we make sure that, in light of the fact that we had reports that the aircraft was acting like a bucking bronco, how important do you think it is that we give each and every pilot the full knowledge and experience on a simulator versus allowing them to be retrained on a computer . If you will . Well, first of all, boeing should never be allowed to conceal information from the aviation industry, from the pilots and the public because they did that with mcas. Eight days after the crash of lion air flight 610 they issued a Flight Operations manual bulletin and even after knowing that 189 people died, they did not mention mcas. They did not want to mention the software. And that means they were just trying to conceal information because when you talk of mcas than you talk of the design flaws in the 737 max. And a lot of times, in our lives, we tend to rely on experiences of other people. And when capt. Sullenberger spoke he said that even knowing, he knew, he knew what would happen so what he was trying to do, when he was trying to do the simulator he got to understand why the pilots could not control that aircraft. And that means that just the ipad is not enough at all. So, my recommendation is that the pilots should go through Simulator Training, and the Flight Operations manual should always be disclosing everything that is in an aircraft. That should never happen again. I mean that is criminal. Why would you conceal information of an Important Software that can take control of the plane . And that is what happened, mcas took control in the pilots could not recover it and it just dove to the ground. So that is something that the committee should look into. Michael . Thank you for the question. This plane, we definitely want Simulator Training would if we want Simulator Training as families. My wife and myself came to washington after his death far earlier than we would ever want to. We hear that the board was proposing another hour of ipad training. We were very unhappy and worried there is going to be a rush to underground this plane. The commentary was only 14 days. We got involved in even though we were not ready to do so. We had a meeting with faa early. We got families to sign the letter requesting that the Comment Period be extended. We need Simulator Training. The faa was gracious enough to grant that time to comment. Other members of the public submitted comments that Simulator Training is needed. As they said, when you have it undisclosed or at the very most partially disclosed Software System that can take control and apartments and cause sterling things to happen, the simulator makes sense to me by doing it is far better than one of many checklist. You have to get into your muscle memory when those things happen. You do not have much time to react. After she is done, were going to do a five minute transition to the next panel. Thank you so much mr. Chairman. It is great to see you here again. Thank you for giving me time to speak with you and to talk about how we honor your daughter with action. That is what we need to do. I cannot imagine the pain you are enduring with the loss of your wife and your children. Thank you for finding the strength to testify here today. I want to continue focusing on what more we can do to develop those robust postmarket. After these claims are out. As my colleagues have said. What more we can do to make sure that we have a robust system for identifying these red flags before crashes occur. I keep wondering how one industry fundamentally rooted in safety and like robust mandatory reporting requirements by manufacturers and mechanics and etc. In the last hearing, i asked about the safety action program. The Flight Operations quality assurance. Whether or not this operational recording schemes were catching the mechanical malfunctions or red flags in this country. I also have wondered how they cannot be required by law to compile and publish near miss malfunctions. It is hard to believe that not a single pilot anywhere in the world went headtohead with this malfunctioning system. Overcame the software. Landed with information about that experience. And the public did not know that. I work for a company that produced pacemakers before command. The control the regular heart palpitations. Machines that by design are there to save lives. That we had those kinds of robust reporting requirements. Why doesnt the airlines and manufactures. He testified in support of them creating a system that will require manufactures and others to develop this kind of early Warning System. The industry has advocated in favor of the aviation safety action program. The Flight Operations reporting system. Do you think these are currently in love. What other changes do you think they must incorporate for all parties to be held accountable for putting safety first and making sure the events do not go unreported or unnoticed. Thank you for that question. We as the family or at least my family and others without to think that a more robust system is necessary. If you have a Safety Record, that is one crush every thousand flights. That is not getting up. I know in other critical safety industries, i am not the expert. There is that mandatory reporting. You need a system that can analyze and recognize patterns and have a way to get in front of those patents. On and you have had experience with that in the medical device industry. The combination of software and hardware interacts. Indeed more often the software fills the hardware. We have talked to a former administrator who says there was some sort of an auto mandatory reporting in the auto industry. And him analyzing of those records. They may very well be but i do not know there may be a more mature reporting on the auto side. I do not love the state of that program right now. There is a lot of information besides gps data were these plates are on the functions. For us, we wish the faa had gotten ahead of. I am sure theyre doing their job the best they can. But to get ahead of it. Like it was said, we now have 346 tombstones. Lets make some changes. Do you have anything to add . Not at the moment. Thank you. I yelled back. Thank you very much for testifying today. I want to commit to the numbers you written testimony. It is equally compelling. What you offered us today is not just additional pathways for us as a committee to explore in our oversight. More importantly youre putting a face to what consumes the outside to be a very bureaucratic and stepbystep and incremental investigation. Your presence is a reminder to all of us the public individuals. They are much more important than the other folks that we tend to listen to around here. I appreciate your willingness to spend some time with us. To remind us of that. Thank you very much. With that the committee will escape and we would do a transition for five minutes. Thank you. I would like to welcome our witnesses to the second panel. The acting director. National president and association. President specialist. Transworkers union. Thank you for being here today. We do look forward to your testimony. In my Opening Statement on the comments. Would like to hear from each of you. Our witnesses full statement will be included in the record. Center whats in testimony has been made part of the record, we request you limited oral testimony to five minutes. You may not perceive. Good morning chairman larson. Members of the subcommittee. Thank you for invited the National Transportation safety board to testify. I am acting director. Within the ntsb. First, i would like to express express my condolences. We must learn from their pain and strive to close the gaps that allow the strategies to happen. It is an independent federal Agency Charged with congress with investigating every act and certain incidents in the United States. And at preventing future acts. We conduct about 1400 investigations each year. In the last decade, the number of accidents have declined overall from 539 fatalities in 2009 to 401 in 2018. 92 percent were in general aviation. The remainder part 135 operation represents a permanent gap in aviation secretary that is on our most wanted list. Currently, all of them are not required to meet some of the same safety requirements that have proven effective in enhancing the safety of commercial Airline Operations. In march, the completed investigation of a part 135 learjet that crashed into new jersey. Based on the findings, they again reiterated recommendations to the faa to require data monitoring programs and Safety Management systems for part 135 operations. We have initiated another investigation into accidents and incidents. The safety issues were not known to the accident. They had originally issued these recommendations following a 2015 crashed in ohio. Following a 2016 accident in alaska. We have also made recommendations to the faa under part 121 and 135. The cockpit image recording system. His recordings would have focused and that in the development of targeted safety recommendations to reduce risk to the traveling public. These recommendations are currently open on an acceptable response. Unfortunately there is also consists of passengers aboard aircraft where the operation is exempt from part 135. On june 21 a skydiving flight crashed in hawaii killing 11 people. Regardless of the purpose of the flight are the type of aircraft, commercial aviation should be safe. Our most wanted list also includes strengthening occupant protection. Without the use, preventable death will continue to occur. We recommend the require on general aviation airplanes. The faa has not require them on aircraft manufacturers before 1986. For economic reasons. This recommendation was closed on acceptable action. This week marks the 30th anniversary of united flight 230 to crash. 111 people were killed and 172 were entered. Format infants were on board the aircraft. In preparation for the landing, all the adults were instructed by the crew. All of them were rejected from the adults ribs and enter. One of them fatally. We recommend that prohibit children from being upheld on commercial flights. Children are safest when theyre probably secured in their own seat. Even when documents use the appropriate restraints and evacuation procedures, because otherwise survivable crashes to turn fatal. And demonstrates that previous actions to mitigate the safety hazard has not been effective. This recommendation is currently open on acceptable response. Another area of concern. The transportation technology. Such as commercial Space Systems operation. The continue to grow with expertise in both areas. Including our first investigation in 1993 and a midair collision between aircraft and drone in 2016. It is inevitable that the need for our investigations will continue to grow as well. We continue our focus in these areas. We appreciate the commitment to making sure we have the resources to vent safety in the feature. Thank you for the opportunity to discuss the work theyre doing to make transportation safer. Continues to be room for the improvement. Best and ready to work with you to improve the safety of our safety. Im happy to take care of questions. Thank you very much. Good morning. Thank you chairman. On behalf of the 62,000 pilots that are represented, most let us express our condolences to the loved ones of the victims of the Ethiopian Airlines. We cannot know the depth of your great. We can share in your determination to leave a legacy of safety improvements for those who have lost. As a fortyyear pilot, the highest standard of safety has been at the forefront of off line career. As president of the irvine association, the Worlds Largest nongovernmental safety organization, i can tell you that all pilots share this dedication. What Airline Accidents are rare, even one fatal accident is one too many. Over the years, they have helped develop an investigation process to identify all the contributive factors. Most importantly implement those changes to improve safety. The results include the first officer qualification experience and training requirements that emerge from the investigation. These requirements are major reason why u. S. Industry has not experienced a Pilot Training or operational related fatality on a u. S. Passenger airline in more than 10 years. This is why they have called upon the International Civil organization to set global pilot standards. Incredibly, even when safety improvements like these are codified in law, some still sick to undermine them. What we have made strides, we have more to do. They will continue to help identify improvements not only do these investigations but also in the longterm the industries risk and data driven approach to enhancing safety. We will never stop fighting against those who put profits before the safety of our passengers and crew. Our safety commitment means there will be fully involved in understanding what went wrong and evaluating how to move forward with the 737 max. Once the final review is completed. We made clear the questions must be answered in the areas of oversight. Certification and delegation of authority. Their work to ensure that industry and government make the changes necessary to safeguard our system. There must be more determined to have her. That would have a lesson from the past. For example, we must deliver on congresss intent to install secondary product barriers on all newly manufactured Passenger Aircraft. A lesson we all learn from the report. The pilots like myself are condo. Today they released in the report. The lives of the indisputable safety of the presence of at least two highly trained pilots on the flight deck. We know the presence of at least two pilots on board as not only contributes to our proactive risk predictive Safety Culture, it is the reason why u. S. Air transportation is so safe today. The importance of a strong Safety Culture is one reason they propose allowing Foreign Airlines with the Business Models to show the United States. The schemes created a stable Work Environment that can discourage proactive sector reports. Document the chair. Vice chair davidson. And this subcommittee for supporting legislation to enable the department of transportation that they supply for the United States. The house included a similar provision. In the reauthorization. I hope they will move quickly. To finish, as pilots, our party is always safety. We make certain our industry learns from their tragedies we see. We make improvements. Whether it is the decision on return to service the boeing 737 max. Or detect off on every flight, it is safe to fly when the pilots in command say this. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak to you all today. Thank you. I recognize your five minutes. Good morning chairman. Ranking member and members of the aviation subcommittee. Im the president of the association of professional Flight Attendants. First i like to send my deepest condolences. And all the families who are impacted by the Ethiopian Air and land crashes. The testimony was very compelling and heartfelt. They represent over 20,000 Flight Attendants of american month. It is the largest independent union in the world. Is also member of the coalition of Flight Attendants. Organizations that enable all usbased Flight Attendants come together to support safety and profession. Today im proud to be the voice for the nearly 100,000 Flight Attendants across the nation. I know many of you on this committee job each week and personally understand the challenges of air travel today. Believe me, we feel your frustrations. As the First Responders on board the aircraft and the last line of defense to the unthinkable happened again. Your safety and security is our top priority. The 2018 reauthorization bill included many safety improvements we are all eager to see implemented and made the continuing oversight of this important committee. We apply the passage of this bill with overwhelming bipartisan support. Is a general attribute to leadership. There are several safety provisions i like to speak to today. First, in section 337. They have instructed to review and evacuation procedures. The changes to passenger seating configuration. In that time i have been speaking, it has been 92nd. My crew will be charged with evacuating a full aircraft with 291 lifesupport. I hope we save all of those laws. They have previously testified regarding our concerns on seat size. Our ability to evacuate an aircraft using just half of the exits in 90 seconds or less. This is the certification requirement mandated by the faa. The truth is the passengers are now older. Sometimes less mobile. As they continue to shrink, frustrations rise. We are seeing unprecedented levels of air raids. In an Emergency Landing, passengers have enough space to assume the proper brace position. Under these conditions, even 90 seconds seems realistic. A comprehensive review of evacuation procedures under roadwork conditions is long overdue. Second, the faa recognizes that it jeopardizes flight safety. It has no process to select reports from great. This means the true extent of toxic fumes contamination remains largely unknown. Last year, but our not alone, 1500 events were reported to our safety department. Mann members have been hospitalized and suffered chronic and permanent neurological damage. Section 326 the first step. It takes to build a needed step father. Third, congress amended the minimum Flight Attendant risk requirement for 8 to 10 hours. When they pass this legislation, the intent was clear. Simply modify the 1994 rule related to Flight Attendant risk within 30 days of passage. It makes common sense but apparently not. We are not hearing from the d. O. T. And faa that will take months to implement this modest change. Given the support of this provision, we asked that the committee reengage and assist on this timely implementation. Last but not least we want to thank the committee for your work providing oversight on the 737 max tragedy. We will be the ones in the aisles reassuring our passengers. Flight attendants must have absolute confidence in the aircraft and process that will return to service. We continue to look to you to ensure that process is fully transparent. As Flight Attendants, safety is in our dna. On any given flight on any given day, we could be called upon to attend to a heart attack victim. To fight fires. To avert security risks. To deescalate and raise passengers. Identifies six traffickers. All while being prepared to evacuate a plane stuffed full of passengers at a moments notice within 90 seconds. We need to know and be able to communicate to the traveling public our guest that we have and will continue to have the safest Aviation System in the world. Thank you. My testimony is not complete. I recognized them for five minutes. Members of the subcommittee. Thank you for inviting me to testify on behalf of the aviation specialist to discuss the current state of aviation specialty. While it remains a world leader, it is time to examine all facts that influence aviation safety. First of all alike to knowledge the family members here today to boston love once in the Ethiopian Airlines accident. On behalf of all members, we extend our deepest condolences to you and the families for the victims off also suffered great loss. Represent approximate 11,000 employees nationwide. s employees are the backbone of the Aviation System. Textile operations maintain and support and Certified Air Traffic Control equipment. Safety inspectors or asis oversee and inspect commercial aviation. It also develop flight procedures and perform quality analysis of Aviation Systems using air Traffic Control and aid in building and restoring the facility. When i last appeared, it was in the wake of the longest shot down in u. S. History. The support personnel were followed and no longer providing safety oversight while technicians and agents and others work without pay. They were being stripped away. Enforcement we find herself approaching a similar situation with our Funding Agreement in sight. It is imperative to the safety of the National Airspace system that congress and the white house worked to avoid another shut down. The certainty of the political bombing also threatens the ability to attract and retain the highly Skilled Workforce that it requires. Staffing and training challenges have played it for years. It remains a challenge. Resulting in increased restoration time and more air traffic delays. Staffing shortages can also put them at risk. The safety of the system starts with the safety of all faa employees. They do not even know how many employees are adequately needed to perform safety critical work. For example, this committee soffits. The faa reauthorization directing them to examine the staffing model. It remains unclear when this work will be completed. Their bottom for the certification process is that is your aircraft and equipment that meet the requirements. Past representatives in flight standards. And others to operate. Why the inspectors and, individuals and ideas are often granted more authority to conduct certification functions for additional reform. Their nonperforming more than 90 percent of the certification activities despite serious concerns by the Inspector General that oversight is lacking. While the delegation of this authority may be deeply integrated, now is the time to make sure the faa is providing the proper oversight of the program to assure success moving forward. Enforcement, after the; tragic accidents that led to the ground of the 737 max, with the agency facing scrutiny, they continued to rapidly expand the delegation program. The oversight from the certification process. Related to the 737 max artisan. This is but one example where risk is continuing being introduced into the system that may not manage to sell for years to come. I also like to highlight the work performed overseas on u. S. Aircraft for and repair stations. Domestically, inspectors perform unannounced inspections of repair facilities. However, for facilities receive unannounced inspections. Given the facilities advance notice to ensure compliance before inspectors arrive. They should be subject to the same requirements as domestic repair stations. The Weather Technology will offer the make of our airspace at the integration of drugs. Over 1 million drones registered, there facing a new set of safety and training challenges. Astrologer not sharing airspace with manned aircraft, the safety technicians are tasked with ensuring the safe operation and compliance with federal regulations. Similar to the many other areas of aviation safety. Employees will be forced to oversee this plumbing industry throughout the proper guidance and training. This is not the contract to before the Agency Recognizes and reconsiders this approach. In closing, the past safety of our airspace with the investment and was oversee and maintain a. Anything short of that is simply gambling with aviation safety. I look forward to many questions. Thank you. I now recognize mr. Simpson for five minutes. Thank you chairman defazio. Ranking members. For holding this hearing today. Im the International President of the transworkers union. Representing over 150,000 members in the usa and caribbean. Our members work as mechanics and Flight Attendants. Polyp instructors. Airline dispatches. Fleet service workers. Frontline aviation workers are responsible for maintaining our safety and security system. We often have the best view of, safety gaps forgiving all of us the opportunity to share our experience. Our recommendation is very important. Today i want to highlight 2 safety issues. Legally the faa requires that all u. S. Flights commercial air crash. However, the faa has exemplified Maintenance Work done outside the United States for many Safety Standards. The result is now a twotiered system. That encourages airlines to ensure more and more work. Introducing more and more risk into our Aviation System. Stations are exempt from regulations requiring background checks for workers. Riskbased safety and security evaluations for facilities. Drug and Alcohol Testing. Faa certification standards for mechanics and technicians. Theyve already directed them to address some of these safety gaps twice in the past decade. Compliance with these mandates are years overdue. Have a delays led to a boom perform repair stations. The number of these facilities have gone for more than 30 percent in the past 4 years. That is more than 900 faa certified foreign repair stations including 200 that have been approved since 2007 10. The amount of Maintenance Work being performed with lower Safety Standards is already extremely high with the coordinated efforts underway right now to increase those numbers. The show that three leading u. S. Airlines all sent about 30 percent of their Maintenance Work performed facilities. They are increasingly alarmed by the incompetent work and often nefarious acts performed by paragraphs outside of the United States of america. The discovery is included. Critical Engine Components held together with tape and wire. Cabin depressurization caused by incorrectly installed exterior door buffs. Aircraft covered with flammable paints. Drug smuggling and aircraft will wells. Laboratory panels. The country with the most faa certified foreign repair station is china. That represent other security questions. This unlevel Playing Field for safety regulation is also costing american jobs. With 8200 Aircraft Maintenance jobs left the country in recent years. The job losses caused by revelatory loopholes that allow airlines to cut cost diminishing safety. We often hear that airlines do not compete on safety. Right now that is exactly what theyre doing. Congress and the administration had to move up to this idea by mentally closing all the loopholes that encompass moving this important minutes work out of the country. I would also like to highlight another problem. That is cabin air quality. The atmosphere surrounding paragraphs of 40,000 feet above sea level is to dance a brief. Before circulating it into the cabin. These are resolved by both inhalation and the skin. Repeated or prolonged exposure to these agents. Everyday by Flight Attendants and frequent air travels. Have Devastating Health impacts. s are being reported more and more often because of the public awareness. Just three days ago, a commercial plane made an Emergency Landing because of a few move it made passengers and crew did like sick. Air crash and not even commit were fema debts are occurring. This misreporting and respond to these events extremely difficult. I want to say thank you to the representative for introducing the cabin air safety act. It directly addresses the health and safety concern by these events. Fully endorses this legislation and to help the committee will take action artisan. Thank you so much for the opportunity to testify again. Thank you for that. Thank everyone for your testimony. We will move down to member questions. Each member will be recognized for five minutes. My first question is for mr. Schultz in the ntsb. With the need for growing expertise, to match the use of the airspace, do they have a plan to develop the expertise . If not, what is your plan to develop the plan . Thank you for your question. We do have a plan. In the National Airspace system. We have since our first investigation back in 2006. Looking at this issue very seriously. We recognize the atomic business segment of the industry was coming. In 2010, we actually changed our regulations to address Unmanned Aircraft system. We added the accidents. In our regulation. Shortly thereafter we also issued guidance to the industry for reported status. To understand what is reportable to us. We have also continued along that line having a specialist identify. Experts internally within our organization. The have helped us develop our investigative protocols. As i mentioned, in 2016 we investigated our first drawing midair collision with an aircraft. Over new york city. Staten island. We are very interested and very engaged in that technology. We appreciate the communitys support. Visit drawn on anything or drawn on the aircraft. In terms, any involved. That there is not an injury involved with their substantial damage, it is for jones to the 300 pounds a greater. There is an ongoing debate on whether or not the faa is including aviation safety inspectors in the certification process. How to the challenges impact your members currently. In the traveling public as well. The problem we have is that they do not have enough inspectors. The do not have the staffing and training. It is expanding like i said more than the faa can handle. We just want them to understand the need to have the oversight available. We understand that have the expertise. Theyre going to do what they need to do. The bottom line, have the knowledge to understand what is going on. That they can sign off on the oda program. They have to be there. The position right now is there data collectors. They used to go out and kick the tires. And see it have a rapport with the industry as well. Our inspectors just look at the data and sign off. That is not a good position. Dealing with the Government Shutdown. Industry blowing. Our investigators were sitting at home. All that backlog work. Things just fell through the cracks. Are you changing how you train . Like the commercial space transportation issues. Our folks represent. What we have seen the regulation. We have asked him while we were not included. We have asked, get a response. We agreed Training Needs to be modified. Since it is a subject, they cannot include us. Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate it and want to thank all of you for your testimony today. Earlier today, there were calls for more proactive early Warning Systems. The program we put together to identify any safety concerns associated with the aircraft. Could you explain right now. Did you explain right now what type of system is provided for. Thank you for the question. Back in 1997 and 19 98 time period, the commercial air safety team very aggressive Data Collection effort on the way. Measurements of over 150 the data came in with the Program Safety action. Inclusive in the program. It was also included in that. Very soon after, we saw 4 accidents occur. That led to technologic i completed the circle or looking at the way pilots were trained. Thanks to the work of this committee. Flight time and duty time regulations. That led to the safest period in aviation history in america were i can say that we have moved closer to three quarters of the worlds population in Metal Composite in the lower stratosphere without a single pilot caused pathology. 51 aircraft. It is my belief here that the absence of accidents is a wonderful thing. It is all the more important that we remain diligent and committed to safety to look more into how we can better report. We have a strong resilient system right now. It is working. Although, obviously we are here today. We hear from some the families behind me. Something happened that was not supposed to happen. Many years ago, we had a forensic approach. The tombstone mentality that you mentioned. Now we have a risk predictive model. Is very important like i said we examined closely the certification and the oversight and Designation Authority to find out how we can make this better. In your testimony, you discuss federal regulations for the top of certification process. Right now, who was it that establishes the certification basis for the safety standard. That have to be met in order for an aircraft to proceed. The regulation is done by the faa. That the industry has to follow that whenever they come up with. Who establishes the certification plan and the means of compliance. The level of faa involvement in the verification process. I think the industry comes up with a plan on how to do it. The faa oversees that procedure. You are saying that the faa or boeing would actually come up with the certification plan including the means of compliance and the level of faa involvement . They come up. They do all the studies. The faa makes sure that complies with the regulation and the system. Was the do it, then make sure theyre following the compliance. Usa the companies established the certification plan. There the ones that know the best way to come up with the engineering design. The faa oversees it. I do not think that is accurate. Im anxious to hear on that certification process. Then last but not least, who was it that verifies that all the requirements have been met and the top of certification have been issued. To clarify, the procedure. They come up with a plan. The engineers build that. And the faa oversees a. I was concerned because you noted in your testimony. The faa has delegated primary oversight of the max. I was concerned about that. I was concerned that may have left people with a different understanding than what i have. The role the faa place. I am not sure they would concur. Thank you mr. Chairman. Recognizing chair defazio for five minutes. I asked that the following item be entered into todays hearing. The letter from the Flight Attendant regarding child restraint. We recognize chair defazio for five minutes. You both raise the issue that the faa cannot go to with no prior notice. Without properly overseeing them. They accepted the Alcohol Testing. Background checks and etc. Talked about what these oversees. I just like you to comment on this. There are no commercial flights to the United States. From el salvador. Yet, airlines are taking the planes to el salvador for maintenance and repairs. This causes some concern to me. You want to comment on that . I would say that usa flag carriers that perform work in el salvador. Particular where they fly the planes to have maintenance done. There is only one reason for that. They have been permitted to do it by the faa. The only reason for that is the pursuit of profit. Certainly not sending plans to el salvador because the work is been safer than it is on the United States all. You listed a few disturbing examples of overseas maintenance. Correct. There is plenty of those. One specific example is april 5 2018. A plan that was servicing south america payment to chicago and mechanics found it opponents held together with duct tape. It was applied on foreign soil by noncertified mechanics. That is just one example. There others that we can provide the committee. We would love to have those examples. We have been on this issue for years. That goes along the same lines. They used to have inspectors in different locations overseas. They closed those offices down. For moneysaving purposes. In the end, we believed they were in different locations at the continued moving the Work Overseas that the inspector should be available to do oversight inspection. We agree with that. The work should be done in the United States. Of the we have the greatest country in the world to do the oversight. Why not keep it here. You both raised issues about cabin evacuation. We mandated the procedures be reviewed. And give us a quick update on where they are on that . Thank you for your question. We have made recommendations on a variety of areas for evacuation. Asked him to form a committee. Between the cockpit and the cabin. At this point, the recommendation is open on acceptable action. We are committed to bringing that communication with the faa. Thank you. You raise the issue about the length of time for one particular evacuation. Carryon bags and all that. You also raised the issue of seat with. People having trouble getting in and out of those closer together seats. Thank you for that question. First of all, i want to thank you for the seats i am in today. Is a lot more comfortable than what i flew down in here. I want to be in the narrowest coach seats i can find. We went in there for a few hours. I will tell you from experience, crossing my legs in one of those seats. For a passenger for me to leave their seat back, i think i almost broke monday. It is distracting to see our passengers. As you know, it never used to be this way. As Flight Attendants, to accommodate our passengers who may be taller or bigger, we like to move them to a seat that is more accommodating. Which is up at the bulkhead or by the emergency exit. However, now the airlines are charging more for those premium seats, we can no longer do that. We find that the seats are not only getting smaller, there is no more padding on them. It is a torture chamber for our passengers. I commend you so much for addressing that in this committee. We were so pleased to hear that it is being addressed. Is extremely important. Mainly for evacuating the aircraft. The passengers already getting on and off the airplane are having difficult times getting into the aisle to sit down. Can you imagine in a stressful situation trying to evacuate in a reallife scenario. Passengers from a plane that is burning or is half tilted or upside down. s people having a hard enough time getting in and out. It is going to be almost impossible. That is extremely important. Thank you mr. Chairman. I call him mr. Perry for five minutes. The faa announced it is again delayed the publication of his proposed making. Rulemaking required by the 2016 reauthorization. According to the faa, they will not be published in september after the agency acknowledged it would fail to fulfill the congressional mandate by july deadline. The track Records Office little optimism that the new deadline will be realized that the importance of the issues demand immediate action. It is my understanding that they express their concerns. In a letter earlier this month. Assured their concern about the safety implications about continue to operate without the remote id and tracking system in place. There feeling to mitigate significant potential threats to the safety of the flying public. I also like to highlight the impact of the inaction on our global competitiveness. Every day, theyre unwilling to do their job. Was that more of our vantage to our industry. To our International Competitors friend and foe alike. Honestly this is in the warehouse. I want offer you an opportunity to just respond. I would also like to hear from the other members on the panel their thoughts about whether or not this identification increases or decreases the safety and the flying public. Wedding another two years for this critical rulemaking to be finalized in the interest. For the competitive standpoint. Thank you for your question. At this time based on the work we have done, we have not identified that. I think we worked very closely with the drone industry. We do act as observers. To understand where these different technologies are gone. What we are trying to do is ensure that we are prepared to investigate accidents. They may be caused in part type that is where our focus is right now. Thank you. Great question. I was going to try to integrate that into my comments today. I am as frustrated as well. There is an unwavering commitment to safety and we have been part of the process of the introduction of ua s into our National Airspace system. We want it to be safe. And we certainly recognize the social economic benefits to drones, it is a Fascinating Technology and we support it. We support the safe integration. The delay is not a good thing in my view. We have an opportunity here to do it right the first time. I shudder at the day that i hear about the accident when a drone gets sucked into an engine and to welltrained, well rested pilots safely get it on the ground, lets hope that is the outcome. But, what really adds fuel to the fire on this particular issue is that id and tracking which we were a part of those aviation rulemaking committees are foundational technologies that are going to be necessary for the safe integrations. We work very closely with all our regulators and we are going to consistently compel them to move the process along quickly but we could certainly use your help, thank you. Appreciate it. Director scholz, what is the u. S. Aviation Safety Record over the last three decades and how does it compare to the rest of the world if you know . I can say that as i mentioned in my statement over the last decade it has improved in terms of the numbers. We are always looking at the individual factors involved in accidents and we think that safety is something that one must always be vigilant no matter what the numbers are reflecting. I have three decades worth of data with me or we would be happy to follow up with you after the hearing on that data. But i would just reinforce that the numbers do tell one side of the story but it is critically important as i think some of the other witnesses have testified to be proactive in understanding these issues as they manifest through some of the volunteer reporting programs and in terms of our role for accident investigation. Thank you madam chair, yields. Thank you mr. Cohen, you have five minutes. Thank you madam chair. I presume, i appreciate the compelling testimony. I was here but i had to go to another hearing. Airplane safety is so important and in those crashes it is a serious matter and the public has a right to know when a decision to increase Profit Margins has an impact on their health and safety. Federal law requires planes being capable of being evacuated within 90 seconds of an emergency. Half of aircraft exits are inoperable. There have been several recent occurrences that raise westerns on whether all passengers of an aircraft can indeed evacuate within 90 seconds. In 2016 the ntsb concluded it took at least two minutes 21 seconds, 51 seconds longer, over half the time longer than the faa assumes is the correct time for 161 passengers to evacuate and lightly loaded American Airlines flight. In january 2018 the ntsb included evidence of passengers retrieving carryon baggage during this another emergency evacuations demonstrate that this safety hazard has not been effective. This should concern everybody. It is not the same as a plane falling out of the sky. But when a plane does have an emergency and they land, people cant get off in time, injuries and deaths occur. They are preventable. Emergency evacuations is a serious issue as well as the tensions for air raids in tightly packed cabins. Deep vein thrombosis can affect passengers who dont move their legs during longer flights. Despite this seat sizes continue to shrink and the seat sizes shrink, not on their own but because the Airlines Want to pack more people in. They want to emulate sardines in an airplane. They pack people in on their side, and in front. You cant cross your legs or get out. That is life representative and i are introducing the seat act that requires the faa to review kevin evacuation procedures and issue regulations regarding minimum dimensions of seats for safety of passengers. Great work on the faa reauthorization bill. It appears very little action has taken place. This is something that could save lives and in the nine month since Congress Said do it, nothing has apparently been done. Ms. Schulze you are the acting director in the office of national safety, as mentioned in ms. Bassanis testimony has the faa begun working with the ntsb on implementation of the seat act . Thank you for the question. We have been contacted the faa but i would say theres additional conversations that will ensue. I think it is at the planning stage would be our assessment but we have been contacted. After nine months that Congress Said to do it and lives are in the balance and you are in the conversation stage, hello, how are you . I am here at the university of michigan as a freshman, nice to meet you erie dont you think you ought to take some action by now . Well certainly the faa requirement that was in the legislation is clear. We have made a number of recommendations and we continue to work proactively with the faa to have those implemented. From our standpoint we are remaining only open and ready to receive the work with faa. And i ask you to call them and urge them to start to act in behalf of the flying public . We absolutely on a routine basis interact with them to promote and advocate for those recommendations. Thank you. Ms. Bassani you discuss the importance of this seat act and how important it is for the faa to review kevin evacuation procedures . Can you expand on why that is so important and how a new review could positively affect your members . Thank you for the question. I want to thank you for spearheading that act. It is one of the single most important things that Flight Attendants find that we need right now and that our passengers need. Safety is so important. Like i said earlier safety is in our dna. It is so important that we enact this soon, sooner rather than later. The airlines are smashing seats into airplanes. When i talked to them as the president of my union and say this is ridiculous, we have a seat right on an emergency exit on one of the newer planes. We had to almost sit in a passengers lap to arm and disarm that door. And you know what they say in response . If we have to remove that seat that equates to 500,000. In my mind, every inch equates to a customer and a passengers life possibly. In their mind every inch is real estate. And it is dollars and it is ridiculous. And i implore this committee to take that seriously. That is what we are here for and what you are here for. That is what all of us are here for, the safety in the aviation industry. When i see the frustration of congressman collins, you can triple that for us out here that have to deal with this every single day. And the reason we know our passengers are enraged. By the time they get on the flight they are traumatized by the whole travel experience and we inherit them and it is our job and we learn how to defuse situations. But when you are up in the sky there is no way you can say you need to leave and go out that door. You have to deal with them and it rest on us. In the back of the aircraft. It is extremely, extremely important that people not only feel comfortable but that we are able to evacuate them in the case that we can save their life and in some cases we cant. And congressman collins very eloquent lee stated some of those cases. Thank you very much for listening. Thank you. In closing, this is like the 737 in regards that they dont want to use actual people to test it, like simulators would be best. They want to do a computer study and have people who are ran a marathon getting off the plane. With the Service Animal. I recognize mr. Fitzpatrick for five minutes. Thank you madam chair. Thank you for being here today. Mr. Samuelson, the faa certifies aircraft mechanics and technicians in the United States. First question is do the workers in the farm facilities have similar or equivalent certifications and is there any reason we shouldnt require the workers to have at least an equivalent certificate from their government before we allow them to perform any safety critical work . The answer is absolutely not. There is no lawful requirement that mechanics or socalled mechanics on foreign soil have the same certification as those on usa soil. And it should absolutely be required. The Playing Field should be leveled. It has been said many times that airlines should not compete on safety and that is exactly what is going on right now. They are competing on safety by sending work into Foreign Countries to try to save as much money as possible even though it is objective and factual that worked on an overseas country is less safe than when done on u. S. Soil. Thank you. Captain depete as you said in your testimony earlier, you said so there was no confusion there are barriers being installed in each new aircraft that are being manufactured for Passenger Air carriers in the United States. You believe that the Aviation Rulemaking Advisory Committee working group is useful and how can congress act to ensure there are no more delays and that the requirement is issued by october. We see this issue as so important right now for the security of our passengers and crew. We have examined this issue for so long that we view the current efforts underway as no more than delay tactics. Having the secondary barrier is so critical because it preserves, let me make it clear. It preserves the reactionary gap that is absolutely essential when the doors opened. There have been tests done and they have tried to take a Flight Attendant and see if they can get by them and they stand there and try to help as best they can. We can do so much better. These have proven to be inexpensive lightweight, very easy to install and design into other airplanes. I have been on many of those working groups. Heres the real critical part. Just walk with me for this one. Somebody does get in without a secondary barrier since it is an in trues and resistant cockpit door, they locked themselves in the airplane in a and now you have an intruder that you cant get at. I have often heard them say this will never happen on the Passenger Airplane. Passengers will never take it. They will run up and assault lovers tried to do it. That is the risk. One simple solution, it is so easy and so in a answer. Well how much will it cost . Well, we use to carry around 60 pound bags with all our gear on it, all our flight of and now we have electronic flight bags that way a fraction of that. I just suggest we call it even and put something in the airplane that will keep our passengers secure and safe. What is the cause of the delay . And what can we as a committee do to fix that . I think that we can say enough is enough number 1. We have enough information to go forward. It has been mandated now. But a concrete timeline for installation. The other thing is to fight back special interest who were starting to make noise about the fact that we meant type design. We were very careful about how we put that language together. That would be externally helpful. We dont need to know much more about this but we do need a solution and we can make a difference. If it happens what will we say . What will we do, what do i tell my members . Nearly 18 years after the 9 11 Commission Report where they expressly spelled out how 9 11 hijackers would zero in on the cockpit and wait for that exchange to occur. To add insult to injury, again as a cargo pilot we have airplanes without cockpit doors. We have animal handlers, some of them foreign nationals. They have syringes and sedatives capable of taking down a large animal sitting behind pilots. There have been instances where there have been confusion about what their instructions are and how they are supposed to behave in the cockpit. It is so clear to make sure that cockpit doors are in. That is just one of the many shortfalls between passengers and cargo. We know the solutions to these problems. But, we will continue to focus and fight against the special interests that seem to want to put hurdles in the way of the fine work that is being done. Thank you for the reauthorization act, incredible. The question is now, can we push it forward without other folks trying to will it away . Thank you for your service. Thank you mr. Fitzpatrick. Mr. Brown, you are recognized for five minutes. I have a number of questions then i would ask the panelists to be brief in your response if you could. Captain depete in your written testimony you discuss the different pilot licensing requirements at the International Level is typically the International Aviation regulatory body recently introduced a license and you mentioned some potential safety issues associated with that. Can you elaborate . Thank you for the question. An important question especially given discussions today. So, most recently i wrote a letter to the secretary general of the International Civil Aviation Organization asking for a Global Review of Pilot Training and qualification standards. I want to qualify this conversation before i begin though. The pilot that in ethiopia and aligned air at a significant disadvantage by not knowing what was on their aircraft. We are specialists in Human Factors and responses. And i think captain sullenberger was very eloquent about how he described this. In these very automated airplanes, we need more training, not less. So the only thing that stands in the way, i have seen automation all my life. I have seen good automation that helps me do my function and i have seen automation that tries to replace me and it is just down and we have to figure out ways to work around it. Those are the things that become distractions almost in a way. We have seen how it is supposed to work. If automation is supposed to be assistive to help us do our job and not replacing it. And you go down that road there is not a level of Artificial Intelligence that exists today with that capability is sound. We are looking at the boeing 737 max in particular. We are looking at a series of system breakdowns, not one thing. We have a very vast interconnected aviation echo system. But clearly, i will ask you a question. You have your family or yourself on an airplane, do you want your crew to be well trained and experienced or do you want them to just be trained strictly to rely on automation . That is a simple question and im not relating it to any other event at this point. That particular airplane had a system malfunction that basically made it almost impossible or difficult to control. If you didnt know about it and you werent prepared for it, you didnt train for it. We here in the United States, i know this is a long answer. There is an airplane i have flown where i didnt have a runaway trim system failure. If you miss it or if there is impact rather distractions in this particular instance that is why we have called for more robust oversight into the oversight process, the designation authorization and the certification process. A lot of these issues require a lot more time than we have. Mr. Samuelsen in your testimony you touched upon that more than 8200 Aircraft Maintenance jobs have been moved abroad to Foreign Affairs stations sincerely 2000. Can you go into more detail in your observations of subsequent shortages of qualified u. S. Professionals and what we ought to be doing to address those shortages . I dont think the cause of that is that there are not untrained professions in the United States. The cause of that is that the faa has allowed new pools. I agree with you. I think it is the effect. If you have foreign overseas maintenance then you have less jobs in the United States and then you see a decline in workforce as a result. Are there critical shortages in the profession . No, i think the airlines use that as one excuse to continue to export american jobs overseas and capital, 2 billion worth of capital. Ms. Bassani you mentioned the 10 hour rest. And you mentioned a lot of conditions that put a lot of strain and stress on the ability of a Flight Attendant to do their job. Can you put a face on that . If we are not meeting tenhour rest requirements, how difficult that is to perform the job of the Flight Attendant . Thank you for the question mr. Brown. It is important to realize first of all that the tenhour rule doesnt mean behind the hotel door, that is from the time you leave the aircraft until the time you check in to your next trip. That in itself is already a reduced rest. 10 hours is not enough but it is what we have now and we need to get that through. It should not be being slow walked. Flight attendants must be alert at any minute to be able to perform something as important as an evacuation or perhaps operate the aed machine to save your life if you are having a heart attack. How can they be alert if they havent had enough sleep. Im not talking about just on domestic soil, the Flight Attendants also fly internationally. In america alone you have three different time zones. You factor in all of those different types of things and it is so important that they get the rest. Like i said that is minimal. They need more. But it is so important to get that done for our Flight Attendant and passenger safety. Thank you madam chair. Thank you, i really appreciate the witnesses and your comments. In particular a point about the safety. Every one of you safety was a priority. Before i begin my questioning i will give you a history of my background. I was a Police Officer for 23 years and ended up as a commander. Safety was the number 1 priority that the men and women i worked with went home to their families and to hear that there were family members that didnt come back is heart wrenching and to those family members, our thoughts and prayers and we are going to do something about it. We will make it better with the experts here. I appreciate all your comments. Ms. Schulze. While the workers on the front lines are critically important to aviation safety it is also important we have regulations and safety protocols in place to ensure the safest possible experience. Much of the responsibility falls on the shoulders of the faa and ntsb. As you know in july 2017 at San Francisco airport, and air canada airbus narrowly landed on a crowded taxiway mistaking it for a cleared runway. Information about a runway closure that could have prevented this confusion was located on page 8 of the 27 page list of San Francisco airport modems. It was the ntsbs finding that a contributing factor was the ineffective presentation of the note of information. How has the faa responded to this recommendation . Thank you for your question. We did issue a recommendation to ask that that type of information have a methodology to better prioritize that information for pilots to be developed. I will need to get back to the committee on the current status of that. We have had more recent conversations with the faa. But i would also comment that because of our engagement with the industry and the faa we understand they have been looking at the note on process for some time. Our recommendations for more specific to the findings in San Francisco. As you know, i put forth legislation to the notice to airmen improvement act and i think it is important that Industry Experts have the ability to prioritize that Safety Information that the pilots understand the importance. But quite frankly to have a 27 page note him, i think captain, you would agree with me that lets prioritize the information that is absolutely needed so as you command that aircraft you know the concerns on the runway and the airport and you can make a decision whether it is safe or not. Absolutely. I appreciate the question. That was a bit of a game changer when no one happened. In particular it was a very alert crew on the parallel taxiway from United Airlines that happened to comment on it. I wonder if that was a fatigue cargo crew. Would they have caught it like that . Elaborate interconnectedness of a complicated echo system. But wrong one ray surface landings are a very big issue particularly of interest to us and also the faa and ntsb. There are a very technologies that can be very assistive. Final approach runway occupancy signaling and things like that that can be employed, better guidance. We think that in 121 Airline Operations that there should be Precision Approach guidance to everyone way runway and yet some people are stirred still trying to push that back. With your input, the professionals inputs, the legislation will get much better. My last question is ms. Bassani. To go back to the front lines we really appreciate everything that Flight Attendants do for our safety. Much of what many of us dont notice, i appreciate you bringing up cabin air safety in her testimony because it matters and it matters especially because of the long hours you will spend in that environment. I am a cosponsor of the cabin air safety act that you mentioned in your testimony. Would you be able to talk a little bit more about the legislation and how it can help . Yes, i sure can. First i want to thank you for helping with that. It is also very important. I have been flying for 33 years. Since i have been president of our union that is only a year we have seen an uptick in incidences. We didnt really have very many of these types of occurrences. Like i said in my testimony last year alone 1500 reported fume acts from our Flight Attendants. Know the pilots are experiencing much of the same and samuelsen is also an advocate for getting something done with this as well. It is important that we have a way to record and collect data and reporting procedures are standard throughout all of our airlines and systems including management and the union. I have actually hired a specialist in this area about four months ago because we needed more help. We need someone dedicated to help these Flight Attendants that are experiencing these fume events. It really is damaging their health. There are a lot more stories. There are a lot of dedicated facebook pages and some videos and i want to thank you for stepping up and helping us with this. We will work on it and i appreciate your comments. I yelled back. Thank you, i now call on mr. Tran 19 for five minutes. Thank you madam chair. Captain depete you mentioned the difference in safety rest standards, flight time duty between Passenger Airline and cargo Airline Operations. The socalled cargo carlisle. Can you clean how this came to be and why this is a problem and what do you believe should be done about this imbalance . Thank you for that question. Near and dear to my heart of course. I know we have someone in the audience here who was on the flight time duty time. I will try to get this right. Obviously after the accident when it was determined that fatigue played a part in the accident through an arc process we came out with industry and regulators worked together to come up with a pretty good rule. Due to a costbenefit analysis that was done, it was determined, i looked at what examples they cited, they eliminated cargo as a rule based on a costbenefit analysis. It was only a 31 million benefit. Now i would say that is a dangerous way to go. You could maybe weigh the idea of what the cost of the benefits is. They werent measuring a 777 loaded with Dangerous Goods barreling down to los angeles, they picked an old aircraft that fell short of the runway in florida summer in tallahassee in a remote area. Costbenefit analysis, but all the same i think you could look at whether or not dealing with safety issues and we want that to be the number 1 weighted factor . Second of all heres the real situation. Imagine this for a moment. I use this example a lot. You have a school bus in one lane on the highway. And it is proven and you have your children on the school bus. Your children are going to school on the school bus and right next to it is a tractor trailer carrying a bunch of freight on it. It is a proven fact scientifically that time awake of 17 hours or more on task is equal to a blood alcohol level of about. 05. You have a very sober driver driving your kids to school and right next to them is a tractortrailer. My point in bringing that up, who is obviously impaired. My point in bringing it up is we share the same skies. We flight over the same cities and lands of the same airports. If you know traffic Collision Avoidance systems that was included in Passenger Airplanes and not in cargo aircraft. It took an almost headon collision with air force one to make that change. So, if i had to describe it as anything, you are only as strong as your weakest link. You have a great Safety System but, that is one gap that needs to close. I will conclude with this because it is an important statistic. When you look at the two individual risk factor theres of passenger and cargo and you look at the frequency with which passengers flight and cargo flies tallied, if you look at the number of departures and we swapped and we did as much lying as passengers did, we would have 276 accidents in that 10 year period. That is the difference in that risk file. It is startling. So, we really need to close that gap because you are only as strong as your weakest link. Thank you. I will yield the remainder of my time to representative napolitano. Thank you. Ms. Bassani, i fly twice a week back to california and coming here. And i have respect for Flight Attendants. The primary connection of customers. They get asked every imaginable question about safety, security and efficiency of the airplanes and airlines and i have overheard Flight Attendants asked questions that only an Aerospace Engineer could answer. Yet, they have been very diligent and intelligent in answering questions. Does the airlines and the faa and Airline Manufacturers give you sufficient training to handle any questions, technical questions should be your job to handle them . I would like to thank you for your question. That is a loaded question. We do receive annual training, emergency training. They dont cover questions for every single incident, i would say no. Flight attendants themselves are a very inquisitive group. The longer you are around the airline and working on the airline you do Gain Knowledge that you wouldnt normally have just as a passenger. But, there is so much now that has changed in the airline industry. Perhaps that is something we do need to pursue. I thank you for that question. I would think so. I have other questions for the record. Tank you very much ms. Chair. I will now recognize myself for five minutes. I wanted to get back to the foreign repair stations, mr. Samuelsen. I know when your testimony you talked about the fact that i think both in 2003 and 2015 dig has identified on several occasions weaknesses in the faas oversight of overseas repair stations. The faa reauthorization act of 2012 and 2016. It addresses repair station oversight and we are talking about issues of drug testing, preemployment background checks and security screening. Now we have thailand and costa rica classified as category two and category two is defined as the government does not have the confidence to meet Safety Standards. So, i just want to ask it has been someone asked already, but what are the faas stated reasons for the failure to implement this law . I honestly dont know that the faa has articulated a good reason for allowing the loopholes to continue and allowing the work to be sent overseas. And certainly they dont have a good reason, there is no reason for them to continue to allow u. S. Flag carriers to do work in the country you mentioned that have been downgraded. It is a potential disaster waiting to happen. We heard a lot of conversation today about safety being the paramount issue in not only the aviation issue but the entire transport sector. I dont think that the Current Situation with the faa or Passenger Carriers recognize safety as their paramount function. I think they are willing to jeopardize safety in order to maximize profit by sending Aircraft Maintenance into Foreign Countries that have objectively less safe standards than we do on u. S. Soil. Have you yourself been to some of these foreign repair stations tooait for yourself . I have not. But we do have plans to go to brazil to try to access the hangar where American Airlines is doing some work. Thank you for that. And captain depete, is this a concern for you . Absolutely chairman. Over my entire career it is pretty clear whenever we have had an aircraft come back from a foreign station, we are always taking a good look and we ourselves has found instances in all our carriers that it can occasionally happen. Some countries where we have foreign maintenance stations are decent players and others arent. They typically go to the lowest bidder. I have always said this. Skilled labor is not cheap. Cheap labor is not skilled. And you end up getting what you pay for. Ms. Bassani . Do you have concerns . Oh my god, of course we do. We have supported the tw you in their request not to offshore american jobs. We think it is very important to keep those jobs not only on our soil, for reasons that were outlined, it is going to keep our aircraft safer. We fly in those aircraft so we have extreme interest in how those aircraft are maintained. We want to keep them here. Thank you. Captain depete, mr. Sullenberger was here in our last hearing and talked about the simulators and about the importance of fullmotion simulators to create that muscle memory. And in your testimony you talk about this and about how there seems to be a movement within the industry now to move mower more towards nonmotion simulators. You talk about the pros and cons on both. If you could just to that. I have 34 seconds left. That is a really great question. We just recently had an instance where it is a requirement now to have upset Recovery Training having our crews trained to handle that situation. There were some airlines that were looking at doing this in a nonfullmotion simulator. You simply wouldnt get the same effect in terms of the training. It is really important. Emulators are great. They can do certain things. They dont replicate a real flight. In fact i know is a line check airline for fedex there were times when people would teach only the simulator and they were instructors. When they would go back to flying the real airplane they would have to take somebody with them because it is a different experience. I know the fidelity has increased in some machines but they havent reached a level to wordy crates to really flying in the air. Experience matters. I think all the witnesses for being here. This is a very important hearing and i appreciate you very very much. I now recognize ms. Norton for five minutes. Thank you very much. I second what you just said madam chair. I have a question first for mr. Samuelsen. I remember in your testimony that you had indicated that the faa had directed agencies, or workers rather that congress had directed workers at foreign repair stations who perform safety sensitive work to undergo preemployment background checks. Do you have any information on the kinds of vetting that is currently being done. I am particularly interested in whether what happens abroad is consistent with the vetting we require here. Yeah, so what happens abroad is absolutely inconsistent with what happens on u. S. Soil and certainly it is one of the reasons why the work is less safe when it is done overseas in most overseas countries. The faa has failed to follow through on what congress has. How long have they had so far . Several times over the last decade. Congress has acted but the faa is lax in their enforcement and it is potentially going to lead to a disaster. We have seen a disaster in the air transport system recently. And certainly the faa seems to be waiting around for another disaster to occur to start addressing these things. They should be proactively addressing these things and mitigate against the induction of risk to the Passenger Transport system. It has to do with people. I am very concerned on actual followup so we can get a response from the faa on when they intend and how they intend to conform with what congress has apparently asked them to do some time ago. Ms. Bassani, i cant resist asking you about something you mentioned. You mentioned the kinds of animals that you can bring onto planes. Monkeys, chickens, i cant believe this. Miniature ponies, come on. I can tell you if you brought some of those onto a plane i would have to get off. So, i must ask you if the faa bill, the section 437 and i dont know precisely what it requires but i wonder if you think it requires enough to address who gets onto planes and who is really a passenger, i would like to know if Congress Needs to do more to keep from frightening passengers with who gets brought onto planes. I would like your response and any of you on this. Thank you. Yeah, we support section 337 of the faa bill. It should clarify what constitutes a Service Animal in the first place. They are not trained. They need training on how to travel if they are going to bring full Service Animals. A Service Animal, is that something that makes you feel better about being on the plane . It is an emotional support animal. That means anything can get on the plane. We have seen almost anything on the plane that is for sure. There needs to be some oversight on this. Definitely. I hate to ask for a hearing on this, but i am going to have to ask for congress to try to clarify what we mean and this sounds so open ended that it is not what we intended. Finally, ms. Schulze , could i ask you i am concerned about the outsourcing of Aircraft Maintenance to foreign repair facilities. And whether there has been any investigation by nts be that have linked aircraft crashes to outsourcing of any kind, if you have investigated that . Thank you. We do not have a position. We have not established a position on that because we have not seen that factor. I will add that clearly we are going to look at all factors that can contribute to an aviation accident including maintenance. It is outsourcing i am particularly concerned about. We have not addressed that at this point. Will you be looking at that . Certainly if the evidence points us in that direction we will do our normal comprehensive job of looking at that. I would like to ask the committee that asked that ntsb look at any outsourcing when it comes to aircraft, we have to be looking at. Thank you very much. Thank you. Next i would like to recognize representative katko for five minutes. Thank you for being here today. It was morning, now afternoon and hopefully doesnt go into the evening for you. I do thank you all for being here. I want to acknowledge the parents in the corner. You are there at all these hearings in our heart goes out to all and god bless you for what you are going through. Obviously the name of the game is safety and how can we make it better. So the first question i have is there seems to be efforts afoot to support the efforts over the last several decades to change the aviation regulatory culture from punitive to collaborative. I wondered if you could talk more about that and what that would mean if we could get more collaboration and less punitive going on so we can have better procedures going forward. Im sorry, with a question for me . For schulze. Thank you for the question. I think from the ntsb standpoint we have certainly supported the approaches that are being taken. We are observers on the commercial aviation safety team. And the corresponding activity that occurs to integrate a lot of these programs that i know captain depete mentioned with regard to the aviation safety action program. We also have actually to the point of having a memorandum of understanding with those organizations to obtain information to help us when we are looking at safety issues in a particular investigation. I think what we have seen is there is a wealth of information in our systems but it is really predicated on people coming forward and being unafraid to come forward and bring up information that could be useful to identifying previously unknown hazards in the Aviation System. We do have a working relationship with those groups. We have seen value to contributing to our investigations. We are appreciative of the committee of our authority to use voluntary Safety Information to inform our investigative process and that is where we are at today. Are there things we can do better to improve the process . We dont have a position in terms of a recommendation on those processes because we havent seen a particular deficiency. I think that for us it is continuing to be able to work collaboratively with the industry to get access to that information. It can help us identify emerging issues in the aviation Safety System for our incidents process much like we did with the air canada 759 investigation. We appreciate that authority. Captain depete is or anything you want to add to that . I very much believe in robust reporting and in fact that is the question you want to address . I just want to make sure i am answering it quickly. I was absolutely thrilled. Thank you for all you do for safety and security. You do a lot. It was really fantastic to have the automatic acceptance. The voluntary safety action programs have contributed greatly to the safety and aviation history. Thank you for that. It is so important especially now since we see fewer and fewer actions here in the United States that that reporting continue to be robust and we continue to look at new ways to make it even better. The fact that we arent seeing where the stress points in the system are and i cant over emphasize how important that is to us all. Since we talked about fumes quite a bit that we have been trying to work across the board with others both industry and regulators to implement reporting for fume events as part of the asap program and we worked with carriers to get that done but it would be very helpful if this body could help us in the sense that there needs to be a repository for all of that data to analyze it and see where we can go and really completely understand from a very neutral position what is happening in the airplane. If you have suggestions for more details please submit them to me. I would be happy to take a look. Ms. Bassani i dont have time to ask a lot of questions but i will note that the concerns are wellfounded and we need to get a handle on the extent of this. Im all for accommodating passengers is much as i can but i dont want to see a process bang abused and getting out of control. To some extent i am concerned about that. I would just ask if you have information on that you would like to provide us we would like to hear it. Thank you, we can provide that in righting. I yelled back, thank you. I now recognize myself for five minutes. In both 2012 and 2016, congress directed the faa to address three safety gaps between domestic and foreign repair facilities. One was security screening or safety sensitive personnel. Another, risk based oversight and the third drug and Alcohol Testing. Todays the faa has taken no actions on any of these to my knowledge since 2016. The faa has approved a net of 200 more overseas facilities. As i understand from the testimony today more than 8200 maintenance jobs have been offshore. This outsourcing further enables airlines to evade critical safety and maintenance roles that apply at american facilities. It also appears to me an effort to avoid organized labor. To mr. Bassani and mr. Samuelsen, how many foreign repair stations have opened since these directives beginning in 2012 were first passed into law and what safety gaps exist . The answer to the question is 200 in the last three years and 300 since 2016. There are 900 in total. Im not sure how many since 2012. Certainly the faa has created an atmosphere where american Passenger Air carriers are exporting more and more Work Overseas. And theres only one reason to do that and that reason is for profit. It is certainly not because the work is being done safer. I would further say that the mechanics are an effective stopgap for work coming back from overseas facilities, china and south america where the work is done in an inappropriate way and we have given some examples of that. They are stopgap and eventually work being done overseas will lead to the potential of a disaster happening to american citizens on the u. S. Flagged carrier. The issue of avoiding organized labor, i think it is maximizing profit at the risk of exposing crewmembers and travelers to flawed safety planes. That is really the goal. We have nonunion carriers that are doing it as well. So, it is a bad situation. Mr. Perrone . We have domestically about 3000 repair stations and that is growing rapidly. The concern we have is that the faa has to have inspectors now travel overseas and again with staffing issues and money, Government Shutdowns that gets delayed or backlogged. Also the oversight as we have said they dont have the same standards as we do for domestic. So the folks that are working there are not at the same high level that we have in the United States. So how much Maintenance Work is performed outside the u. S. Now if you know, and how much of that work would return to the u. S. If these safety gaps were closed, to either one of you . One of the issues that is going on is the faa doesnt have a system for collecting data for problematic work that comes back from overseas. They simply dont collect the data. The only time the faa receives data on it is if there is a problem that leads them to make specific inquiries of Passenger Air carriers, u. S. Flagged carriers and it is about 30 of the work done overseas now. And that is up from 7 in 2003. It is growing tremendously. And the idea that to this is somehow beneficial to american air travelers or to the safety of american air travelers is ludicrous. It is not beneficial at all. It is objectively less safe but the airlines keep increasing the amount of work they are doing overseas and theres only one answer for that and i said it before, it is profit. You know congress has already directed the faa to close these gaps, what next steps would you recommend we take to bring the administration into compliance and 30 seconds . Because the faa has ignored congress, they have just ignored congress, there needs to be a moratorium on any more certification of foreign stations until the situation is under control. Anything else . I agree. I think touching on having an faa administrator would be beneficial. We have had an actor for a while. There should be someone that should be in place to hold the agency accountable to congresss wishes. We are now going to do a second round of questions. I would like to recognize Ranking Member graves. Captain depete i want to followup on a question earlier. There were discussions earlier in the hearing about establishing an early Warning System. What i would like to understand is effectively what process, what opportunities are there in place now for your members to be able to report or identify concerns related to safety . Does that make sense . Makes total sense. What we have now . You helped a great deal here. The automatic acceptance, when these asap reports are filed they get processed immediately , within a relatively short period of time and they get analyzed. Under the previous rules you should know it took time to determine whether or not the report would meet the standards with a few exclusions. Now we know that that information is so critical to the functioning of the system that we will put aside whether or not it is to be accepted or not and provide the protections in the program. We are more interested in seeing the data. It has been a very significant affective improvement. We have been happy about that. I want to understand where we are to understand where we should go or where the deficiencies are. I appreciate you bringing that up. You have raised twice now in the hearing the disparity between cargo and passenger on the fatigue issue and i appreciate you raising the fatigue issue. It is something i think is important that we continue to take a close look at and make sure that we understand. I have a question for you, though. I fly back and forth from new orleans every week. And i know that we have some pilots that commute often with me. I commute with them. How does that factor in to fatigue. Im curious because last night i finished up at 1230 but i didnt go to bed until 2 15. Just the cat just because i had an opportunity to sleep i didnt do it. How does that factor in . The committee that handled this actually looked at the issue, the issue of commuting was brought in. Many of our own within our union and companies institute policies. When you show up for your job whether you have driven five or 10 hours to get your base to take a flight, you are responsible when you sign for that flight to be fit to fly, period. It is just that when they looked at the complexities of trying to figure out whether they drove or fly, you had to stay within your normal allowable flight duty. Basically. If you exceeded it, then you can sign for the flight. It was up to the pilot to make sure he got himself in position ready to fly and fit to fly. The sad part about the cargo end of it is last i looked i have the same physiology that any other pilot flies regardless of what they fly. And that is where the real problem lies and the travesty is because we have people who clearly from a scientific point of view are flying relatively impaired and obviously it would have an effect on the total system. It is just time. I want to thank the ntsb actually. They have been long standing supporters. I appreciate the information. I want to better understand that issue and whether you drive in or you drive long hours or what have you, just making sure that we are not looking in a vacuum. Mr. Samuelsen, you have been pretty candid on the foreign servicing facilities and i do appreciate your candor because as we talked about, i believe it was captain sully who was here at the last hearing talked about how we have to look at every step in the process and not just become myopically focused on one thing and i think it is important. You are raising some really important concerns about safety and making sure that we have safety parity with repair and maintenance facilities. I appreciate your candor. I want to ask the question as i hear you talk about it. I know it may be a little outside your lane but do you sense it is a cultural safety issue perhaps at some of the other facilities that they dont have the same culture of safety that you have with some facilities here . I think that is absolutely an element of it. I think there are countries in the eu that have an extremely high Safety Standards and Safety Culture that parallels american usa american usa soil Safety Culture. But certainly, there are countries that u. S. Flight carriers that send their work through simply dont have the Safety Culture. And they dont view safety is the paramount reason for the Maintenance Work that is done in these planes. Thank you. Do you think of that culture of maybe lack of safety is limited to just the servicing . Or do you think that expense other aspects as well, including the pilots. I think that when you begin to compare the safety of culture within the United States, it is hard to match it. There are some countries that do. And i think it goes across the entire aviation industry. Not just related to the technician work that we do on airplanes, jets. Thank you very much. I want to thank all of you for your commitment, your suggestion. We want to thank, continue to strive for perfection. Are there any further questions for members of the subcommittee . Seeing on, i would like to thank each of the witnesses for your testimony today. The contribution to todays discussion has been very informative and helpful. I ask unanimous consent thats a record of todays hearing remain open until such time as our witnesses have provided answers to any questions that may have been submitted to them in writing, and unanimous consent of the record remains open for 15 days for any additional comments and information submitted by members or witnesses to be included in the record of todays hearing. Without objection, so ordered. No other members having anything to add, the subcommittee stands adjourned. Thank you. This weekend, American History tv features the 50th anniversary of the apollo 11 mission and moon landing. Starting saturday at 7 am eastern, we are live from the Smithsonian National air and space museum on the national mall. Was apollo 11 astronaut, michael collins, air and space museum director, ellen still fat, director of George Washington universitys space policy institute, john langston, and air and Space Museum Space history curator, cecil mure harmony. And at 10 am, president kennedys moon speech, reits recorded september 12, 1962 at Rice University in houston. We choose to go to the moon and do the other things. Not because they are easy, but because they are hard. Then at 4 pm eastern, the Smithsonian National air and space museum hosts a discussion with space testers and designers, ryan nagata and mit professor, david newman. Take all the systems of the space provide all your pressure, give your oxygen debris. Have to scrub out the carbon dioxide. Have toward optimal temperature control. The system, you shrink it around. The person, now you want the person to stay alive, be safe, and get the work done. At 10 pm, unreal america, the 1970 film, moonwalk one, showing prelift off preparations for apollo 11, and parades for the astronauts after their safe return to earth. T 10 2 and coming. Oxidize the text of the second and third stages now have pressurized. T 1 minute 35 seconds. The third stage completely pressurized. T 50 2 and counting. Will pass t 60. 35 seconds and coming. Good wishes. Thank you very much. We know it will be a good flight. And sunday on oral histories at 8 am eastern, apollo 11 flight director, jean krantz, talks about training for the mission. Spacecraft problems in the july 20 moon landing. And they are all cheering. And you get this weird feeling. Its chilling. It soaks in through the room, and i say, my god, we are actually on the moon. Explore our nations past on American History tv. All weekend, every weekend. Only on cspan 3 former special counsel, Robert Mueller is on capitol hill next week, testifying in back to back hearings, the possible obstruction of justice and abuse of power by president trump, and russian interference in the 2015 president ial election. Live all day coverage on wednesday, july 24 starts at 8 30 am eastern. Watch live on cspan 3, online at cspan. Org or listen with the free cspan radio at. Former acting fbi director Andrew Mccabe and a panelist give a preview of what to expect from Robert Muellers testimony next wednesday. This is an hour. Welcome back to talking feds. The prosecutors roundtable that brings together prominent former federal officials. For a dynamic discussion of the most important legal topics of the day. I am harry litman. , former United States attorney and Deputy Assistant attorney general, and a current Washington Post columnist. We are here in washington dc live to take a