[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 79 (Monday, June 7, 1999)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1138]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                PROMOTING INTERNATIONAL AVIATION SAFETY

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. JAMES L. OBERSTAR

                              of minnesota

                    in the house of representatives

                          Monday, June 7, 1999

  Mr. OBERSTAR. Mr. Speaker, safety is our highest responsibility in 
aviation. The American travelling public has the right to expect the 
highest standards of safety when flying on a U.S. carrier or on a U.S. 
carrier's code share partner.
  Last September, the aviation community received a wake up call when 
SwissAir flight 111 crashed off the shores of Nova Scotia. On board 
this fatal flight were 53 U.S. passengers who had purchased tickets 
from Delta Airlines for Delta flight 1111, but who flew on SwissAir, 
through an arrangement called code-sharing. This accident brought home 
the realization that, in a world of close alliances between domestic 
and foreign airlines, the lines separating domestic safety regulation 
and international safety regulation have been blurred. It is clearly 
time to reassess our safety activities to make certain the American 
travelling public flies safely, whether on a U.S. or a foreign carrier.
  As relationships between domestic and foreign carriers continue to 
grow through code sharing, we need to take a hard look at whether 
safety has kept pace. Since 1994, the number of code-sharing alliances 
has more than doubled--from 61 to 163. A passenger who buys a ticket 
from a U.S. airline for a code-sharing flight (ticketed as a flight by 
a U.S. airline) has a right to expect that the entire flight will be 
operated under similar safety standards. Yet, put simply, there is not 
a process within the Department of Transportation (DOT) for assuring 
that a foreign code-share partner operates under safety standards 
similar to those governing U.S. airlines.
  A look at the world's aviation safety record establishes the need for 
prompt action. There is a wide disparity in the accident rates for 
different regions, with Africa and South and Central America, for 
example, having an overall accident rate considerably higher than the 
world average. This suggests strongly that some carriers are not 
offering a similar level of safety as U.S. carriers. Unfortunately, DOT 
does not have a comprehensive mechanism in place to determine whether 
particular foreign carriers have safety deficiencies before code-
sharing arrangements are approved.
  Accordingly, I am introducing legislation today with my colleagues, 
ranking Aviation Subcommittee member Mr. Lipinski and Ms. Johnson of 
Texas, that will dramatically improve DOT's organizational capability 
to assess whether a proposed foreign code share meets safety standards 
similar to those required of our U.S. carries.
  The legislation would require a U.S. carrier seeking to code share 
with a foreign air carrier to conduct a comprehensive safety audit, 
including on-site inspections, of the foreign carrier's operations. 
Prior to receiving DOT approval of a foreign code share, the U.S. air 
carrier must certify to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) that 
the foreign air carrier meets the standards set forth in its FAA-
approved safety audit program. In turn, the FAA would be required to 
conduct a comprehensive annual review of each domestic carrier's 
approved audit program, thus assuring that the FAA remains vigilant in 
its oversight of the carrier's implementation of that program. The 
domestic carrier would also conduct a periodic review of the foreign 
carrier's operations to ensure continued compliance with the safety 
standards. In addition, the FAA would be directed to work with the 
International Civil Aviation Organization to ensure that code-
sharing oversight becomes a part of any foreign authority's air safety 
regulatory framework.

  The importance of this requirement cannot be overstated. Currently, 
the FAA, which is responsible for safety oversight of our domestic 
carriers, conducts only limited review of foreign airlines 
participating in code-share agreements with our airlines. For foreign 
airlines, the FAA looks only at whether the flag country has a good 
institutional structure for regulating aviation safety. The FAA does 
not evaluate the safety of the foreign airline itself.
  Delta's recent suspension of its code-share with Korean Air 
underscores this point. The FAA had no safety concerns with the 
arrangement because South Korea has a system for regulating safety 
that, on paper, appeared adequate. However, in this case--and possibly 
in far too many other cases--there appears to be little correlation 
between FAA's assessment of the foreign regulatory system and the 
actual safety performance of a carrier.
  That observation is not meant to fault FAA for its efforts to assess 
the aviation regulatory systems of foreign governments. The FAA's 
assessment does provide valuable information about the structure and 
capabilities of a particular country's civil aviation authority; it 
does not provide specifics about a particular foreign code-share 
partner, when the changing nature of international aviation demands 
such an assessment.
  This legislation will respond to the challenge of increasing the 
safety margin for the American traveling public by establishing a 
process for making meaningful safety judgments about foreign airlines.
  I urge my colleagues to join me in co-sponsoring this legislation.

                          ____________________