United States General Accounting Office

GAO Testimony

Before the Subcommittee on Aviation, Committee on

Commerce, Science and Transportation, U.S. Senate

For Release

on Delivery

Expected at

10 a.m. EST

Wednesday

March 5, 1997

AVIATION SAFETY AND

SECURITY

Challenges to Implementing

the Recommendations of

the White House

Commission on Aviation

Safety and Security

Statement by Gerald L. Dillingham,

Associate Director, Transportation Issues,

Resources, Community, and Economic Development

Division

GAO/T-RCED-97-90

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee:

We appreciate the opportunity to share our views on the

recommendations contained in the recently released report of the White

House Commission on Aviation Safety and Security. The Commission’s 57

recommendations broadly cover safety, security, air traffic control, and

disaster response. As you know, 1996 was a bad year for aviation safety.

Last year, 380 people died in air accidents involving large U.S. air carriers,

the highest number in 11 years. The crashes of TWA Flight 800 off New

York and ValuJet Flight 592 in Florida accounted for most of those deaths.

Although the nation’s air transportation system remains the safest in the

world and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) the model for other

nations, these tragic events have served to raise the Congress’s, the

administration’s, the aviation industry’s, and the flying public’s

consciousness of the need to continuously increase the existing margin of

safety.

During the past several years, we have reported to the Congress on the

status of a wide range of programs and initiatives intended to expand that

margin of safety. Our testimony this morning, based on this prior work and

on an analysis of the Commission’s recommendations, will focus on the

implementation issues relating to three areas addressed by the

Commission: aviation safety, air traffic control modernization, and

aviation security.

We believe that the Commission’s recommendations are a good start

toward an evolutionary process of making real the Commission’s vision of

ensuring greater safety and security for passengers, restructuring the

relationships between the government and the industry, and maintaining

America’s position of global leadership in aviation. However, key

questions remain about how and when the recommendations will be

implemented, how much it will cost to implement them, and who will pay

the cost. Our message this morning focuses on the challenges that lie

ahead in taking the next steps to convert the Commission’s

recommendations from concepts to realities.

Aviation Safety The Commission made 14 recommendations in the general area of aviation

safety. Foremost among these is establishing a national goal to reduce the

fatal accident rate by 80 percent within 10 years. This is a very challenging

goal, particularly in the light of the projected increases in the amount of

air traffic in the coming decade.

Page 1 GAO/T-RCED-97-90 Aviation Safety and Security
We applaud the Commission’s adopting such a goal for accident reduction

and endorse many of its recommendations for improving safety. These

recommendations include, for example, expanding FAA’s inspection

program to cover not only aging aircraft’s structural integrity but also such

areas as electrical wiring, fuel lines, and pumps. A number of these

recommendations resonate with safety and efficiency improvements that

we and others, including FAA, have suggested over the years.1

 However, we

believe that, as FAA tries to fundamentally reinvent itself as the

Commission contemplates through some of its recommendations, FAA and

the aviation industry will be challenged in three areas: (1) FAA’s

organizational culture and resource management, (2) FAA’s partnerships

with the airline industry, and (3) the costs of and sources of funding to

implement the recommendations.

A number of recent studies and the FAA itself have pointed to the

importance of culture in the agency’s operations. Last year, our review of

FAA’s organizational culture found that it had been an underlying cause of

the agency’s persistent acquisition problems, including substantial cost

overruns, lengthy schedule delays, and shortfalls in the performance of its

air traffic control modernization program.2

 Furthermore, the lack of

continuity in FAA’s top management, including the Administrator and some

senior executive positions, has fostered an organizational culture that has

tended to avoid accountability, focus on the short term, and resist

fundamental improvements in the acquisitions process.

Similarly, a 1996 report issued by the Aviation Foundation and the

Institute of Public Policy stated that the recent actions taken to reorganize

FAA have done nothing to change the long-term structural problems that

plague the organization.3

 The study concluded that FAA does not have the

characteristics to learn and that its culture does not recognize or serve any

client other than itself.

As FAA’s own 1996 report entitled Challenge 2000 points out, it will take

several years to overcome the many cultural barriers at FAA, determine the

1

For example, see Aviation Safety: New Airlines Illustrate Long-Standing Problems in FAA’s Inspection

Program (GAO/RCED-97-2, Oct. 17, 1996); Aviation Safety: Targeting and Training of FAA’s Safety

Inspector Workforce (GAO/T-RCED-96-26, Apr. 30, 1996); and Aircraft Maintenance: FAA Needs to

Follow Through on Plans to Ensure the Safety of Aging Aircraft (GAO/RCED-93-91, Feb. 26, 1993).

2

Aviation Acquisition: A Comprehensive Strategy Is Needed for Cultural Change at FAA

(GAO/RCED-96-159, Aug. 22, 1996).

3

Why Can’t the Federal Aviation Administration Learn? Creating a Learning Culture at the FAA, the

Aviation Foundation, Falls Church, Virginia and the Institute of Public Policy, George Mason

University, Fairfax, Virginia (July 10, 1996).

Page 2 GAO/T-RCED-97-90 Aviation Safety and Security
skill mix of the workforce of the 21st century, and recruit the necessary

talent in a resource-constrained environment.4

 In the light of these studies’

results, we would caution that the organizational and cultural changes

envisioned by the Commission may require years of concerted effort by all

parties concerned.

In connection with resource management, FAA’s fiscal year 1998 budget

request reveals some difficult choices that may have to be made among

safety-related programs. For example, FAA proposes increasing its safety

inspection workforce by 273 persons while decreasing some programs for

airport surface safety, including a program designed to reduce runway

incursions. The National Transportation Safety Board has repeatedly

included runway incursions on its annual lists of its “most wanted” critical

safety recommendations. FAA’s budget request includes a reduction in the

Runway Incursion program from $6 million in fiscal year 1997 to less than

$3 million in fiscal year 1998. Although FAA set a goal in 1993 to improve

surface safety by reducing runway incursions by 80 percent by the year

2000 from the 1990 high of 281, the results have been uneven; there were

186 runway incursions in 1993 and 246 in 1995. As was shown by the

November 1994 runway collision in St. Louis, Missouri, between a

commercial carrier and a private plane, such incidents can have fatal

consequences—2 people lost their lives. It is unclear what progress will be

made in this area, given the proposed budget cuts.

Similarly, we have reported since 1987 that the availability of complete,

accurate, and reliable FAA data is critical to expanding the margin of

safety.5

 However, funding for FAA’s National Aviation Safety Data Analysis

Center, a facility designed to enhance aviation safety by the rigorous

analysis of integrated data from many aviation-related databases, is slated

to be reduced from $3.7 million in fiscal year 1997 to $2 million in fiscal

year 1998.

The Commission’s report stresses that safety improvements cannot

depend solely on FAA’s hands-on inspections but must also rely on

partnerships with the aviation industry in such areas as self-monitoring

and certification. Several programs for the airlines’ self-disclosure of

safety problems have already contributed to identifying and resolving

4

Challenge 2000: Recommendations for Future Aviation Safety Regulation, prepared for FAA’s Office

of Policy, Planning, and International Aviation by Booz•Allen & Hamilton, Inc. (Apr. 1996).

5

Aviation Safety: Data Problems Threaten FAA Strides on Safety Analysis System (GAO/AIMD-95-27,

Feb. 8, 1995); Department of Transportation: Enhancing Policy and Program Effectiveness Through

Improved Management (GAO/RCED-87-3, Apr. 13, 1987).

Page 3 GAO/T-RCED-97-90 Aviation Safety and Security
some of these types of problems.6

 For example, one airline’s program for

reporting pilot events or observations—a joint effort by the airline, the

pilot union, and FAA—has identified safety-related problems, the vast

majority of which would not have been detected by relying solely on FAA

surveillance. The discovery of these problems has resulted in safety

improvements to aircraft, to the procedures followed by flight crews, and

to air traffic patterns. As the Commission has recognized, however, such

information will not be provided if its disclosure threatens jobs or results

in punitive actions. However, FAA’s role in some broader partnerships with

industry has also raised some questions. For example, FAA’s cooperative

process working with Boeing on the 777 aircraft helped enable the

manufacturer to meet the planned certification date, but FAA was also

criticized by some FAA engineers and inspectors for providing inadequate

testing of the aircraft’s design.

In the case of self-disclosure programs, decisions will have to be made on

which aviation entities are best suited to such partnership programs, how

to monitor these programs and make effective use of the data they offer,

how to balance the pressure for public disclosure against the need to

protect such information, and how to standardize and share such

information across the aviation industry. With broader cooperation

between FAA and the aviation industry, the Congress and FAA need to be on

guard that the movement toward partnerships does not compromise the

agency’s principal role as the industry’s regulator.

Finally, it is important to point out that the costs associated with achieving

the accident reduction goal and who should pay for these costs have not

yet been determined. In accordance with the Commission’s call for more

government-industry partnerships, government, the industry, and the

traveling public would likely share in these costs. For example, FAA’s

partnership programs involve significant costs for both the agency and the

industry. In the case of equipping the cargo holds of passenger aircraft

with smoke detectors, the cost would fall initially on the industry, while

the costs associated with the recommendation that children under the age

of 2 be required to have their own seats on airplanes would fall more

directly on the traveling public.

Regardless of who bears the cost of the proposed improvements, the

Commission has correctly recognized that additional safety improvements

may sometimes be difficult to justify under the benefit-cost criteria applied

6

Examples of ongoing or recent partnership programs include the American Airlines Safety Action

Program for pilots as well as the USAir Inc. Altitude Awareness Program and the Alaska Airlines

Altitude Awareness Program.

Page 4 GAO/T-RCED-97-90 Aviation Safety and Security
to regulatory activities. The Commission recommended that cost not

always be the determining factor or basis for deciding whether to put new

aviation safety and security rules into effect. Specifically, the Commission

notes that the potential reduction in the fatal accident rate merits a careful

weighing of the options for improving safety in terms of the benefits that

go beyond those traditionally considered in benefit-cost analyses.

However, we also believe that it is important to recognize that the

recommendation (1) represents a significant departure from traditional

processes, (2) could result in significant cost increases for relatively

modest increases in the safety margin, and (3) could rest on a limited

empirical justification. In effect, this recommendation may increase the

number of instances in which the primary factor determining whether or

not to go forward with a safety or security improvement is what might be

referred to as a public policy imperative rather than the result of a

benefit-cost analysis. One instance of such a decision is the Commission’s

recommendation to eliminate the exemption in the Federal Aviation

Regulations that allows children under 2 to travel without the benefit of an

FAA-approved restraint.

Air Traffic Control

Modernization

The Commission also reviewed the modernization of the air traffic control

(ATC) system. FAA is in the midst of a $34 billion dollar, mission-critical

capital investment program to modernize aging ATC equipment. This

program includes over 100 projects involving new radars, automated data

processing, and navigation, surveillance, and communications equipment.

We believe this modernization is also important for attaining the next level

of safety by replacing aging equipment and providing controllers and pilots

with enhanced communication and better information.

Recognizing that new technology, such as satellite-based navigation and

new computers in ATC facilities and in aircraft cockpits, offers tremendous

advances in safety, efficiency, and cost-effectiveness for users of the ATC

system and for FAA, the Commission recommended accelerating the

deployment of this new technology. According to FAA’s current plan, many

of these elements would not be in place until the year 2012 and beyond.

However, the Commission has recommended that these technologies be in

place and operational by the year 2005—7 years ahead of FAA’s planned

schedule. The Commission’s goal is commendable, but given FAA’s past

problems in developing new ATC technology and the technical challenges

that lie ahead, there is little evidence that this goal can be achieved.

Page 5 GAO/T-RCED-97-90 Aviation Safety and Security
We have chronicled FAA’s efforts to modernize the air traffic control

system for the past decade. Because of the modernization effort’s size,

complexity, cost, and past problems, we designated it as a high-risk

information technology initiative in 1995 and again in 1997.7

 Many of FAA’s

modernization projects have been plagued by cost-overruns, schedule

delays, and shortfalls in performance that have delayed important safety

and efficiency benefits. We reported last year that the agency’s culture was

an underlying cause of FAA’s acquisition problems. FAA’s acquisitions were

impaired because employees acted in ways that did not reflect a strong

commitment to, among other things, the focus on and the accountability to

the modernization mission.8

 More recently, we have identified other

important factors that have contributed to FAA’s difficulty in modernizing

the ATC system. For example, FAA’s lack of effective cost-estimating and

-accounting practices forces it to make billion-dollar investment decisions

without reliable information. Also, the absence of a complete systems

architecture, or overall blueprint, to guide the development and evolution

of the many interrelated ATC systems forces FAA to spend time and money

to overcome system incompatibilities.9

We agree with the Commission’s recommendations to integrate the

airports’ capacity needs into the ATC modernization effort and to enhance

the accuracy, availability, and reliability of the Global Positioning System.

However, we have two concerns about accelerating the entire

modernization effort that focus on the complexities of the technology and

the integrity of FAA’s acquisition process. First, the complexity of

developing and acquiring new ATC technology—both hardware and

software—must be recognized. The Commission contends that new ATC

technology to meet FAA’s requirements is available “off-the-shelf.”

However, FAA has found that significant additional development efforts

have been needed to meet the agency’s requirements for virtually all major

acquisitions over the past decade. More recently, two new major contracts

for systems—the Standard Terminal Automation Replacement System and

7

High-Risk Series: An Overview (GAO/HR-95-1, Feb. 1995); and High-Risk Series: Information

Management and Technology (GAO/HR-97-9, Feb. 1997).

8

Aviation Acquisition: A Comprehensive Strategy Is Needed for Cultural Change at FAA

(GAO/RCED-96-159, Aug. 1996).

9

Air Traffic Control: Improved Cost Information Needed to Make Billion Dollar Modernization

Investment Decisions (GAO/AIMD-97-20, Jan. 1997); and Air Traffic Control: Complete and Enforced

Architecture Needed for FAA Systems Modernization (GAO/AIMD-97-30, Feb. 1997).

Page 6 GAO/T-RCED-97-90 Aviation Safety and Security
the Wide Area Augmentation System—called for considerable

development efforts.10

Second, requiring FAA to spend at an accelerated rate could prove to be

inconsistent with the principles of the agency’s new Acquisition

Management System, established on April 1, 1996, in response to the

legislation freeing it from most federal procurement laws and regulations.11

FAA’s acquisition management system calls for FAA to go through a

disciplined process of (1) defining its mission needs, (2) analyzing

alternative technological and operational approaches to meeting those

needs, and (3) selecting only the most cost-effective solutions. Until FAA

goes through this analytical and decision-making process, it is premature

to predict what new technology FAA should acquire. For example, FAA itself

points out that while satellite communications that link the

communication and navigation functions offer tremendous potential

benefits, the technology is not yet mature enough for civil

aviation—significant development is needed to determine the

requirements and operational concepts of the technology. In this

particular case, accelerating the ATC modernization too much could

increase the risk that FAA will make poor investment decisions. Overall,

our message in this area is one of caution—accelerating the entire

modernization effort will have to overcome a long history of problems that

FAA’s new acquisition management system was designed to address and a

number of obstacles.

Aviation Security Aviation security is another component of ensuring the safety of

passengers. It rests on a careful mix of intelligence information,

procedures, technology, and security personnel. The Commission strongly

presented aviation security as a national security priority and

recommended that the federal government commit greater resources to

improving it. Many of the Commission’s 31 recommendations on security

10The Standard Terminal Automation Replacement System project is expected to replace the aging

computers and related equipment used at the FAA facilities that track aircraft in the airspaces

surrounding airports. The Wide Area Augmentation System project is refining the use of the Global

Positioning System to meet the requirements of civil aviation.

11Public Law 104-50, section 348.

Page 7 GAO/T-RCED-97-90 Aviation Safety and Security
are similar to those that we have made in previous reports.12 For example,

the Commission urged FAA to deploy commercially available systems for

detecting explosives in checked baggage at U.S. airports while also

continuing to develop, evaluate, and certify such equipment. Similarly, the

Commission echoed our recommendation that the government and the

industry focus their safety and security research on the human factors

associated with using new devices, especially on how operators will work

with new technology. The Committee’s recommendations address a

number of long-standing vulnerabilities in the nation’s air transportation

system, such as (1) the screening of checked and carry-on baggage, mail,

and cargo and (2) unauthorized individuals gaining access to an airport’s

critical areas. Many of the 20 initial security recommendations that the

Commission made on September 9, 1996, are already being implemented

by the airlines or by government agencies.

We found, however, that in the past FAA has had difficulty in meeting some

of the time frames for implementing the safety improvements

recommended by GAO and the Department of Transportation (DOT)

Inspector General.13 Similarly, in the security area, FAA has also had

problems meeting the implementation time frames. For example, FAA is

just beginning to purchase explosives-detection systems to deploy at U.S.

airports, although the Aviation Security Improvement Act of 1990 set an

ambitious goal for FAA to have such equipment in place by November 1993.

This delay was due primarily to the technical problems slowing the

development and approval of the explosives-detection devices. But we

also found that FAA did not develop an implementation strategy to set

milestones and realistic expectations or to identify the resources to guide

the implementation efforts. It is important that FAA sustain the momentum

generated by the Commission’s report and move forward systematically to

implement its recommendations.

Finally, although the Commission concluded that many of its proposals

will require additional funding, it did not specifically recommend funding

levels for new security initiatives over the long term. Instead, the

Commission recommended that the federal government devote at least

12See, for example, Aviation Security: Additional Actions Needed to Meet Domestic and International

Challenges (GAO/RCED-94-38, Jan. 27, 1994); Aviation Security: Development of New Security

Technology Has Not Met Expectations (GAO/RCED-94-142, May 19, 1994); Aviation Security:

Technology’s Role in Addressing Vulnerabilities (GAO/T-RCED/NSIAD-96-262, Sept. 19, 1996); Aviation

Security: Immediate Action Needed to Improve Security (GAO/T-RCED/NSIAD-96-237, Aug. 1, 1996);

and Aviation Security: Urgent Issues Need to be Addressed (GAO/T-RCED/NSIAD-96-251, Sept. 11,

1996).

13Aviation Safety: FAA Generally Agrees With but Is Slow in Implementing Safety Recommendations

(GAO/RCED-96-193, Sept. 23, 1996).

Page 8 GAO/T-RCED-97-90 Aviation Safety and Security
$100 million annually to meet security capital requirements—leaving the

decision on how to fund the remaining security costs to the National Civil

Aviation Review Commission. The National Civil Aviation Review

Commission is charged with looking at FAA funding issues, and we do not

want to preempt its report and recommendations. But, for example, the

$144.2 million appropriated by the Congress in 1997 for new security

technology represents a fraction of the estimated billions of dollars

required to enhance the security of air travel. To improve aviation security,

the Congress, the administration, and the aviation industry need to agree

on what to do and who will pay for it—and then to take action.

In closing, Mr. Chairman, we face a turning point. The public’s concern

about aviation safety and security has been heightened. The Congress and

the administration have a renewed commitment to addressing this urgent

national concern. The Commission’s work is a good start toward an

evolutionary process of reaching agreement on the goals and steps to

improve aviation safety and security. To guide the implementation of the

Commission’s recommendations, DOT and FAA will need a comprehensive

strategy that includes (1) clear goals and objectives, (2) measurable

performance criteria to assess how the goals and objectives are being met,

and (3) a monitoring, evaluation, and reporting system to periodically

evaluate the implementation. This strategy could serve as a mechanism to

track progress and establish the basis for determining funding trade-offs

and priorities. In addition, successful implementation will require strong,

stable leadership at DOT and at FAA. Although several complex questions

remain unanswered, we hope that the Commission’s work can serve as a

catalyst for change and a strengthened commitment to resolving these

challenges to improving safety.

This concludes my prepared statement. We would be glad to respond to

any questions that you and Members of the Committee might have.

(341527) Page 9 GAO/T-RCED-97-90 Aviation Safety and Security
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