Opinion ID: 743573
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Selecting a group of pilots over the age of 60.

Text: 32 The FAA also rejected the suggestion that a group of pilots over the age of 60 be permitted to continue flying under Part 121 in order to generate the data needed for the FAA to make an empirical judgment about whether the Age 60 Rule is reasonable. The Pilots contend, without elaboration, that the FAA failed to offer adequate consideration to this alternative. The FAA responds that it rejected this proposal because it did not have confidence that it could identify a cohort of vintage pilots who would not be susceptible to subtle impairments or to sudden incapacitation: 33 The FAA withdrew [a similar plan] in 1984 because valid selection tests for the group did not exist. The FAA was concerned that, without valid selection tests, these pilots would create an unacceptable safety risk in part 121 operations. The commenter does not suggest any data that indicates [sic] that a group described [sic] would be able to identify any such tests. The FAA has the same concerns today. 34 60 Fed.Reg. at 65,984. 35 As long as the FAA cannot identify good candidates for the experiment that the Pilots propose, we can hardly conclude that its refusal to run the experiment is arbitrary and capricious. On the contrary, it would be unreasonable for the court to require that the FAA periodically suspend its safety regulations in order to determine anew, upon the basis of (potentially disastrous) experience, whether they are still needed. Nor have the Pilots shown that such experimentation with the safety of passengers is permitted by the Federal Aviation Act. Indeed, the Congress arguably forbade it by requiring the FAA to consider the duty of an air carrier to provide service with the highest possible degree of safety in the public interest. 49 U.S.C. § 44701(d)(1)(A). 36 Nothing in the record suggests that the FAA has, but refuses to act upon, the valid selection tests it would need in order to identify a group of low-risk pilots over the age of 60 who might safely continue to fly. Therefore we must conclude that the FAA did not act arbitrarily and capriciously--and was quite possibly acting as required by law--when it refused to waive the Rule in order to allow a selected group of pilots to fly commercial passenger aircraft after attaining the age of 60. 37