Quote of the Week:  "You improve safety by reducing operational errors, not recategorizing them," Bryan Zilonis, a regional vice president of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association union In a USA Today story talking about new FAA plan to bring planes closer together without it being considered a "near collision"

Aviation Conspiracy Newsletter #436................................................................................July 8,  2007 Past newsletters can be accessed at: http://pages.prodigy.net/rockaway/ACNewsmenu.htm  The PASSUR airport flight tracking system at many major U.S. airports  http://www.passur.com/sites.htm (you must have Java installed to view it). If you want to get the newsletter sent to you every week, sign up to AviationWatch. Bill Mulcahy rockaway@prodigy.net

FAA Changing Rules For "Near Collisions!!!"

As Bill Sees It (Editorial): FAA Reduces Safety To Reduce Airport Delays!!! How does the FAA reduce the number of near collisions? They don't do it by reducing the number of near collisions, but by changing the definition of what is considered a near collision!!!  This new rule change will allow the FAA criminals to suddenly look like they are making the skies safer because it will show, on paper, that the number of near collisions is drastically reduced. Of course, the fact that planes will be flying closer to one another and the chance of a collision will be increased is not important, only the APPEARANCE of less near collisions are!!! The whole purpose of this incredible scam is to allow the FAA to increase airport capacity (more planes) and show that they are reducing delays. The reality will be a less safe aviation system. Air traffic controllers and even pilots are objecting to this new unsafe system. Apparently the FAA is going to continue to push the safety envelope by changing long standing safety rules until there is a major disaster. Northeast Airspace Redesign Plan Decision Starting To Awaken Future Victims: Next month the FAA is due to announce their new routes over New York, New Jersey, Delaware and Pennsylvania. Their victims are starting to wake up (pardon the pun) to the realization that their peace and quiet of their homes will soon be a thing of the past. The FAA's victims are also waking up their politicians like Senator Hillary Clinton who don't want the bad publicity while she is trying to get the democrat nomination for president. Hillery, like New York's other senator, Chuck Schumer, has been a staunch support of aviation expansion. Schumer is keeping quiet about the Airspace Redesign Plan because he has more than four years until his next election. I'm sure he feels the dummies who voted for him will have forgotten this issue by then. Only last year Hillary and Schumer "applauded" the start of AirTran's (formerly ValuJet) service starting at New York's Stewart Airport. DemocRATS always talk about the "jobs" airport expansion bring, but never mention the noise and air pollution impacts until there is a proposed change in routing and a community is agitated. Then they suddenly transform into environmentalists.  They are just as bad as the alleged "pro business" republicans, who are at least honest about their pro-business stance.

FAA Encourages Planes To Fly Unacceptably Close Together!!! A new method of gauging the risk of midair collisions has drawn critics, who say the new system recently implemented by the FAA could conceal the actual danger of airplanes flying in close proximity to one another. According to USA Today, under the old method an incident would be classified as high risk, if two aircraft at the same altitude came closer than five miles from one another -- the minimum distance allowed by regulations -- and were flying head on, forcing one or both pilots to take evasive action. The new system would classify such an encounter as low risk, as long as the two planes came no closer than four miles. The FAA says the new classification will cut the number of incidents considered high risk by half, simplifying the reporting process. The most minor incidents wouldn't be counted at errors at all -- which will serve to decrease overall error totals by about 25 percent.Last year, the FAA counted 1,104 operational errors, of which 610 were deemed high-risk under the old system. Editor's Note: Air traffic controllers and even pilot's unions are against this plan which once again shows that the FAA listens only to the aviation industry which wants to jam more planes into the sky regardless of the dangers. When a plane collision occurs they will be the first to blame the FAA; and rightly so. http://www.aero-news.net/index.cfm?ContentBlockID=970d0e9b-9c8a-4c71-92a5-9aa9bc2897f7  http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2007-07-05-faa-collision-risk_N.htm 

New York: Sen. Hillary Clinton Calls For More Hearings Before FAA Airspace Redesign Decision: Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-New York) is calling on the Federal Aviation Administration to schedule meetings in the Staten Island area to address the New York/New Jersey/Philadelphia Airspace Redesign project, which would change flight patterns. "Considering that this is the first major overhaul of area airspace in almost 50 years, the issue of noise mitigation by the proposed plan on Staten Island is very important, especially considering the fact that the proposed Ocean Routing flight plan would send a significant number of flights over parts of Staten Island from 10:30 p.m. to 6 a.m.," wrote Ms. Clinton. Next month, the FAA is expected to announce its pick for the first redesign of the region's airspace, which is expected to reduce delays and improve reliability at airports in New York, New Jersey and Philadelphia, which are among the nation's busiest, and notorious for some of the worst delays in the country. The FAA's preferred alternative, Integrated Airspace, would reroute planes departing from Newark over the New Jersey Turnpike and other industrial areas, instead of the current left turn flights make above the North Shore of Staten Island. It is expected to shave off about eight minutes of delay per departure. But among the concerns for residents below the friendly skies is the noise that will come from the changed flight routes. http://blog.silive.com/advanceupdate/2007/07/clinton_calls_on_faa_to_addres.html New York: FAA To Explain To Community Increase Of 200 To 600 More Overflights A Day!!!  Ramapo, New York - Two Federal Aviation Administration officials are to appear on a cable television show Thursday to answer questions about a plan that could bring 200 to 600 flights each day over Rockland County within four years. The airplanes would fly at low altitude, from 5,000 to 6,000 feet, and raise noise levels in parts of Ramapo and Orangetown that are not now in any flight paths. Steve Kelley, program manager for the FAA's airspace redesign, and FAA noise expert Scott Carpenter will appear on "Ramapo Live," a weekly program hosted by Ramapo Supervisor Christopher St. Lawrence, to discuss the proposal and questions from the public. The program will be shown from 8 to 10:30 p.m. on Cablevision channels 77 or 78, and on 75 in Suffern. It also will be streamed live on the town's Web site, www.ramapo.org. "I think he understands that Rockland has many concerns, and we need a format to discuss those concerns," St. Lawrence said, referring to Kelley. Editor's Note: I'm glad they will be on TV because if they were at a community meeting they might get hurt.  http://www.nyjournalnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070706/NEWS03/707060378  http://www.thejournalnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070708/NEWS03/707080382/1019 

Crowded Airport Causing Mega Delays This Summer: The evidence is quickly adding up: After more than a decade of troubled air travel, the summer of 2007 may be the most tortured yet, with congestion growing daily, and more frequent meltdowns that ripple across the nation, stranding passengers for days. The airlines' on-time arrival performance in the first five months of this year was the worst in 13 years, the U.S. Department of Transportation reported Tuesday. Only three of every five flights departing O'Hare International Airport were on time over those months, ranking O'Hare last among the busiest U.S. airports. And that was before the weather got really bad. Nor do the statistics capture the most distinctive dynamic of this summer's air woes—the moments when the nation's hub-and-spoke network of airports seem to seize up altogether, causing passengers to miss not just one flight, but the next and next and many more, because planes are full, or grounded, or both. Some of the ingredients in this stew of frustration are familiar, such as a burst of bad weather in June that shut down hub after hub, and the labor troubles dogging some airlines. Some are quirky, such as unrelated computer outages at the Federal Aviation Administration on June 8 and at United Airlines 12 days later. But some result from attempts by the airlines to scratch out profits after years of losses, conditions that may not improve any time soon. With a record 209 million passengers projected to pass through the nation's airports this summer, airlines are trying to keep airplanes as full as possible. When it works, the airlines make a modest profit and passengers get low-priced fares. But when things go wrong, airlines have little room to maneuver, and delays and cancellations multiply quickly.
 http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-airwoes_bd08jul08,1,4899474.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed     

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                                    Important Aviation News Stories This Week

Federal Aviation Administration officials say their new system will enhance safety and simplify a cumbersome process for classifying midair incidents.

Instead of using a complex formula, the FAA's new system ranks the severity of such incidents solely on how close planes get.

For example, jets at the same altitude must stay 5 nautical miles apart. Under the old system, an incident would be classified as high-risk if two planes breached the 5-mile limit, were flying directly at each other and a collision was avoided by the pilots taking evasive action, according to FAA regulations. Jets headed directly for each other could cover those 5 miles in about 20 seconds.

The identical circumstances would be classified as low-risk under the new system if the two jets got no closer than 4 miles. According to FAA data, the number of incidents considered high-risk will fall by more than half using this new formula.

Near-collisions are considered a key gauge of safety in the air-traffic system. There were 1,104 such errors last year, including 610 judged high-risk under the old formula.

In addition, the most minor incidents will no longer be counted as errors in FAA statistics, automatically decreasing error totals by about 25%.

"It's going to make them look like geniuses when really they've done nothing," says Bryan Zilonis, a regional vice president of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association union who helped draw up the old system. "You improve safety by reducing operational errors, not recategorizing them," Zilonis says.

The changes involve how the FAA tracks "operational errors," incidents in which controllers allow aircraft to come closer than rules allow.

Each error is classified for risk. Under the old system, many incidents categorized as high-risk were actually minor, says Tony Ferrante, director of the FAA's Air Traffic Safety Oversight Service.

The new system takes that into account, Ferrante says. It also is designed to improve capacity at congested airports by encouraging controllers to bring planes closer to the limits without fear of being cited for violations, he says.

Under the new system, controllers who breach the standard by 10% — allowing planes to get 4.5 miles apart instead of 5 — will not be considered in violation.

Several aviation experts voice concerns about the new system.

Former Transportation Department inspector general Ken Mead, whose office wrote several reports on midair incidents, says he fears that the FAA is, in effect, endorsing bringing planes closer together without conducting the complex safety analysis required to justify the change.

"Do you want planes coming that close together or not? If you don't, then you ought to say that," Mead says.

George Donohue, a former FAA official who now teaches at George Mason University in Virginia, says the multiple factors considered in the old system were necessary to understand how controllers made mistakes. "It seems to me that they are going in the wrong direction," he says.