Southwest Airlines Safety

There is quite a bit of hot water boiling over at Southwest Airlines and with the FAA. Seems that airplanes that maybe should have been grounded for possible safety violations continued to fly, potentially placing thousands of passengers at risk. And now, the FAA is setting up some big dollar amount penalties for Southwest Airlines to pay.

We all pay a lot of fees and taxes when we fly, with the idea that governing bodies will ensure that standards are not only met, but enforced when they aren't met. Thankfully, no one was hurt, but they could have been, and taking chances with safety is simply not an acceptable risk. Given that several older airplanes at Southwest Airlines were flying for up to several days without required inspections, and that the FAA did not ground those planes it would seem that both the FAA and Southwest should be looked at in assessing blame.

Southwest Faces Penalty on Plane Cracks - from the Associated Press
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