Airline Safety and the EU Blacklist of Airlines
Tuesday July 7, 2009
With the crash of a Yemenia flight last week, I couldn't help but notice the renewed interest in the European Union's blacklist of airlines.
Yemenia had a solid safety record before its deadly crash with one survivor, and yet certain aircraft it flew had been cited for potential maintenance / mechanical issues. This however does not mean the airline was banned from flying in the European Union's airspace, unlike another airline that is based out of Comoros, but it has elevated the awareness of safety concerns.
Given too, that an air disaster on a massive scale over water occurred only weeks earlier in the shape of Air France 447 where over 200 people perished, the Yemenia crash is certainly going to be affected by the investigation of that crash - the fact that it was over water, poor weather conditions, an Airbus, and more strongly still, that the Airbus in question was about 20 years old.
The European Union's blacklist of airlines contains over 100 airlines. Essentially, due to safety / maintenance concerns or violations, these airlines are not permitted to land at any airport in the European Union. They do include the disclaimer "The fact that an airline is not included in the Community list does not, therefore, automatically mean that it meets the applicable safety standards." Thus, although extensive, it seems that the list of banned airlines is not comprehensive. Interesting too, that other parts of the world do not have a similarly extensive list of banned airlines, but over the years, there have certainly been rumblings over possibly creating them.
I personally have traveled on more than one of the blacklisted airlines. Although the flights were unspectacular, I didn't feel particularly unsafe. That being said, I flew on short haul flights with said airlines. One of the blacklisted airlines I've been a passenger on is pictured in this blog entry. So if you have ever wondered about the EU's blacklist, I've linked to the entire list of currently affected airlines.
While I admire the idea of the blacklist in terms of assuring certain international safety standards are adhered to, I can truly say I have been on planes that seemed to be in immensely worse shape (as in duct tape keeping the overhead bins closed), and are not blacklisted.
image courtesy of Arlene Fleming
Duct tape on a baggage compartment has nothing to do with the planes ability to fly?
The maintenance that matters is not visible to the passenger. The captain, however, does have access to the maintenance log and does inspect the things that matter.
The real question is whether or not the captain will refuse to fly a plane that is questionable. And you might think that no captain would do so. But when there is no pilots’ union, captains are under pressure. They knew they will be fired if they make waves.
So they fly planes that should be grounded and deride pilots who recognize that a union is a necessary evil when dealing with management.