Word: valujet
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
After the crash, government officials began appearing on television to reassure the public that discount airlines were safe to fly. Top officials at the Department of Transportation shifted quickly into crisis-management mode. Secretary Federico Pena drew on his own experience flying ValuJet to reassure the public on national television: "I have flown ValuJet. ValuJet is a safe airline, as is our entire aviation system." Pena insisted that "if ValuJet was unsafe, we would have grounded...
...report proved that discount airlines were as safe as the major carriers. But Pena had to know this simply wasn't true. He was protecting an airline just the way government officials had for decades. In fact, the FAA had an avalanche of evidence that proved that ValuJet had been troubled for months and that other marginal airlines were just as unsafe. Conclusions from the report Pena referred to were etched into my memory. It revealed that the cumulative safety rate of discount carriers was skewed because one of them, Southwest, had a nearly perfect safety record. Good grades...
...crashed plane was a used DC-9, serial number 901VJ, that had been plagued with faulty equipment and emergency landings since January. Watching Transportation and FAA officials, I realized there was no charitable way to characterize what they were doing--they were simply lying to the public about ValuJet's record. It was not the first time I had seen the department react to a plane crash with a blitz of political spin control. But this time their overstatement and vehemence left me outraged...
...officials very likely would have continued with their charade if not for a phone call to my home late in the week after the ValuJet crash. An anonymous FAA employee had tracked me down through a reporter. I needed to know, the voice said nervously, that in the days after Weintrob grilled the Atlanta inspectors about ValuJet, the Atlanta staff took a good look at the airline. Ten days later, they put their fears in writing to headquarters. Did I understand? the caller demanded. The field staff in Atlanta had recommended in February that ValuJet be grounded. They...
...next morning, the FAA called a press conference to offhandedly release a tall stack of ValuJet documents. Buried in the middle was the innocuous-looking report from the Atlanta staff. I practically lunged at the copy handed to me. Skimming several pages on Valujet's troubles, I stopped short at the field inspectors' bombshell: that "consideration should be given to an immediate FAR-121 recertification of this airline." Official FAA jargon, yes, but the meaning was clear: ground ValuJet...