EU Safety Agency powerless because of loopholes in EU regulation

Citation

(2008), "EU Safety Agency powerless because of loopholes in EU regulation", Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, Vol. 80 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/aeat.2008.12780aab.008

EU Safety Agency powerless because of loopholes in EU regulation

EU Safety Agency powerless because of loopholes in EU regulation

Aircraft Engineers International's Executive Board expressed its deep concern and fear that aviation safety in Europe is being degraded. During the EU – US International Aviation Safety Conference held recently in Prague, it was publicly stated that during many audits of EU member states aviation authorities, the EASA standardisation teams had uncovered over 1,000 errors in either regulation or the use of the aviation regulation by the authorities as well as airlines in 2006. This is not new, before 2006, hundreds of irregularities were also reported to the EU Commission with a request to initiate appropriate corrective actions. Despite this only few corrective actions have been taken by the EU Commission.

This despite the fact that many of the irregularities have a direct negative impact on aviation safety which in turn places EU citizens at higher risk when flying the EU airlines. This lack of political will to ensure that the highest levels of safety are maintained throughout Europe must cease immediately.

AEI called on the EU Commission to implement change now before this situation turns into one or more disasters.

AEI state that it has repeatedly requested that the EU Commission publish these irregularities in order to ensure that all EU citizens are aware of the safety standards employed by European Airlines before deciding with which airline to travel. Despite the safety issue here, requests by AEI are said to have been completely ignored and they claim that they have not even received a reply as to why their letters have not been answered.

AEI is seriously concerned about the level of safety in Europe and has therefore declared 2007 the year of the Licensed Aircraft Maintenance Engineer in order to help promote awareness of the growing problem of commercialism over safety. AEI considers it their responsibility to inform the flying public about these safety issues which both industry and governments still continue to ignore.