Planes with Problems Allowed to Fly
HOLMES: All right, don't know if you're going to want to go flying after you hear this story. There's a "USA Today" investigation just out that finds 65,000 airline flights over the past six years should not have happened because the planes were not maintained to FAA standards. Sixty-five-thousand flights. It's possible you were on one of them. Millions of passengers were on those flights. The reporter on this story, from the "USA Today," was Gary Stoller. He joins us now on the phone from Connecticut, and also rejoining the conversation is former Department of Transportation inspector general Mary Schiavo. Gary, let me ask you this simple question: after doing this study, are you more nervous about flying these days?</s>GARY STOLLER, REPORTER, "USA TODAY": I wouldn't say I am more nervous about flying, because I've known about these problems for many years and reported on them. I think, certainly, there's a reason for many consumers to have deep concern about the maintenance on their airplane. To have at least 65,000 flights flying in un-airworthy condition is certainly not a good thing.</s>HOLMES: How were these things, these flights, allowed to take off? I guess we say they shouldn't have taken off, but I guess what mechanisms or lapses are in place that allows them to take off?</s>STOLLER: Well, often the FAA will only find these problems after the flights have taken off. It could be many months before the FAA looks through records and finds the problem. I also found that something the FAA would find a problem, mention it to the airline. The airplane would continue to fly despite the FAA pointing out the problem to them.</s>HOLMES: Mary, let me bring you back in here. Where is the breakdown, would you say? And I know some of this has to do with the fact that many airlines are, surprised to hear, and a lot of people would be surprised to hear it, outsourcing the maintenance, even outsourcing it to -- not just some other company, but foreign companies.</s>SCHIAVO: That's right. And Gary is right on, spot on in this article. What's occurring is we've kind of got a perfect storm. The airlines are outsourcing more and more maintenance issues, and this is a trend that started in the early '90s, except it's increased three- fold. The FAA often follows the airline. They have maintenance inspectors that find to the airline. But the airlines are allowed to farm out, including to non-FAA approved repair stations.</s>HOLMES: Mary, why?</s>SCHIAVO: All they have to do is -- yes. All they have to do is recertify, and they're pretty much on an honor system. We just -- we don't have any more inspectors today than we had 15 years ago, and yet the airline industry is dramatically different.</s>HOLMES: Why is that allowed? Mary, that sounds nuts.</s>SCHIAVO: Well, it is nuts. But the FAA has the theory; it's their way of doing business. They believe, and they have said this publicly in hearings, et cetera, that they are in partnership with the airlines and that the airlines should be allowed to self-report. If they find a problem and they report it, they receive amnesty. So, the FAA has taken a bit of hands-off approach, in part. In all fairness to the FAA, they only have about 3,600 inspectors to cover the world. You know, for example, in China alone there are 100 -- over 100 repair stations. And so they have to cover the word -- world with a very small workforce, so they allow the carriers to self-report. And if the carriers turn themselves in, then they don't get a work action. But what has happened is they have now farmed out so much of the maintenance...</s>HOLMES: Wow.</s>SCHIAVO: ... that quality control has really suffered, and no one can really -- no one can really police it, because a lot of it is simply outside the United States.</s>HOLMES: Well, let's put up on the screen here a response from the FAA. And Gary, I'm going to bring you back in after we read this statement here. But the FAA saying, U.S. Airlines "regard safety as their highest priority" -- excuse me -- "responsibility. Their maintenance programs reflect that commitment to safety." Now, after your reporting, Gary, do you have a problem with that statement?</s>STOLLER: Well, I believe airlines do want to have safe flights. No one wants to have flights that have problems. However, these problems just keep recurring. The inspector general for the Department of Transportation has pointed out that airlines and the FAA have poor oversight over a lot of the repair-station work. So the oversight is not being done; the work isn't being done. Yes, I believe that airlines would like to have safe operation, but there are so many problems.</s>HOLMES: And last thing here to both of you, if you can, quickly, for me. Do the airlines, frankly, need some kind of help? Of course, they are trying to keep a business running, and we historically, over the past few years, several years at least, they have been losing, hemorrhaging money, in a lot of ways. Do they need some kind of federal help to raise these standards, because a lot of this seems to be the result of them just trying to cut corners and save money. Gary, I'll let you take it, and Mary, I'll let you wrap up.</s>STOLLER: John Gollier (ph), a former member of National Transportation Safety Board, had suggested that some of these fines or maybe even all of the fine money at the FAA, when they find a problem, actually be invested back into the airlines' programs to improve these maintenance programs. That's one idea. Whether it work -- whether it will work, I guess we don't know.</s>HOLMES: Mary, you go ahead. What do you think will work?</s>SCHIAVO: I'm going to use the big "R" word: regulation and re- regulation. The problem is that the airlines are in a situation very much like they were in the '30s. They're breeding -- bleeding red ink. They need help on safety. They have lost control on some of their operations. And the airlines were regulated because they asked for it in the '30s. I think we're in a situation where we have to seriously consider whether we don't need additional federal oversight over these operations to ensure that we don't backslide. We want to keep safety right where it is: No. 1 priority.</s>HOLMES: All right. Well, Mary Schiavo and Gary Stoller, again, from the "USA Today." It is an interesting, albeit a scary read. But thank you both for being here. We will hopefully continue this conversation later. Thank you both so much. Well, no matter what you do out there, send a text, maybe buy some popcorn, raid that mini bar, chances are you've done at least one of those things. But you have to realize how much you get ripped off when you do so. We're going to be breaking down just how much you are paying through the roof.