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The FAA
On the morning after ValuJet Flight 592 plunged into the Everglades last May, then-U.S. Transportation Secretary Federico Pena went on TV to say the airline was safe. It was a sentiment echoed by FAA Administrator David Hinson.
But a month later, investigators had turned up 34 violations by the airline, including delayed maintenance, failure to repair jammed landing gear, cabin doors that wouldn't lock and a weather radar system on one aircraft that was inoperative. And they discovered inspectors had known about some of the problems for months.
The airline was grounded and the FAA's safety chief, Anthony Broderick, resigned under pressure.
By the end of 1996, both Pena and Hinson had also left their posts; Hinson retired and Pena became energy secretary.
The crash has had a marked effect on the Federal Aviation Administration and the industry it regulates. Since the crash:
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The FAA added hundreds of new inspectors, and teams began placing special scrutiny on startup airlines.
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New rules banned dangerous oxygen generators from airplane cargo holds. Other rules that have not yet taken effect would require fire detectors and extinguishers in the holds of all airplanes, which the National Transportation Safety Board first recommended in 1988.
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Airline safety data became available via the Internet.
But that's far from enough to those who lost loved ones, such as Deborah Landrum of Plano, Texas. She considers the FAA criminally negligent in the crash that killed her sister, Terri Watkins Bell.
"The FAA has messed up," Landrum told the Associated Press. "They still, to this day, have the tombstone mentality they had a year and a half, two years ago. They need desperately to make changes."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Related stories:
- FAA confronts more intense scrutiny, workload - November 22, 1996
- 'This smells. This really smells.' - November 22, 1996
- NTSB official blasts FAA at ValuJet hearing - November 21, 1996
- FAA review is complete, sources say - September 18, 1996
- ValuJet crash prompts shakeup at FAA - June 18, 1996
- CNNfn: FAA chief to leave by year's end - June 25, 1996
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The Accident | The Airline | The Investigation |
| The Families | The FAA | data points |
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