NTSB calls for oversight of air tour operators

Federal safety officials are making another push for stricter oversight of air tour operators and hotair balloon rides after several deadly crashes in recent years.

The National Transportation Safety Board asked the Federal Aviation Administration to raise safety requirements for the passenger-carrying operations, which fall under less restrictive regulations than airlines do for things such as pilot training and maintenance.

“When people step on board an aircraft as paying passengers, they have the right to trust that the flight will be operated as safely as possible,” NTSB Chairman Robert Sumwalt said at the end of a board hearing on the matter.

Some airplane and helicopter tours operate under rules for “general aviation,” a category that mostly covers private planes not used to carry paying passengers. Safety board members said some of the operators exploit loopholes in FAA regulations to avoid stricter oversight.

The FAA said in a statement that it “has a number of initiatives under way to improve the safety” of passenger-carrying general aviation operations, including requiring air tour operators to have safety-management programs and requiring balloon pilots to pass medical exams.

Under current FAA rules air tours are subject to more inspections than other private planes, tours must take off and land at the same airport, and operators must have drug and alcohol testing programs for employees. NTSB members said, however, those steps aren’t enough and that some tour operators evade closer monitoring by how they describe their flights.