AIRLINE SAFETY Transportation safety board urges better training to improve safety of small air carriers //

OTTAWA—Canada’s transportation safety board is urging more rigorous training and a cultural shift to improve the safety of small air carriers, operations that provide vital lifelines to small communities yet have the worst accident record in commercial aviation.

Facing economic pressures, too many small aviation operators have become accepting of safety risks, the Transportation Safety Board of Canada said Thursday as it released the results of a special, four-year investigation into the safety of the country’s some 500 air taxi operators. While not flagrantly breaking the rules, it said bad practices such as flying overweight aircraft, operating with minimal fuel or pushing ahead in marginal weather put pilots and passengers at risk.

“That doesn’t mean the result is always an accident, but it almost always means a reduced safety margin,” said Glen Whitney, who led the board’s special investigation.

Kathy Fox, chair of the safety board, noted that air taxi operations have more accidents and more fatalities than all other sectors of commercial aviation combined.

“Air taxi flight crews and their passengers should not have to accept a reduced level of safety compared to those who fly on scheduled airlines,” she told a news conference Thursday morning.

The review cited two broad factors behind the streak of accidents: acceptance of unsafe practices and inadequate management of operational hazards. Yet operators may not view their practices as unsafe but rather as “part of getting the job done,” said Whitney.

For the period 2000 to 2017, there were 789 accidents in the air taxi sector, resulting in 240 fatalities, representing 55 per cent of all commercial aviation accidents and 62 per cent of fatalities, according to statistics compiled by the board. That’s far above the 93 accidents and 15 fatalities involving the country’s large airlines.