SEATTLE — A lone safety inspector for the Federal Aviation Administration who oversees flight operations at Horizon Air has stuck his neck out to insist that the airline’s jets cannot take off with passengers aboard if a critical safety system is inoperative.
The system in question is one on commercial airliners and other smaller planes called the Traffic Alert and Collision Avoidance System, or TCAS. In early February, according to a document viewed by The Seattle Times, Horizon sent a memo to flight maintenance crews informing them of this. The jets can fly to another base for repair, but not with passengers aboard. This notice was “effective immediately.”Even Alaska Airlines, the major carrier that Horizon shares a livery with as part of the Alaska Air Group, doesn’t follow that practice.
An Alaska Airlines veteran captain, who asked not to be named because he spoke without company authorization, said providing the three days’ relief is “just the practical thing to do.” “There have been numerous cases of near midair collisions that were averted due to TCAS warning the flight crews of the approaching aircraft,” he wrote in an email. “In these times of increased hazards, resulting from aircraft collision , this is not the time for the agency to be ambiguous.”Laurie declined to speak about his position, referring a reporter to FAA communications staff.
That spurred the February memo to Horizon flight crews telling them the three-day relief options were “no longer usable.” On big airliners, TCAS provides the flight crew with “traffic advisories” to enhance their awareness of what aircraft are around them.More urgently, if the trajectories suggest two aircraft are headed too close to one another, the system will announce an escape maneuver to avoid collision, which pilots are required to act upon immediately.On Feb. 22, the system annunciated an avoidance maneuver when two regional jets came too close together at a Burbank, Calif., airport.