Federal Aviation Administration

Remarks Prepared for Delivery
Marion C. Blakey
Administrator
Federal Aviation Administration
International Aviation Club Luncheon, “Accountability is the Right Thing”
Washington, DC February 16, 2005

Thank you, Charlie [Hunnicutt, club president].  Good afternoon, and thank you for inviting me. It’s a real pleasure to have this opportunity to address the International Aviation Club.  I enjoy this group because you and I share a common goal: spreading the gospel of aviation.  You know, there’s a lesson that I learned years ago, but it’s been reinforced many times over since joining the FAA.  And it’s a lesson that applies to this group … a group that recognizes the value of a light touch.

Let me illustrate by telling a story about Ben Franklin ... inventor, statesman, diplomat.  Seems that in his early years, Ben took to using a steamroller to make his point.  He convinced others to change their ways by crushing them with facts, rhetoric, and the sheer force of his will.  Given how bright he was, Franklin’s intellectual capacity was both daunting and intimidating even to the brightest of the bright.

But one day, a friend pulled him aside and said, “Ben, you reject the ideas of others with such ferocity that it’s like a slap in the face.  People don’t want to be around you.  They don’t want to waste their time, their words ... or risk a smack in the face.”

Franklin knew his friend was right.  Franklin was a diplomat by trade, yet he’d just been told that people preferred him to stay away.  He learned the lesson.  So when Ben decided that streetlights would be a good idea for Philadelphia, he didn’t browbeat others into accepting his view.  Instead, he hung a lantern from a pole outside his own home.  When his neighbors saw how well the concept worked, they followed suit.  Soon, the entire street was lined with lights.  Ben learned an important lesson: a good example is more persuasive than a week of meetings.

And that’s a concept you and I share as well.  We know that the facts and the figures are clear with regard to our business, but the best way to get others to join in ... the best way to create an international web of safety ... is to lead by example.  And I think that’s the road each of us has chosen.

With that being said, today is a terrific time for me to discuss the FAA that you don’t frequently read about.  The FAA is not a litany of articles that begin and end with accidents or runway incursions or controller staffing.  It’s an FAA that frankly you should read more about.  It’s an organization that’s deeply committed to an international umbrella of safety and efficiency ... an FAA that makes a promise and then makes a difference.  And I thank you for giving me the chance to talk about that today.

As some of you are aware, we’ve placed the FAA’s international mission on the front burner.  We have made it a priority to build stronger relationships with foreign civil aviation authorities.  Last year I had opportunities to interact on a face-to-face basis with many of my counterparts in Asia, Canada, Europe, and Latin America.

Today, I’d like to examine the changing nature of our global aviation system and the FAA’s vision for strengthening partnerships around the world.

To say that our industry is becoming more global is to put it mildly.  For years, aircraft manufacturers have cultivated business relationships with foreign suppliers to design and assemble better products.  Airlines have partnered through code share agreements to generate more business through greater efficiency and access to foreign markets.

But there is something new under the sun.  The changing nature of global aviation can be put in one word ... accountability.  More than ever, airlines, manufacturers, airport operators, air traffic service providers -- and regulators, of course -- are being held accountable for ensuring the safety of aviation operations.  Just as it should be.

As you know well, for more than 50 years following the signing of the Chicago Convention that created ICAO [International Civil Aviation Organization], countries worked together to develop and implement strong standards for aviation safety.  But we were basically under a global honor system in terms of meeting our obligations.  Some countries took their obligations as signatories to the Chicago Convention more seriously than others.  To no one’s surprise, wide gaps developed between the levels of safety oversight provided among ICAO member states.

Today, we’ve left the honor system behind in favor of a system based on accountability.  ICAO began its Universal Safety Oversight Audit Program in 1999, and it’s now performed safety audits in 181 states.  ICAO has audited many countries twice.  The FAA’s International Aviation Safety Assessment program has also encouraged national civil aviation authorities to bring their safety oversight systems into compliance with ICAO Annexes 1, 6 and 8, which we require if they are going to provide service to the United States.

There’s no doubt that this heightened level of accountability has improved the quality of global safety oversight.  Yet, safety oversight is only one important variable in our aviation safety equation.  This topic was front-and-center during the ICAO General Assembly in Montreal last September.  These discussions resulted in a global consensus for ICAO to raise the bar on accountability by adopting what’s called a “comprehensive systems approach” to auditing aviation safety systems.  This means that ICAO is expanding its safety audit program to include all safety-related Annexes.  That’s 16 out of 18 Annexes ... including airports, air traffic management, and accident investigation.

We are witnessing a similar trend in the airline industry, where the International Air Transport Association is increasing accountability through the IATA [International Air Transport Association] Oversight Safety Audit program.  IATA has implemented this program to ensure that member carriers meet basic safety requirements.

This increased level of accountability throughout our industry reflects a new sense of urgency for the global community to step up to the challenge of improving aviation safety.  We’ve come a long way, but we still have much work to do in terms of developing a safe and seamless operational environment.

Today, I am confident that we have the technologies and procedures in our toolbox to meet our goals.  The Wide Area Augmentation System [WAAS], advanced inertial navigation systems, next generation weather equipment, and parallel runway monitoring systems are just a few of the technologies at our disposal.  We are also working with new procedures such as Required Navigation Performance and Reduced Vertical Separation Minimum.  My goal is for the FAA to work together with industry to squeeze every last ounce of potential out of these new technologies and procedures to improve our global system.

When it comes to providing air traffic services ... the FAA wants to be the best.  When it comes to helping airlines save fuel and maintain on-time operations … we want to be the best.  And, when it comes to ensuring safety ... we want to be better than the best.

I am convinced that the only way that we can be successful in this endeavor is to expand our global partnerships.  Our interdependencies are too great to achieve our full potential on our own.  That’s why we’re focusing on a strategy to strengthen bilateral and regional relationships with key aviation partners around the world.

Let me take just a few minutes to highlight a few of our major initiatives, starting with two of our bilateral priorities.  I’m sure that I’m in good company with many of you in the room today when I say that China is one of our highest priorities.  Most forecasts point to China as the single largest growth market for aviation over the next 20 years.  Its recent order for 60 Boeing 787 Dreamliner aircraft is indicative of its real growth potential.

China was one of my first international stops after being named Administrator.  During that trip, I had the privilege of meeting with Minister Yang, who is one of the most respected and dynamic leaders in the region.  I am proud to say that I consider Minister Yang a colleague and friend.  We are working with his organization on a comprehensive technical exchange program through which we can both improve the safety and efficiency of our respective aviation systems.

The U.S. Aviation Cooperation Program in China that we created last year is a good example of what we can achieve through cooperation.  This unique program brings the private sector and public sector together in a more coordinated approach to support the many important aviation improvements Minister Yang is pursuing in China.  In addition to the FAA, the U.S. Department of Commerce, the U.S. Trade Development Agency, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in Beijing and many of the companies represented in this room have joined forces in this important effort.  It’s a model that’s working, and I would like to use in other regions as well.

India is another important global partner.  With a population of more than a billion people dispersed across a country more than a third the size of the United States, it is poised to become one of the world’s most important aviation markets.  I am particularly encouraged with the direction India’s leadership is taking in utilizing satellite-based navigation to improve the safety and efficiency of their aviation system.  I was very pleased that India’s GAGAN [Geo Augmented Navigation] project is modeled after our successful WAAS program, and we will work closely with them in the months and years ahead to support their implementation of this system.

Regional aviation safety organizations are another high priority for us.  I view this as a very positive trend, and one that we will continue to support in the future.  Countries are recognizing that they can achieve more to improve aviation safety by working together and sharing resources.  Civil aviation authorities are forming regional organizations to standardize aviation regulations, share inspector resources, establish technical training programs and consolidate certification responsibilities. In short, whatever it takes to meet safety standards.

I can personally attest to the benefits of partnerships through our ongoing collaboration with Canada and Mexico through the North American Aviation Trilateral -- the NAAT.  We tackled several initiatives under the NAAT last year.  Without question, we’ve taken each initiative further by working as a team.

We’ve been working together for some time to ensure a smooth transition to new Reduced Vertical Separation Minimum procedures, which were implemented throughout the Western Hemisphere on January 20.  We are now moving on with the development and implementation of a North American Wide Area Augmentation System.  We signed agreements with our trilateral partners in 2004 to install WAAS reference stations in Canada and Mexico.  This will expand the WAAS footprint and allow for greater interoperability of our contiguous airspace.  Required navigation performance, or RNP, and how to address issues associated with the growing fractional ownership industry are two major new initiatives now being tackled by this trilateral group.

I am committed to sharing the success of NAAT to date with our partners in the rest of the Western Hemisphere.  Projections indicate that aviation traffic in Latin America will grow at an annual rate of 7 percent in coming years, and we want to maintain a very open and active dialogue with our counterparts in Central and South America and the Caribbean.  To that end, I recently hosted our first senior-level meeting between the FAA and the Latin American Civil Aviation Commission right here in Washington.  Aviation leaders from 15 Latin American countries participated in a very productive meeting and we are now planning ways to join forces to support aviation safety across the Hemisphere.

We are also strengthening our relationships with Europe through our work with the European Aviation Safety Agency [EASA].  Europe remains one of our largest aviation trading partners, and we consider this a very critical period of transition for them and our joint activities.  I recently joined Patrick Goudou, the Executive Director of EASA, in Cologne for the official opening of its new headquarters office on December 13.  Our work with EASA has been progressing better than expected.  The EASA members find it very easy to let me know when there’s a problem.

In closing, I want to underscore the importance of partnerships across the aviation industry to support global aviation safety.  All of you play a role in this important global partnership and I urge both the public and private sector representatives here today to encourage your respective organizations to continue to reach out to your partners.  Continue to make the important investments of time and resources to support our shared safety goals.  Each of us needs to step up to the challenge and do the right thing.  When it comes to aviation, there’s no question global relationships are the right thing.  Thank you.