Lobbyists Deferred Air Safety Rules, Says Transport Canada

Tom Korski , www.blacklocks.ca
Industry successfully lobbied Transport Canada to delay for years the introduction of new air safety rules, documents show. Amendments to Canadian Aviation Regulations were put off due to costs though the department said current rules are inadequate, according to a cabinet memo released through Access To Information.

“Given the complexity of issues and significant impacts identified, Transport Canada requires additional time to work with industry,” says the December 26, 2014 memo to then-Transport Minister Lisa Raitt. The document cites industry complaints over a proposal to impose tougher limits on the number of hours that aircraft crews can fly in a week, and regulations on minimum rest times.

“Transport Canada determined that the flight duty time requirements…should not be as restrictive,” says the memo Flight Crew Fatigue Management. The memo adds regulators would “work with industry to alleviate their outstanding concerns and, where required, to amend the regulatory proposal for smaller operators.”

Regulators have attempted since 2010 to update rules on maximum on-duty hours and minimum rest times for air crews. The department noted its current Aviation Regulations have not been updated in 19 years and failed to meet standards set in 2009 by the International Civil Aviation Organization.

“Current requirements do not reflect today’s fatigue science,” the memo notes; “Transport Canada’s current flight and duty time requirements permit daily duty periods that are too long; permit rest periods that are too short; do not consider human physiology; and do not consider the effect of cumulative fatigue.”

The Transportation Safety Board cited at least five incidents in the period from 2000 to 2014 “involving commercial Canadian operators where fatigue was a contributing factor”, the memo continues. No details were cited.

“Pilot decision-making played a role in 70 to 90 percent of aviation accidents in the past five years,” Fatigue Management says. “Fatigue can affect flight crew decision-making and, as such, it is reasonable to assume that in some of these accidents fatigue may have played a part.”

“A Lot Of Good Excuses”

Proposals would limit all air crew to 13 hours’ flying time per day and 60 hours a week, similar to U.S. standards; restrict the number of night shifts to three consecutive nights; expand rest periods; and limit the number of hours that crew can fly every month. The department noted major air carriers are already covered by union contracts that meet or exceed the proposals.

Industry groups opposing the regulations included the Helicopter Association of Canada; the Canadian Business Aviation Association; and the Northern Air Transportation Association, which estimated adoption of the rules would require carriers to hire 30 percent more flight crews.

“It’s extreme,” Stephen Nourse, executive director, said in an earlier interview. “This is huge. It’s immense in its impact.”

“This takes Air Canada’s union agreement and cost structure and imposes it on the rest of Canadian aviation,” Nourse said; “Margins are thin. They are trying to rewrite the rules for everybody, all at once.”

The cabinet memo agreed smaller commercial operators, air taxis and commuter aircraft companies should be given at least two years to comply with any new regulations, which have yet to be finalized. Transport Canada yesterday declined to say when the rules would be introduced.

The Air Line Pilots Association International blamed “excuses” for the years of delay in complying with world standards on crew fatigue. “We were told they simply didn’t have enough time,” Captain Don Adamus, Canada Board president, said in an earlier interview.

“There are a lot of good excuses – I get that,” Adamus said; “We were told they simply didn’t have enough time”; “Yes, there’s going to be an increase in cost, however everybody’s going to have an increased cost. If everyone has an increased cost, there’s no competitive advantage. It’s pretty hard to carve out which pilots should fall under the new rules and which shouldn’t. A pilot is a pilot, and fatigue is fatigue.”

Under current rules air crew can work a 90-hour week under regulations – a standard Transport Canada said was “not acceptable given the current fatigue science.”