Safety Issues, User Fees Top of Mind for NBAA Members at Oshkosh

July 27, 2015

Members of the NBAA Safety Committee held a meet-and-greet session at the Experimental Aircraft Association’s AirVenture Oshkosh 2015, where they discussed some of the committee’s top priorities, including reducing inflight loss of control accidents and runway excursions. Several dozen NBAA Members participated in the informal two-hour safety session, which was held on Wednesday, July 22 in the Association’s large, white air-conditioned tent at the Oshkosh, WI air show.

The safety discussions – which touched upon many aspects of business aviation safety – were led by NBAA Safety Committee Members Gary Cooke and Marilena Sharpell, NBAA Regional Representative Bob Quinn and Brian Koester, the Association’s project manager of operations. Much of the focus was on the committee’s seven safety hazards: fatigue, procedural non-compliance, distraction and technology management, airspace complexities, birds and wildlife, ground-handling collisions and single-pilot task saturation.

Cooke, who heads the Safety Committee’s Bird Strike Working Group, was approached by one NBAA Member who showed him smart phone photos of a rumpled wing skin that required a “six-figure repair” after a wildlife encounter.

Later, Sharpell joined Cooke in a conversation with several Members on the importance of hands-on upset training. That exchange led to a conversation about the business aviation talent pipeline and how pilots and other aviation professionals can learn about available positions.

At the end of the two-hour session, Koester judged the event a success. “For any inaugural event, participation is always a question, and the excellent turnout was an unspoken demonstration of how important aviation safety is to our Members,” he said.

“This is an excellent outreach effort that helps the Safety Committee calibrate its focus on business aviation’s day-to-day operations and identify developing trends that need attention,” Cooke added.

Visitors to the NBAA tent also shared their concerns about user fees with NBAA President and CEO Ed Bolen, and some took the opportunity to use NBAA’s onsite Contact Congress online resource to communicate those concerns to federal legislators. User fees have at the forefront in recent weeks, with discussions about the potential introduction of a proposal, in the U.S. House of Representatives, for creating a privatized air traffic control system, funded the issue, as part of reauthorization for the FAA.

At the tent, NBAA’s advocacy efforts were on display in other ways as well: the association’s No Plane No Gain advertisements, featuring real-world accounts of how entrepreneurs use business airplanes, adorned the tent’s walls. NBAA also had plenty of the popular No Plane No Gain lapel pins on hand. The association jointly sponsors the No Plane No Gain program with the General Aviation Manufacturers Association.

The NBAA tent was also the site for the debut of three new ads that combine historical images of Charles Lindbergh, Admiral Richard Bird and Stephen MacGordon (one of aviation’s first record holders), with a contemporary message about NBAA’s ongoing efforts to promote business aviation, and the value of membership in the association.