Originally Posted by
4andCounting
I wonder if before the valujet incident there was a run up in returns and failures. I pray this is not a replay of that situation.
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In August 1995, the Department of Defense (DoD) rejected ValuJet's bid to fly military personnel. In a scathing report, the DoD cited serious deficiencies in ValuJet's quality assurance procedures.
The Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA) Atlanta field office sent a memo on February 14, 1996, to Washington, D.C., stating that "consideration should be given to an immediate FAR-121 re-certification of this airline" - in other words, the FAA wanted ValuJet grounded. ValuJet airplanes made 15 emergency landings in 1994, 57 in 1995, and 57 from January through May 1996. In February the FAA ordered ValuJet to seek approval before adding any new aircraft or cities to their network, something the industry had not seen since deregulation in 1979. This attempt at removing ValuJet's certification was "lost in the maze at FAA" according to NTSB Chairman Jim Hall.By this time, ValuJet's accident rate was not only one of the highest in the low-fare sector, but was more than 14 times that of the legacy airlines."
Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.