Travel Blog

Most airplane crashes are readily preventable and most pilot errors are errors brought about by the data vacuum of not using the digital flight data recorder data in real-time to prevent crashes, giving the on-board pilot greater visibility of the aircraft's environment, etc. For example Comair Flt 5191, Aug. 27, 2006 ground incursion fatal crash mirrors the Singapore Airline Flt 006, 10/31/2000 crash. These crashes are brought about by an archaic information system that doesn't present to the pilot the correct and safe path to take. The aircraft information system hasn't changed substantially since the 1965. It wouldn't be tolerated in any modern information system. Latitude and Longitude don't show if a plane on a cross runway has its breaks on and thrust low. The Teneriff 500+ fatality crash is just as probable now as when it happened. The system can be fixed and 70% of all fatal crashes including decompression crashes such as Helio and Payne Stewart are preventable. Too often we blame pilot error when the fault is an archaic Air Traffic Control system. There is no reason that when a plane is low on fuel and icon light couldn't come up on the air traffic controllers display. Instead we have a verbal system that is prone to misinterpretations and errors. Not only can the displays be more user friendly and simpler when we utilize all of the data available they enhance all of our safety. Even though Payne Stewart's crash occurred years prior to 9/11 we did nothing. If we had put the remote copilot system in we wouldn't have had the 9/11 disaster that we had. The cost of 9/11 alone would have more than paid for a modern aviation system that displayed all of the important data to prevent crashes. There simply is no economical, security or safety issue why the Digital Flight Data Recorder information isn't telemetered to the ground and utilized in a proactive way to prevent crashes. It has been the intentional withholding of data out of fear of liability that has blinded our system and is directly responsible for 9/11 and a host of other preventable fatal crashes. The fear of liability has blinded us and has kept air traffic systems in the 1965 mode. The changes have been superficial and have not enhanced the visibility required to prevent fatal crashes.
Sincerely,
Sy Levine

Most airplane crashes are readily preventable and most pilot errors are errors brought about by the data vacuum of not using the digital flight data recorder data in real-time to prevent crashes, giving the on-board pilot greater visibility of the aircraft's environment, etc. For example Comair Flt 5191, Aug. 27, 2006 ground incursion fatal crash mirrors the Singapore Airline Flt 006, 10/31/2000 crash. These crashes are brought about by an archaic information system that doesn't present to the pilot the correct and safe path to take in an easy to interpret cockpit dispay.

The aircraft information system hasn't changed substantially since the 1965. It wouldn't be tolerated in any modern information system. Latitude and Longitude don't show if a plane on a cross runway has its breaks on and thrust low. The Teneriff 500+ fatality crash is just as probable now as when it happened. The system can be fixed and 70% of all fatal crashes including decompression crashes such as Helio and Payne Stewart are preventable. Too often we blame pilot error when the fault is an archaic Air Traffic Control system. There is no reason that when a plane is low on fuel that a flashing icon light couldn't come up automatically on the air traffic controller's display. The data is available digitally, yet instead we have a verbal system that is prone to misinterpretations and errors. Not only can the displays be more user friendly and simpler when we utilize all of the data available they enhance all of our safety. Even though Payne Stewart's crash occurred years prior to 9/11 we did nothing. If we had put the remote copilot system in we wouldn't have had the 9/11 disaster that we had. The cost of 9/11 alone would have more than paid for a modern aviation system that displayed all of the important data to prevent crashes. There simply is no economical, security or safety issue why the Digital Flight Data Recorder information isn't telemetered to the ground and utilized in a proactive way to prevent crashes. It has been the intentional withholding of data out of fear of liability that has blinded our system and is directly responsible for 9/11 and a host of other preventable fatal crashes. The fear of liability has blinded us and has kept air traffic systems in the 1965 mode. The changes have been superficial and have not enhanced the visibility required to prevent fatal crashes.
Sincerely,
Sy Levine

You are wrong on so many levels.

For starters, the DOT was run by
Norman Mineta during 9/11, and his
is no longer there. This is unfortunate,
as his replacement is not as capable, IMO.

Second, if you think that remote control
would solve anywhere near 70% of crashes
you are sadly mistaken.

Do you seriously think that people on the
ground are in a better position to make
judgment calls than the folks in the air in most
circumstances?

What about the recent brazilian crash?

Go read the ntsb reports for crashes during the
last few weeks and tell me exactly which
ones could have been avoided in this way.

Or how about the control system failure
in the citation lifeguard flight from about a
month ago? Remote control won't fix flight
control issues.

Most crashes are human error. You can't
solve that by using different humans on the ground
at the last second.

Since Bush has been president thousands of innocent people died needlessly in 911. Yet, neither the Secretary of the Department of Transportation (DOT) nor the Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) have lost their job. Hijacking and Terrorist attacks have traditionally accounted for about 10% of fatal accidents world-wide. This known threat existed and was well tabulated/tracked prior to 911 in world fatal accident statistics and still President Bush’s appointed a political head of the FAA that had little security or aviation experience. Neither the DOT nor FAA took the required steps necessary to keep the public and the nation safe even though the threats were known and it was their job to assure the security and safety of our sky. They operated out of fear of losing the aviation industries support for maintaining their positions and thereby allowed the nation and the traveling public to suffer needlessly. The deaths that occurred on 911 won’t even show up on the FAA’s fatal accident statistics. This is done intentionally to minimize aviation related fatalities and to give the public a false sense of security. Thus 911, like Katrina, was the result of President Bush’s Republican political appointees that had little knowledge of their appointed critical tasks.
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At first look it isn't obvious that the golfer Payne Stewart, and the Helios (2005 - 100+fatality) decompression crashes and 911 are related but from a aviation safety and security system view they are:

When a plane substantially deviates from its approved flight plan it is presently possible to have a remote pilot located in a secure simulator fly the plane to a safe landing at a sparsely populated airfield. Over 70% of all fatal air crashes occurrences are readily preventable if handled correctly.

Unfortunately, the data needed to accomplish this is locked up in the flight recorder and is utilized predominately in an autopsy mode. If the data is so important that it is necessary to discover the cause of a fatal crash it is much more important to prevent a fatal crash. Yet because of the aviation industry's partnership with the FAA and NTSB none of the flight data coming out of the recorders is available in real-time to proactively prevent fatal crashes. The inability to use the flight data in real time has jeopardized the safety and security of the traveling public and the nation. The astronauts were guided back from the moon because the data was telemetered to the ground in real-time. Once it got to the ground it was analyzed, and then via a concerted effort by experts, using simulations the proper and safe way to handle life threatening situation was accomplished. Yet this proven technique isn't utilized by the industrial/government partnership to keep our nation and air-passengers safe and secure.

One year prior to 911, I was the guest speaker at the International Aviation Safety Association meeting in NY where I spoke on how terrorists and decompression fatal crashes are preventable via remote control of a deviating aircraft using ciphered technology developed for our ballistic missiles. This technology can prevent most aviation crashes (approximately 70%) even those from mechanical problems and errors of commission and omission. At present a pilot has displayed only a fraction of the information necessary to make the right decision to prevent a crash. The pilot in many instances is seeing a problem for the first time. The aircraft data and air traffic control data isn't shared extensively so experts on handling the aircraft's problem aren’t consulted nor can the problem be simulated to aid in crash prevention. This data vacuum is responsible for most fatal crashes. For example, the Swiss Air and Alaskan Air fatal crashes could have been prevented if handled correctly.

In addition it is not only terrorists that sabotage aircraft. Commercial and Military pilots have also done it. When a pilot deviates substantially from the approved flight plan the aircraft should be safely remote piloted to a landing at a sparsely populated airport. Several years ago a rogue military pilot substantially deviated from his approved Continental United States (CONUS) flight plan and flew an A-10 aircraft loaded with bombs clandestinely across multiple states. It took two weeks to find the plane which had crashed into a Colorado mountain. The plane was eventually found but the bombs are still missing. Exhaustive searches were made but no one has a clew as to what happened to the bombs. Must we wait for a bigger disaster than 911 before any action takes place?

Everyone knowledgeable about the holes in our aviation system, brought about by the industrial government partnership, knew that a 911 could occur and the government allowed it to occur. Even though we knew about Payne Stewart nothing was done and so we got Helios' 100 + deaths. Presently we are just as vulnerable to a 911 disaster, decompression disaster, ... etc. as we were in 2001. The public needs to know the system is fixable for the good of our nation. Even though 3000 people died needlessly on 911 the system doesn't fix the data vacuum mode of operation. It works around the system with attempted band-aid patches that are costly and ineffective simply to protect the industry from liability suits. The necessary data is only available in the tombstone/autopsy mode. With all of the deaths that were preventable not a single FAA or NTSB person was even laid-off. Thus, the industry won out and the public and nation suffered. It is quite possible that we went into an unnecessary and horrible war just because we protected the special interest of the aviation industry. The cost of those disasters alone would have been a small fraction of the cost necessary to fix the system and we would now have a safer and securer nation. Instead, things are the same and we are vulnerable.

If you should need more info on this please don't hesitate to contact me (you can see some of my work by going to Google and doing a search on "aviation security, safety and sy levine" or go to my web site www.safelander.com. My work was also featured on the BBC show called "The Black Box". There is simply no reason, technical, cost or data privacy wise" for not using the Black Box Data in real-time, in addition to its autopsy mode, to make our nation safer and securer. The fear of liability, via law suits, should not stand in the way of the airline passenger safety, the safety of people on the ground, or our national security. It is imperative that the traveling public write to the President, their Congressional Representatives, the DOT, FAA and NTSB and demand that the Black Box data be available and utilized in real-time for the security of our nation and to substantially reduce fatal crashes.

Sincerely,
Sy Levine
sylevine1@sbcglobal.net

Since Bush has been president thousands of innocent people died needlessly in 911. Yet, neither the Secretary of the Department of Transportation (DOT) nor the Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) have lost their job. Hijacking and Terrorist attacks have traditionally accounted for about 10% of fatal accidents world-wide. This known threat existed and was well tabulated/tracked prior to 911 in world fatal accident statistics and still President Bush’s appointed a political head of the FAA that had little security or aviation experience. Neither the DOT nor FAA took the required steps necessary to keep the public and the nation safe even though the threats were known and it was their job to assure the security and safety of our sky. They operated out of fear of losing the aviation industries support for maintaining their positions and thereby allowed the nation and the traveling public to suffer needlessly. The deaths that occurred on 911 won’t even show up on the FAA’s fatal accident statistics. This is done intentionally to minimize aviation related fatalities and to give the public a false sense of security. Thus 911, like Katrina, was the result of President Bush’s Republican political appointees that had little knowledge of their appointed critical tasks.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
At first look it isn't obvious that the golfer Payne Stewart, and the Helios (2005 - 100+fatality) decompression crashes and 911 are related but from a aviation safety and security system view they are:

When a plane substantially deviates from its approved flight plan it is presently possible to have a remote pilot located in a secure simulator fly the plane to a safe landing at a sparsely populated airfield. Over 70% of all fatal air crashes occurrences are readily preventable if handled correctly.

Unfortunately, the data needed to accomplish this is locked up in the flight recorder and is utilized predominately in an autopsy mode. If the data is so important that it is necessary to discover the cause of a fatal crash it is much more important to prevent a fatal crash. Yet because of the aviation industry's partnership with the FAA and NTSB none of the flight data coming out of the recorders is available in real-time to proactively prevent fatal crashes. The inability to use the flight data in real time has jeopardized the safety and security of the traveling public and the nation. The astronauts were guided back from the moon because the data was telemetered to the ground in real-time. Once it got to the ground it was analyzed, and then via a concerted effort by experts, using simulations the proper and safe way to handle life threatening situation was accomplished. Yet this proven technique isn't utilized by the industrial/government partnership to keep our nation and air-passengers safe and secure.

One year prior to 911, I was the guest speaker at the International Aviation Safety Association meeting in NY where I spoke on how terrorists and decompression fatal crashes are preventable via remote control of a deviating aircraft using ciphered technology developed for our ballistic missiles. This technology can prevent most aviation crashes (approximately 70%) even those from mechanical problems and errors of commission and omission. At present a pilot has displayed only a fraction of the information necessary to make the right decision to prevent a crash. The pilot in many instances is seeing a problem for the first time. The aircraft data and air traffic control data isn't shared extensively so experts on handling the aircraft's problem aren’t consulted nor can the problem be simulated to aid in crash prevention. This data vacuum is responsible for most fatal crashes. For example, the Swiss Air and Alaskan Air fatal crashes could have been prevented if handled correctly.

In addition it is not only terrorists that sabotage aircraft. Commercial and Military pilots have also done it. When a pilot deviates substantially from the approved flight plan the aircraft should be safely remote piloted to a landing at a sparsely populated airport. Several years ago a rogue military pilot substantially deviated from his approved Continental United States (CONUS) flight plan and flew an A-10 aircraft loaded with bombs clandestinely across multiple states. It took two weeks to find the plane which had crashed into a Colorado mountain. The plane was eventually found but the bombs are still missing. Exhaustive searches were made but no one has a clew as to what happened to the bombs. Must we wait for a bigger disaster than 911 before any action takes place?

Everyone knowledgeable about the holes in our aviation system, brought about by the industrial government partnership, knew that a 911 could occur and the government allowed it to occur. Even though we knew about Payne Stewart nothing was done and so we got Helios' 100 + deaths. Presently we are just as vulnerable to a 911 disaster, decompression disaster, ... etc. as we were in 2001. The public needs to know the system is fixable for the good of our nation. Even though 3000 people died needlessly on 911 the system doesn't fix the data vacuum mode of operation. It works around the system with attempted band-aid patches that are costly and ineffective simply to protect the industry from liability suits. The necessary data is only available in the tombstone/autopsy mode. With all of the deaths that were preventable not a single FAA or NTSB person was even laid-off. Thus, the industry won out and the public and nation suffered. It is quite possible that we went into an unnecessary and horrible war just because we protected the special interest of the aviation industry. The cost of those disasters alone would have been a small fraction of the cost necessary to fix the system and we would now have a safer and securer nation. Instead, things are the same and we are vulnerable.

If you should need more info on this please don't hesitate to contact me (you can see some of my work by going to Google and doing a search on "aviation security, safety and sy levine" or go to my web site www.safelander.com. My work was also featured on the BBC show called "The Black Box". There is simply no reason, technical, cost or data privacy wise" for not using the Black Box Data in real-time, in addition to its autopsy mode, to make our nation safer and securer. The fear of liability, via law suits, should not stand in the way of the airline passenger safety, the safety of people on the ground, or our national security. It is imperative that the traveling public write to the President, their Congressional Representatives, the DOT, FAA and NTSB and demand that the Black Box data be available and utilized in real-time for the security of our nation and to substantially reduce fatal crashes.

Sincerely,
Sy Levine
sylevine1@sbcglobal.net