I get the impression, reading the posts about FR and the IAA that we're in "Tombstone Imperative" territory; nothing - at least nothing significant - is going to happen until there's an almighty balls-up (aka, "a crash"), traceable back to FR's mgmt and poor oversight by the IAA. You can almost imagine the report now: probable causes:
- Crew fatigue
- Hostile r'ship with mgmt - disincentive to report problems/issues, including fatigue
- Lack of effective oversight by IAA; no effective plan to raise/follow up issues raised by crews;
- Commercial rationale undermining regulatory authority's failure to challenge operator*;
- Other issues?
What happens then? It may seem irrelevant to EI, but what happens if as a result of the IAA being criticised for its oversight, the FAA decided to reduce Ireland to a Level 2 country, which would make it harder for EI to add US routes? That is, of course, way down the list of "bad things", relative to the key issue - safety, but I wonder what would happen if that possibility alone were brought to the Dept of Transport's attention?
Incidentally, has MO'L or FR done anything further to look into Latvia or other countries as a possible base?
(*I know virtually all aviation regulatory bodies receive income from airlines for licencing etc, but are there any others which are as dependant on revenue as the IAA?)
Last edited by akerosid; 18th Sep 2006 at 21:08.
Reason: Inclusion of question