Diary of a Disaster - Alaska Airlines Inc. Flight 261

Chief Executive, The, Oct, 2000 by Christopher SPRINGMANN, Jennifer PELLET

Despite the corrective measures taken in response to the FAA findings, in May the FAA threatened to strip Alaska Airlines of its authority to do heavy maintenance on its aircraft--a move that would have effectively grounded six planes a month out of a fleet of 88, slowly strangling Alaska's ability to fly. In the meantime, Alaska Air was fighting hard to get its views across. A May 22 company press release detailed inaccuracies in a Seattle Times article, quoting Witter saying, "Grieving families as well as our many employees want to get to the bottom of the Flight 261 tragedy. Careless reporting and anonymous speculation don't serve anyone."

The FAA backed off on its threat June 29, after Alaska Air reported its efforts to improve procedures--a document Kelly shared with the media and posted on an employee Web page. The measures included hiring a new VP of safety (David Prewitt, a direct report to Kelly), filling two executive vacancies for VPs of safety and maintenance; creating an 11-member office of safety; committing to hiring at least 130 new mechanics (with 82 already on board), promising to revise its general maintenance manual, and completing a thorough review of every "C" check aircraft in the fleet to ensure that all paperwork was accounted for and all work properly done.

By now, Kelly's responses to reporter queries hinted at mounting frustration over the gap between media portrayal and reality. "The FAA found 150 instances our of 267,000 entries where a paperwork discrepancy was found," he told the Seattle Times in a written response it elected not to print. "That's a compliance rate of 99.94 percent of all entries. And in every case the maintenance or repairs that had been called for had been completed. That said, no one here is content with a 99.94 percent compliance rate. We just can't settle for less than 100 percent. As we've told the FAA, our intent is to be a model of safety and compliance."

The FAA's Lacey had blamed Alaska supervisors for the "serious" breakdowns in documentation and quality assurance, saying, "We think the root cause is really management [in]effectiveness and a certain amount of sloppiness." Yet, Alaska Airlines has been recognized again and again by trade, professional, military, and consumer groups for service, safety, and social responsibility. The Department of Defense, for example, commended Alaska Air for "strong oversight of all maintenance activities." Ironically, the FAA itself had applauded Alaska for outstanding training in Oakland in late 1999, citing "dedication to quality and concern for the safety of the traveling public."

But a Seattle Times follow-up article suggested the relationship between Alaska Air and the FAA's Seattle regional office, the agency charged with policing it, has been too cozy for comfort--or objectivity. The paper quoted Mary Rose Diefenderfer, the ex-FAA chief inspector first charged with watching over a pre-Kelly Alaska Air in 1992, and chronicled a long history of alleged questionable safety conduct on the part of Alaska management and token penalties from the FAA.