PLANE MECHANIC WAS NEW AT TASK

NTSB SAYS CABLES IMPROPERLY ADJUSTED
Thursday, March 6, 2003

TED REED, CHARLES LUNAN, and AMES ALEXANDER, STAFF WRITERS

The mechanic who adjusted the flight-control cables on the Beech 1900 turboprop that crashed Jan. 8 in Charlotte was doing the job on that type of airplane for the first time, a source said.

The crash of US Airways Express Flight 5481 killed 21 people. The National Transportation Safety Board, which is investigating, has said the cables were improperly adjusted two days before the crash. The cables connected the cockpit controls to the elevators on the airplane's tail.

The mechanic, who sources did not identify, had been laid off from US Airways after the Sept. 11 attacks rocked the airline industry, said a source familiar with the NTSB investigation. He went to work for a labor contractor from Edgewater, Fla., called Structural, Modification and Repair Technicians Inc., or SMART, sources said. It was SMART that provided the workers in the Huntington, W.Va., hangar where the airplane was maintained, sources said.

The mechanic was certified by the Federal Aviation Administration but it's unclear whether he had any experience working on small planes.

After adjusting the cables he awaited an inspection by the station manager, a source said. Whether the work was inspected is part of the investigation.

"He was under the impression that the work would be checked to make sure it was OK," said a source who asked not to be named. "But something failed."

Airlines generally require critical maintenance work, such as the rigging of flight controls, to be inspected.

Adjusting control cables on smaller planes like the Beech 1900 is a tricky job. Technicians typically work in cramped spaces, and they often discover it's hard to find the right cables and to make sure they have been adjusted properly, according to several airline mechanics.

"There are many mistakes made on them," said Bart Crotty, a former airline mechanic and FAA inspector who now does independent airline safety consulting. "Many guys don't do well in control cables and they screw it up."

Experts say improper cable adjustments could have hindered the pilots' ability to control Flight 5481, especially because the plane's load was estimated to be within 100 pounds of its maximum allowable weight of about 17,000 pounds.

The plane crashed 37 seconds after takeoff on the ninth flight following the adjustments. Sources familiar with the investigation say the plane was relatively full for the first time since the work was done.

Following the crash, investigators converged on the single-plane Huntington, W.Va., hangar. The maintenance shop, at Tri-State Airport, had been open six months and employed about a dozen people.

The NTSB has not specified a probable cause for the accident. It is looking at maintenance as well as weight and balance issues.

The plane, flown under contract to US Airways, was operated by Air Midwest, which contracted with Raytheon Aerospace LLC for routine maintenance work. Raytheon retained SMART to provide nearly all of the employees in the hangar, sources said.

Airlines are increasingly contracting out maintenance work to third parties like Raytheon. It's less clear how often routine maintenance is farmed out to companies like SMART, which provides both FAA-certified mechanics and other skilled technicians to aircraft repair and modification shops all over the United States, according to its Web site.

An attorney for SMART declined to comment, as did spokesmen for the NTSB and for Raytheon Aerospace LLC. In a statement, Air Midwest said its maintenance facilities operate in accordance with FAA procedures.

Nothing in the FAA regulations prohibits the use of labor contractors, but whoever works on the plane must abide by the airline's maintenance manual, said Les Dorr, an FAA spokesman in Washington. Regardless of who performs the work, the agency holds the airline and the FAA-certified mechanic who signed off on it responsible for any violations, Dorr said.

The FAA said it has not disciplined any Huntington mechanics in connection with the crash.

Mechanics and airline safety experts say FAA certification is only the start of a mechanic's training. Ideally, mechanics receive substantial instruction on how to repair each type of aircraft they work on.

Officials of the International Association of Machinists, which represents mechanics at various airlines and which is part of the NTSB crash investigation, have asked the board for a public hearing to examine the contracting relationships at Huntington.

Michael Peat, flight safety director for the IAM, said the union is concerned that employees who performed work were two levels removed from Air Midwest.

"We really don't know how deep this practice is," said Peat. "And I dare say the NTSB does not either."