Since Michael Huerta became administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration on New Year’s Day, the agency has issued new regulations on a wide range of issues, including pilot qualification, occupational safety rules for working in an aircraft and how to integrate “unmanned systems” — i.e. drones — with U.S. airspace.
It is a telling example of federal priorities that when it comes to airline safety, extending the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s voluminous rule book to commercial jet aircraft cockpits and expanding the use of drones in domestic surveillance rank among the top achievements. This is as opposed to, say, preventing passenger aircraft carrying hundreds of men, women and children from flying into midair collisions with gliders that went undetected until it was too late.
