Southwest Safety follow-up

March 11th 2008

Southwest Airlines was charged last week with operating planes that missed key safety inspections. Today, three employees were put on leave and an outside expert was hired to reassess its maintenance and safety procedures. They've promised federal regulators to fix any inadequacies in its system of maintenance work tracking.

The Federal Aviation Administration, last week, proposed a $10.2 million civil penalty-historically the largest against an airline-after learning that dozens of Southwest planes had missed safety inspections and continued to fly them before being examined. Initially, Southwest said it recalled the FAA closing the matter last year as they reported the missed inspections themselves. However, Chief Executive Gary Kelly said that after understanding the investigation last month, demanded outside experts to investigate Southwest's handling of the situation.

Southwest has hired JDA Aviation Technology Solutions, headed by a previous longtime FAA senior official. Southwest has not identified which employees-or their positions-were placed on leave. The airline stated it is cooperating with the investigation.

What's more, documents released by congressional investigators depict FAA inspectors being too snug with airlines they regulate.