EU warns Spain over air safety checks

 

The EU warned Germany and Spain on Tuesday that their air safety is flawed, describing weaknesses in the oversight of airline carriers and a shortage of qualified safety personnel.

A European Commission report raised concerns about ramp inspections of planes in Germany, including a shortage of experienced personnel in the national aviation authority, the LBA.

"In the case of Germany... there's a trend of too-high a level of non-compliance coming from the ramp checks, that is attributed to very stretched resources in the German authority responsible for oversight," a Commission spokeswoman said.

Referring to checks carried out by inspectors in May 2009, the Commission said the results "pointed to an insufficient number of qualified personnel within the LBA, thus impacting upon Germany's ability to ensure continuous oversight and limiting the LBA's ability to increase the level of oversight".

Germany has promised to rectify the situation, but that is only likely to happen next year, the Commission said.

"If such actions are ineffective in improving the performance of air carriers certified in Germany, action would be necessary to ensure that identified safety risks have been adequately controlled," the report said.

Regarding Spain, the Commission highlighted an incident in February this year when a flight operated by Flightline, an air carrier certified in Spain, crashed at Cork airport in Ireland, killing six people.

Flightline had leased the aircraft from a third party, Air Lada, which was not a certified air carrier.

The Commission report identified five Spanish-certified air carriers about which it had concerns and asked Spain's air safety authority, AESA, to provide more details on actions being taken to remedy the shortcomings, or face redress.

"The Commission underlined that if such actions are ineffective in improving the performance of air carriers certified in Spain, action would be necessary to ensure that identified safety risks have been adequately controlled."

Separately the EU executive said it had banned all three Mozambican airlines from using European airspace after "significant deficiencies" were identified with the country's civil aviation authority.

Two Boeing 767 aircraft operated by Air Madagascar were also added to the EU's air safety blacklist because of what the Commission called persisting deficiencies in the company's operations and oversight.

"The Commission is ready to work together with the authorities of those countries which have safety problems to overcome them as quickly and as efficiently as possible," EU Transport Commissioner Siim Kallas said in a statement on Tuesday. "In the meantime, safety comes first."