Claims Agency Attempted To Quiet Questions, Cover Up Problems

Gabe Bruno served with the Federal Aviation Administration for 29 years before retiring in January 2006 from the FAA Southern Region office in Florida. A simple look at the number of years he worked with the FAA might lead one to believe that the retirement was on his own terms... but a recent report claims that Bruno was coerced into retirement after he questioned the priorities of his office and the administration as a whole.

In his leadership role at FAA Southern Region, Bruno was responsible for oversight of the ValuJet-AirTran merger in the years following the 1996 ValuJet crash near Miami. The National Transportation Safety Board and the FAA's own "90 Day Safety Review" found the lack of FAA oversight was one of the accident's contributing factors. As a result, he attempted to implement necessary oversight to prevent recurrence of the tragedy during his leadership.

Referencing a report made by the Government Accountability Project (GAP), Mr. Bruno stated that he fought for several years in attempts to get the necessary personnel to perform proper inspection of the growing airline. After these attempts failed, Mr. Bruno expressed his concerns directly in a meeting with his two immediate supervisors in May 2001. Their response was to initiate a "security investigation" and reassign Mr. Bruno from his management position.

In a report this past week by WKMG-6 in Orlando, Bruno claims this reassignment seriously jeopardized air safety in the region. According to the report, he says not only FAA coziness with big airlines and a lack of effective maintenance oversight are to blame, but also improperly trained mechanics stemming from the cancellation of a mechanic retesting program he instituted.

The retesting program was a result of the discovery of improper mechanic training by Anthony St. George, an FAA-contracted Designated Mechanic Examiner and St. George Aviation operating at Sanford-Orlando International Airport. In January 1999, St. George was arrested and subsequently convicted on federal charges for charging students a negotiated rate for fraudulent certification of the students as Airframe and Powerplant mechanics without proper testing. He was subsequently sent to prison for the charges.

The report claims Bruno insisted the FAA locate and retest over 2,000 mechanics who were trained by the school. Effectiveness of the retest program was clearly seen as it resulted in 75% of St. George-certified mechanics failing certification standards when subjected to official tests.

Bruno claims that cancellation of the program after his 2001 meeting with his superiors left over 1,000 mechanics with fraudulently obtained credentials throughout the industry, including major airlines.

According to the GAP report, Mr. Bruno filed an official whistleblower disclosure with the Office of Special Council (OSC) in June 2002, citing both the oversight problems with AirTran and the cancellation of the reexamination program.

Immediately following the disclosure, a lengthy fight ensued and Bruno endured nine months without pay. The FAA offered a settlement agreement to Bruno that included reduced pay and loss of his management position. Faced with no other hope or recourse, he accepted the agreement.

The final OSC resolution in June 2005 to the disclosure filed by Bruno confirmed that mistakes were made by the FAA, but found no intentional wrongdoing and did not require the agency to change its practices. The OSC-endorsed solution to the whistleblowers complaint was a retesting program consisting only of an oral and written examination for the identified mechanics. The retest neglected the practical, hands-on exam found in traditional FAA mechanic examinations. The GAP report claims that such a concession decriminalizes the same scenario -- incomplete testing -- that previously led to prison time for Anthony St. George.

The revised FAA reexamination program was scheduled to conclude in December 2005.

WKMG reports Bruno is still fighting the actions of the FAA in the matter by testifying to Congress and assisting an investigation into whether the agency is still tracking down the inadequately trained mechanics.

"I'm trying to do this to do the best I can do to bring corrective actions about and to try to hopefully get the FAA in the place where it needs to be," Bruno said.

FMI: www.faa.gov, www.whistleblower.org