Pilot Organizations Reject CAA CEO’s Claims That The Air Display Community Has Declined To Co-Operate With Its Post-Shoreham Crash Changes To Airshows

The UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) has warned that a number of 2016 air shows will not go ahead unless they adopt the new safety measures being introduced by the regulator.

An extensive review of air show safety has been carried out by the CAA, following the accident at the Shoreham Air Show in August 2015. As part of the review, we have confirmed a series of additional safety measures that air shows must meet in order to go ahead, including carrying out enhanced risk assessments. Tougher checks and training requirements for pilots and display directors are also being introduced.

Opposition to these changes has been voiced within the industry, with some in the air show community suggesting that the changes go too far or are not necessary.  The CAA firmly believes that these changes are essential to ensure air shows are even safer for the millions of people who attend them each year. Unless the new requirements are met, the regulator will be unable to permit the shows to take place.

Andrew Haines (pictured), CEO of the CAA, said, “We understand that people care passionately about air shows and we want all events to be a success, but we are also very clear that we will not compromise on safety. Enhancing the safety of air shows is essential and events that do not comply with the safety measures we are introducing simply won't be able to go ahead.

“We welcome the opportunity to address with air show organizers any questions or concerns they have around their planned activity for 2016, but safety must be the priority and we are committed to doing all that we can to make air shows even safer in the years to come.”

The CAA's air display review work continues and we expect to publish our final report in the coming weeks.

Hines told the U.K. newspaper The Times that a significant number of organizers are refusing to comply with the new guidelines, which include stricter pilot checks, better training for organizers, and a big jump in CAA inspection fees. In some cases those fees may climb from about $3,800 to more than $28,000. Additional changes are coming later this year, according to the CAA.

The Times reports that half of the air shows planned for the U.K. this season have been cancelled, and many of them may never return.

But air show organizers say that they are not resisting the new regulations. In a joint statement, the British Air Display Association and the Honorable Company of Air Pilots say that the airshow community is very focused on safety, and called on Haines to retract his statement.

“The assertion by the CAA’s Chief Executive Officer, Andrew Haines, reported in The Times yesterday, that there has been resistance in the air display community to the changes being proposed is factually incorrect," the organizations said in the statement. "Nothing could be further from the truth. The entire airshow community has been focussed on drilling into the core safety issues that stem from the Shoreham tragedy to assess what changes can sensibly be made to prevent a recurrence.

"There has been great anxiety about the massive increase in charges, made without realistic consultation or with any meaningful impact assessment. To suggest, however, that the airshow community has declined to “co-operate with reforms such as rigorous checks on pilots, new training for organisers etc” is completely false.

"That Mr Haines should compound this blatant piece of politicking by a public body by saying that “the community seem to think that Shoreham is a one-off and therefore you can carry on as you are” is totally inaccurate, and a reprehensible statement from the CEO of the CAA. Before Shoreham, Mr Haines carried out cuts within the CAA budget such that many departments were unable to exercise proper regulatory management of various aspects of the aviation industry. In the case of the air display community, the small, hard-working office, responsible for the regulation of air displays, was sinking under the workload. The system was sustained only by the professional involvement of Display Authorization Evaluators (DAEs) from the airshow community, and by the presence of a sound and well-framed regulatory system evolved over many decades.

"This system was not perfect, but was subject to constant review, thanks to a healthy relationship between the small CAA office and the community at large. The system was admired throughout Europe for its practical approach to air display operation and the focus on safety. As part of the hollowing-out of the CAA, as late as mid 2015, Mr Haines was personally involved in trying to offload the responsibility for Airshow management, with its associated deregulation, to the British Air Display Association (BADA). BADA declined, as they perceived this to be a retrograde step with regard to regulatory oversight and fundamental safety.

"More recently, post Shoreham, the CAA understandably instituted a top-down review of air displays, in which the air display community were anticipating their professional involvement, similar to the last major review, where the split between the CAA and the professional community was approximately 50/50. We were dismayed when it became apparent that, apart from a little window dressing by involving the inclusion in the team of an Air Marshal, this was to be an in-house exercise with no involvement of the display community at all. It should be obvious that the expertise for the disciplines of all aspects of displays largely resides with the air display community itself; the CAA is populated in the main by officials, many of whom having little or no understanding of aviation, let alone the complexities of aerobatic flying display routines.

"By way of example, last month’s regular pre-season BADA symposium, an event attended by over 350 military and civilian air show organisers and pilots, was addressed by a CAA representative with little or no understanding of aviation matters who had most recently served as a Civil Servant with the NHS. Such things gave added impetus to the vigorous lobbying by the air display community to be involved in the process, and only at the eleventh hour did the CAA accept a single respected member on to the review panel.

"Mr Haines has chosen to deflect criticism of him and the CAA by falsely accusing the display community of obdurate behaviour, which the public should be aware is completely untrue. The CAA has yet to issue the full details of the regulation changes even at this late hour, so display organisers have no regulations with which they can refuse to comply.

"Air shows enjoy huge public support. Thanks to the professional co-operation between the community composed of highly experienced display pilots and evaluators and display organisers, the British people have been able to enjoy a safe entertainment without a fatality amongst the public for over 60 years. Of course, post Shoreham everyone needs to review how, if possible, we can prevent the recurrence of such a tragedy, but imposing draconian changes, with inadequate consultation, risks not only depriving the public of something they enjoy but also depriving young people of an experience which for so many has inspired them to become aviators or aeronautical engineers, contributing to one of the UK’s most successful, world-leading industries.

"The intemperate and irresponsible approach by the CAA suggests that these rushed measures are not driven so much by a desire to enhance air show safety as to pre-empt any criticism of the CAA which might arise from forthcoming enquiries. Accordingly, we call upon Mr Haines to retract his criticism.”

Meanwhile, one of the organizers of the successful Throckmorton Airshow, Samantha Jones, a full time paramedic, has called for intervention from the government in an increasingly heated argument between the Civil Aviation Authority and the airshow community. She, and others, also brought into question the credibility of the man running the CAA itself, its CEO Andrew Haines.

“I would like to meet with the Minister for Aviation, Robert Goodwill, and the Secretary of State for Transport Patrick Mcloughlin regarding the CAA’s farce of a 'consultation'," Jones said in a statement posted on the Keep Airshows Airborne Facebook page. "The government must take immediate action to properly investigate the introduction of the so-called safety proposals which will allow the CAA to single-handedly destroy many British Air Displays. The fact remains that airshows are one of the safest outdoor events someone could attend. The last airshow incident involving a member of the public, before the tragedy at Shoreham, was in 1952, more than SIXTY years ago. We pride ourselves on being one of the safest airshow industries in the world, and yet the CAA is rushing through new “regulations” which will cripple the industry and not improve safety whatsoever. The CAA is run by non-aviation people who have no passion nor proper knowledge of how these incredible events are put together.

"The intemperate and irresponsible approach by the CAA suggests that these rushed measures are not driven so much by a desire to enhance air show safety but to line their ever expanding pockets," Jones continued. "In the government’s list of the highest paid quango bosses in Dec 2015, the CAA has 13 staff members, with total salaries of £2.45 million BEFORE bonuses. Andrew Haines’ payments totalled £367,900 last year. They are among the highest paid bureaucrats in the UK. They say that the extortionate airshow charges they are forcing onto us are to pay for £250,000 of new administration. They are prepared to sacrifice an industry for just 10% of the total board members’ salaries. It is a disgrace. Haines doubled the number of fat cats in the last 3 years since 2012 (earning more than £150,000) He also created four new positions in 2013 on massive salaries over £150,000 including a new HR director on £250,000 (the same as the Chief of Defence General Nick Houghton). How is this justified?

"I am a full time paramedic and Angus Nairn the other organiser is a full time police officer, We have been organising Throckmorton without incident for nearly 10 years. We receive no money for that, we are volunteers who love what we do. Our joint salaries are less than Andrew Haines’ bonus of £67,900. Andrew Haines doesn’t fly, he ran railways before this and the Chair of the CAA Dame Daphne Hutton is from the food industry (current salary £135,000 for 14 hours per week).“ What would the public prefer? Someone who does something to do with personnel management or inspirational airshows? Same price.

"The Air Accident Investigation Branch (AAIB) report into the Shoreham tragedy is still yet to be released. However, the interim report suggests the crash had nothing to do with the ‘airshow safety’. Samantha says, “If the report has yet to be published, then these proposed changes have been implemented based on what facts?

"Six million people a year enjoy airshows and they range from the large Farnborough airshow to charity days with a handful of planes displaying. It is a voluntary sector and non-profit making, any money going to aviation related charities including Air Ambulances, which are completely based on charitable donations. The knock on effect on STEM education and the encouragement of young people into our aviation industry will also be devastating.

"But it is the way in which the CAA is being run which is being brought into question, not just by Samantha Jones. Last week the influential British Air Display Association (BADA) issued a joint press release with the Honourable Company of Air Pilots. The release was damning of the CAA and more particularly its CEO Andrew Haines who has a salary almost 3 times that of the Prime Minister. It also spoke of how, just before the tragedy at Shoreham, the CAA was trying to push responsibility of airshow management onto BADA. Is the CAA trying to preempt an accident report which might be damning of them as a regulatory body?"

Jones makes a call for a review of the CAA itself. "I call upon The Minister for Aviation Robert Goodwill and the Secretary of State for Transport Patrick Mcloughlin to look into the consultation and investigate the CAA’s role of governance with immediate effect," she said in the statement. "Airshows are being cancelled at a rate of knots. Once the Airshow industry has been decimated, it cannot be reinvented. It is the government’s responsibility to investigate this properly before it’s too late."

(Andrews Haines pictured in image from Runways UK YouTube video. Other images from file)

FMI: CAA Provisional Rules, www.bada-uk.com, www.airpilots.org, www.facebook.com/groups/KeepAirshowsAirborne