After a lot of controversy over the FAA issuing fines to Southwest Airlines last spring, the FAA is at it again. According to examiner.com and the East Valley Tribune, the FAA has given United Airlines $3.8M in fines and US Airways got $5.4M.

I'm pretty surprised to hear about some of the issues here...leaving shop towels in the engines on purpose just blows me away. Although all the inspections required for operating complex aircraft are a pain, they're required for a reason. How does an airline justify skipping those inspections or performing required maintenance?

I'm sure that having a very demanding schedule has something to do with it. An airliner can't make money if it's sitting in the shop, so I would expect there is a lot of pressure to get jets through the shop and back on the line as soon as possible. Unfortunately, that mindset is brought about by economic troubles which will only be made worse by multi-million-dollar fines. Is there some other kind of pressure we can put on the airlines to help them understand that we, their passengers, need them to follow all of their safety guidelines?

To throw in my standard two cents about NextGen here as well. We need to consider how a new air traffic control system will effect an already stressed maintenance workforce. If we can significantly increase the density of air traffic in our country, repair shops are going to have more aircraft to deal with at a time. Unless their facilities and staffs are expanded to handle the increased traffic, they will only experience more pressure to cut corners and get planes back on the line. We will need more gates, ramp space, de-icing equipment, etc. before we'll be anywhere near ready for NextGen. We also need more maintenance resources too. I hope our lawmakers and the airline industry consider this and put in the necessary preparation before they start trying to implement the NextGen air traffic control system!