On February 11, the Teamsters Union and the Business Travel Coalition co-sponsored a national summit on aircraft maintenance outsourcing in Washington, D.C. The Teamsters have long been concerned with the practice of U.S. airlines sending maintenance work overseas. The U.S. has no control over foreign labor laws, creating a national security nightmare for every American.

The Teamsters are not alone in their concerns. Safety advocates, members of Congress, current and former members of the NTSB and aviation industry folks—including airline mechanics—played a crucial part in the summit. Nearly 200 people attended, including members of the media.

The interests of all these groups are in complete alignment. The concern is over the further outsourcing of safety and national security-critical airline maintenance in the absence of a single, high standard, and an equally high level of FAA oversight. Aviation technicians and other aircraft maintenance professionals witness firsthand the risks associated with outsourcing. Corporations that field millions of business travelers are increasingly alarmed over dual and vastly different maintenance and FAA oversight standards.

The U.S. Department of Transportation Inspector General’s office has documented many problems in this area over several years. Consumer Reports, a Consumers Union publication, issued an investigative report in March of 2007, and most recently, the Teamsters released its own report detailing the dangers of outsourcing. Many possible solutions have been identified in Congressional hearings.

This summit was just the first of several high-profile events the Teamsters and the Business Travel Coalition plan to hold to examine the problems of outsourcing maintenance work.

Already, the two groups have formed the Coalition to Legislate Aircraft Maintenance Outsourcing Reform (CLAMOR). This reform package will stem from a set of principles that ensures the highest standards of aircraft maintenance and ensures that homeland security is not put at risk by outsourcing practices.

Among the Principles:

1. A single and the highest maintenance standard should be emplaced for airlines’ in-house facilities and domestic-U.S. and foreign repair facilities.

2. FAA oversight of domestic-U.S. and foreign repair facilities should be increased to a level that is commensurate with the volume and complexity of current outsourcing practices.

3. The fully-burdened costs of FAA inspections and audits should be borne by airlines that choose to outsource to overseas repair facilities.

4. Airlines that outsource to overseas repair facilities should hold such facilities to high environmental standards with respect to disposal of toxic wastes and other processes associated with aircraft maintenance.

5. Domestic-U.S. and foreign repair facilities should have adequate safeguards in place regarding personnel backgrounds, aircraft access and parts inventory to frustrate terrorists who might exploit an opportunity to do harm to the U.S. or other countries.

Here are some quotes from the summit:

“ We need to call for a moratorium of all overseas maintenance. We need a moratorium and we need it now. This moratorium should not be lifted until every one of the 700 (overseas) repair facilities meet our standards.”
—Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa

“ This is the first time in my 22 years that I’m really concerned about the maintenance planes receive overseas.”
—Bob Fisher, UAL mechanic (based at Dulles)

“ We can’t wait for the smoking hole. We can’t be waiting for an accident.We have to get in front of it.”
—John Goglia, former NTSB member

“ At the end of the day, unfortunately, as we’ve seen too many times, it does take an accident to change people’s minds. It does take a death toll before issues are corrected.”
—NTSB member Deborah A.P. Hersman

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