Aircraft Certification: New FAA Approach Needed to Meet Challenges of Advanced Technology: Rced-93-155 (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781289018931)

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA) process for certifying designs of transport aircraft to meet safety standards, focusing on whether FAA staff are: (1) effectively involved in the certification process; and (2) competent in assessing the latest technologies.
GAO found that: (1) FAA ability to evaluate and certify new aircraft technologies is questionable because, in response to an escalating workload, FAA has increasingly relied on manufacturers for safety certification; (2) FAA has not clearly defined staff responsibilities or performance standards to ensure that staff are effectively involved in the certification process; (3) aircraft manufacturers' technical expertise and commitment to safety have kept the number of design-related safety problems to a minimum; (4) FAA efforts to increase its technical expertise and build an in-house team of experts to oversee the certification process may be flawed because FAA has not defined when these experts are to be involved in the certification process; (5) although FAA has previously identified and attempted to address its certification staff training deficiencies, inadequacies remain because training programs do not develop staff members' competence in specific fields and the availability of technical courses remains limited; and (6) FAA plans to improve training and staff retention include new technical certification training programs and plans to create technical career paths for certification engineers; however, these programs may not be adequate to overcome current training and staff limitations.

Author: U. S. Government Accountability Office (
ISBN-10: 1289018936
ISBN-13: 9781289018931
Publisher: Bibliogov
Language: English
Published: 06/26/2013
Pages: 84
Format: Paperback
Weight: 0.37lbs
Size: 9.69h x 7.44w x 0.17d