[Infowarrior] - Transportation Dept. Reverses FAA on Bird Strike Data

[Richard Forno]

Transportation Dept. Reverses FAA on Bird Strike Data

By Lois Romano
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, April 22, 2009 5:16 PM

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/04/22/AR2009042202057_pf.html

The Department of Transportation is preparing to reject a proposal by  
the Federal Aviation Administration that would keep secret data about  
where and when birds strike airplanes.

The FAA last month quietly posted a proposal in the federal register,  
requesting public comment, that would bar the release of its records  
on bird collisions. The proposal followed a prominent incident in  
January when a flock of geese brought down a commercial flight,  
forcing the pilot to make an emergency landing on the Hudson River.  
The agency immediately came under fire because the recommendation runs  
counter President's Obama vows of government transparency.

Among the high-profile boosters of releasing the information is  
Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, whose agency oversees the FAA. He  
said the comments ran "99.9 percent" in favor of making such  
information accessible.

"I think all of this information ought to be made public, and I think  
that you'll soon be reading about the fact that we're going to, you  
know, make this information as public as anybody wants it," LaHood  
said in an interview for The Washington Post's "New Voices of Power"  
series. "The people should have access to this kind of information.

"The whole thing about the bird strike issue is it doesn't really  
comport with the president's idea of transparency," the secretary  
said. "I mean, here they just released all of these CIA files  
regarding interrogation, and . . . the optic of us trying to tell  
people they can't have information about birds flying around airports,  
I don't think that really quite comports with the policies of the  
administration. . . . It's something that somebody wanted to put out  
there to get a reaction. We got the reaction, and now we're going to  
bring it to conclusion."

The FAA proposed secrecy on the collisions because the reports are now  
voluntary and because it was concerned that worries about a harmful  
impact on business would discourage both airlines and airports from  
providing the information. In the federal register, the agency wrote  
that "there is a serious potential that information related to bird  
strikes will not be submitted because of fear that the disclosure of  
raw data could unfairly cast unfounded aspersion on the submitter."