(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-04-04 16:37

When FAA inspectors blew the whistle in March 2007, Gawadzinski was their superior. He's still employed by the FAA, but has no responsibility for safety decisions, said Nicholas Sabatini, the agency's associate administrator for aviation safety.

Oberstar disputed that assertion and said Gawadzinski had retained oversight responsibility after his removal from the Southwest office. Sabatini said he would look into it those claims and promised that the FAA will "take whatever action the law will allow" when the investigation is complete.

Gawadzinski was not asked to testify at Thursday's hearing because of the ongoing nature of the investigations and he was considered to be a hostile witness who would most likely refuse to answer questions that could have incriminated himself, according to a spokesman for the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.

Committee Chairman Oberstar said as long as the FAA views the airlines as customers "that culture of safety will not take hold and is not going to permeate the organization."

Sabatini said the FAA is a regulator and that he would immediately work to correct that internal problem of perception.

Still, the inspectors' concerns about Southwest, which the FAA first acknowledged a year ago, have since been confirmed, and the agency on Wednesday said it is investigating four airlines for failing to comply with various federal aviation regulations. It did not name the airlines.

In the last week alone, AMR Corp.'s American Airlines, Delta Air Lines and UAL Corp.'s United Airlines have canceled flights to perform unscheduled inspections of certain aircraft, and US Airways Group Inc. found problems on some Boeing 757s after a wing part from another plane fell off during a flight.

Spokesmen from Delta, United, Northwest Airlines, US Air and American said they have not been informed that their companies are the subject of an investigation. A Southwest spokeswoman said the carrier has not been informed of any additional investigation.

On Wednesday, the FAA announced a new reporting system designed to make it easier for inspectors to raise concerns and strengthening ethics policies aimed at easing potential conflicts of interests.

The agency will launch the system by the end of this month to provide employees an additional way to raise safety concerns they feel are not receiving the necessary attention or response from management, acting FAA Administrator Robert A. Sturgell said.

And by June 30, the agency will start a rule-making process to set a two-year "cooling off" period before former inspectors could work for an airline there were overseeing. That would match the time that new inspectors hired from industry must wait before they can oversee their former employer.

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