WASHINGTON — 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. “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.”
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