In article 42, James
Robinson wrote:

... they were the first airline to extensively contract out
maintenance. Something done in many other industries, I might add.
There was an accident, which arguably wasn't the fault of the airline
management...

Please. They contracted things out to SabreTech because they were
CHEAPER, simple as that. Their subcontractor cut corners, and 110
people died as a result.

Are you implying that dealing with the lowest bidder is somehow wrong?

Not at all. What I'm directly *saying* is that using a contractor to
do work doesn't absolve the company of responsibility for the work done
by that contractor. That's one of the risks a company takes when it
relinquishes control of necessary work to an outside, third party.

It is the way business is done... SabreTech was a licenced aircraft maintenance
supplier.

Of course they were. Just as the garage is where a friend always gets
his New York state inspections "done" is a certified New York State
Inspection Station. Still, for fifty bucks, he gets a sticker on a car
that shouldn't be on the road. The certification means very little.

Also, please describe how the accident was as a result of Sabretech
"cutting corners". The airline prohibited the shipment of hazardous
material, and weren't aware that the oxygen generators were aboard.

Correct. SabreTech *mislabeled* the shipping containers as containing
empty oxygen generators, because full ones cannot be transported in the
cargo hold of passenger aircraft, and thus must be sent on cargo-only
aircraft. That costs more money. That's what I mean by "cutting
corners."

Blaming the airline, even partially, is like blaming Ford Explorer
drivers for Firestone tire failures: They shouldn't have bought them,
therefore they are at fault.

That's an excellent example, actually. But it's more analgous to
blaming Ford for the Firestone tire failures. *Ford* sold the tires,
*Ford* recommended that they be underinflated. Yes, it was Firestone
that built the weak tire, but they were OEM tires -- Ford is the
primarily repsonsible party, not Firestone.


The lack of interphone communication was not cited in the NTSB report as
either a cause of the accident or even aggravating the conditions.

http://www.ntsb.gov/publictn/1997/aar9706.pdf

Page 108:
"Therefore, the Safety Board believes that the FAA should specify, in
air carrier operations master MELs, that the cockpit-cabin portion of
the service interphone system is required to be operating before an
airplane can be dispatched. "


Page 138:

"As a result of the investigation of this accident, the National
Transportation Safety Board made the following recommendations:
‹to the Federal Aviation Administration:
....
Specify, in air carrier operations master minimum equipment lists, that
the cockpit-cabin portion of the service interphone system is required
to be operating before an airplane can be dispatched. (A-97-57) "




It was a side issue, and ValuJet was perfectly legal in flying the aircraft
without the interphone according to the FAA-approved Minimum Equipment
Lists.

"Perfectly legal" doesn't necessary equal safe, in the aviation
business or in any other. In New York, it's illegal for me to hold a
phone up to my ear and talk, but "perfectly legal" to type a message
out on a Blackberry. That doesn't make it safe; some common sense
needs to come into play.