Share It On

I recently read a Japanese proverb:

"Vision without action is a daydream. Action without vision is a nightmare."

I was reflecting on the responses to our European Day of Action - reported elsewhere in this Cockpit News – and felt that the proverb applied to the response from EASA in particular.

All the clues to EASA's role are in its name – it's European, acts only in the field of Aviation, its sole responsibility is, or should be, Safety and it is an Agency of the European Commission. To determine its vision and the consequent actions should be relatively straight forward – unless EASA allows politics to become involved!

On our Day of Action, which we arranged and carried out in concert with the European Transport Workers' Federation (ETF), our point was quite simple: EASA had arranged a review of the aircrew fatigue rules at European level, by the best scientists in this field, but had not acted upon the recommendations for more than a year: They should act, and quickly.

In their response, EASA's Communications Department was reported by the press to describe ECA and ETF as 'positioning for the forthcoming debate with the employers'. This response confused me, as we see no debate. Instead,

  • our vision has a strong and independent EASA, able to act on clear and objective safety advice without a great debate;
  • our vision had EASA drafting the rule set published in January 2009, four months after they received the Moebus Review of Aircrew Fatigue Rules in Europe, with its recommendations incorporated;
  • our vision has EASA fully in line with new ICAO requirements from next month: aircrew fatigue rules must be based on available scientific evidence, such as their Moebus Study.

We saw the vision of the legislators (European Parliament and Transport Council), back in 2006, in mandating a scientific study and their requirement to implement the study's safety recommendations "without delay".

Unfortunately, we did not see the action necessary to make these visions reality – no action from EASA and the European Commission for nearly a year.

So in pursuit of our vision, ECA acted. More than 20 airports in the majority of European Countries saw professional Pilots and cabin crew informing the public of the risks. Sites around the Brussels-based EU Institutions saw uniformed pilots and cabin crew demanding action. Not action in support of our views – not positioning for some future debate, but action to protect passengers on European aircraft from the threat to their safety of aircrew fatigue.

The Japanese proverb implies the conclusion – both vision and action are necessary to achieve anything worthwhile.