In her opening statement at the June 19 convocation addressing General Aviation Safety—Climbing to the Next Level, NTSB Chairman Deborah Hersman said “in spite of improvements to the commercial and corporate aviation safety records, the GA accident rate has been stubbornly resistant to safety initiatives.”
She’ll get no argument that, “the status quo is not acceptable. We need to break through the plateau and bring the accident rate down significantly.” But there will be change, no improvement, if the NTSB works to this mindset: “GA pilots are not learning from the deadly mistakes made by their brethren – not learning from lessons learned in the hardest of ways. Recreational fliers are the chief pilot of an airline of one.”
If the NTSB somehow encourages legislators and the FAA to impose airline and corporate aviation requirements on general aviation, it will surely be the coup de grace.
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