Two comments come to mind, air travel shouldn't be gambled with. If there is a fault, fix it!

The second comment is that it seems the main motive for not reporting faults is to do with finance. Therefore, it seems clear that this must be addressed. Airlines shouldn't be saying "We'll stop gambling with people's lives when it's cheaper."

Aircraft have a defined list of items that are allowed to be faulty with a strictly defined time within which they must be rectified. Thesesare generally all minor items for which there is built in redundancy for example one electrical generator when four may be fitted. At the end of the day, the pilot decides whether or not the aircraft is safe to fly. This authority is enshrined in law and no responsible commander will knowingly take an aircraft that is unfit for flight, if he did so his or her license would be at risk from the civil aviation authority. No airline would do so either because even if they care nothing for their passengers, an accident or incident is a lot more expensive than proper maintenance. The CAA will come crashing down (no pun intended) on any company that allowed this to happen and in any way endangered the public.

The independent is fairly well known for its antipathy towards aviation, trying to whip up false scare stories to ram home your terribly right on green message is irresponsible.There are no European or US airlines flying unsafe aircraft, you are more likely to be knocked off your bike than die in an aircraft accident.

How is down turn in air travel a good thing????
This story is not worthy of the front page. As a licenced aircraft engineer, I know if aircraft is not airworthy then it will not fly.No finance guy would ever be able to convince me to release an aircraft to service when it should not be in service. I could loose my licence and possibly end up in jail.

Pilots are humans too! They belld and ide just like anyone else. There are not many people who know that much about aircraft and how they operate that would take an unsafe one up in the air!

What a 'non story'. As a UK pilot of over thirty years experience I can assure you that nobody would fly an aircraft knowing it was unfit. Passengers fly once or twice a year - we fly almost every day, so why would we take such a risk ?
What you are referring to is the litany of tiny defects, which are allowable but have no effect on flight safety. ('Ashtray missing seat 34F'. 'Bulb requires changing.') These are allowable defects within various limitations, enforced by law, which are entered into the Technical Log and then formally deferred because they are allowable. Sometimes we save time by not entering them until return to base, because the paperwork is onerous and has to be done with precision - and engineers have more practice at this than we do.
You could only read this in an anti-aviation paper .....

To Tony

There is no way that I think you would let fly an unsafe aircraft or doubt your integrity.

However I think it is a good idea that THE INDEPENDENT keep an eye on things, keep everyone alert in the aviation industry, just in case the finance guys start bending the rules to their own advantage and that is entirely possible in the ruthless corporate environment that they operate under.

Arrived from Lanzarote on 17/07 on XL 221 to Manchester. We had to load the plane from front to back because of uneven "weight distribution" and the flight was delayed because of a fault. On arrival we had to disembark from back first to front, for the same reason. Some of the luggage did not arrive and the reason the airlines gave was because of weight restrictions.

Reminds me of the pilot who wrote in the "Faults" book;
"Bumpy landing, automatic landing gear probably faulty."
The engineer's reply where they report action taken, stated; "Automatic landing system not fitted on this aircraft."

Dear investigative Journalist,
as I have worked in an development role in Both the Automotive and Aviation industry , I would like to add my 2 bobs worth.. My area of involvement in Aviation was the ATA 32 chapter ( thats LGERS... I`ll let you work that one out) and the component safety critical or not thats ALLOWED in any mechanical or hydraulic system on an aircraft is expected to have a life expectancy of (wait for it..)at least 20,000 flight cycles ( Thats there and back)140,000 flight hours or a failure mode of for example 5 times 10 to the minus7 (mean or average probability per flight hour).
Then theres the BITE software ( Built in Test equipment) that my ex emplyer and their competition include in the flight systems which constantly monitor and records any system fault and stores it in a data base which can be accessed by an engineer at the planes destination ( A bit like the CANBus system on the Fiesta of Golf you drove to the Airport in... Btw most of the bits in these cars are usually signed off or expected to last for 150000miles (180,000Km)so divide that by about 25,000 miles and you'd get an idea of how many times you could drive from London to Sydney perhaps then think how many times a 767 or A340 does it . Any fault code can only be reset by the engineer after they have replaced the bit thats at fault and no the pilot can't cancel it or erase the content.
So that coupled with fact the pilot has to log what he or she finds, even in fault reporting process there is redundency and there would have to be a serious failure in the reporting system for a fault that had not been "reported" slipping through the net so even if they (the Pilots) don`t report or fail to notice a fault, if its in a safety critical system most modern Aircraft eg your average A320s and 737 ( Both popular mid to long range aircraft ) will "fess up"if there is anything major wrong .
As an aside and hoping to address the financial /conspiracy side .As most of us know when you have a problem with your new car ( something that the guys at Wolfsburg or Valencia didnt capture in the endf of line check for your golf and Fiesta ) you can usually pull over and Call the AA/RAC , this is a luxury that the average Airline can ill afford,for example next time you fly with one of your well known airlines take a look at the terms and conditions of your ticket now if your airline or carrier has signed up to the WARSAW convention or the intercarrier agreement in the horrendous eventuality of you having a walk on part in FAA/ CAA accident report. Your dependents can effectivly expect a sum in the region of million Dollars plus if it was proved the Carrier or manufacturer of the Aircraft were at fault ...as wikepedia says citation needed ( The carrier btw is resp for maintenance) so all it takes is one accident involving for example a mid to long range aircraft with 200 passenger and crew ..plus what /whoever it hits on the ground and this is a finacial incentive enough for them not to want to skimp on the maintenance front and why various airlines that have been a bit tight on the maintenance budget have been banned from landing or departing from Europe .
With this in mind and the fact that I personally prefer to drive to my destination when I can ,I can honestly say in terms of travelling Avaition is quite safe unless Im at the controls then Id worry if I were you!!! so lets talk about something else like for example why do German Tv channels insist on Dubbing everything into german and the only two english language channels I can get are CNN &BBC world... I could talk all bloody night about that one....

...and before any one starts to attack me, i am a licensed engineer and am happy to talk about rulebreaking in maintenance. It is common, every engineer has done it and i would challenge those who say they haven't. All the stories above about being anti aviation are rubbish. Take your heads out of the sand. The comments that said 'paperwork is onerous so we fill in the log when we get back to save time' - illegal!!! ANY defect must be raised before the next flight and either deferred or rectified against approved manuals. No engineer can determine whether the aeroplane is airworthy - they can only rectify defects and troubleshoot again using approved manuals. Airworthiness is a bigger issue! And as for making judgements; there is no such thing - its all written in the approved documents. If its not then it should not fly unless deviations are gained through the right channels.(see the regulations). as for the CAA- they are stuck in the middle. Companies hide things when they visit, tell them what they want to hear and even smooze the CAA to keep them away from the aeroplanes! The regulators need to get stronger!
So, i do work in aviation, i have worked at the sharp end, i have seen rulebreaking happen (and condoned) every day and defects are carried illegally.
I love aviation and my job but i am sick of people pretending its perfect because it is far from it and most of it is known about!

any accident, Helios or not, is not down to one thing. With Helios, the crew made errors as did the maintenance staff (who had also not followed procedures by the way!). The aircraft alarm system was questioned as was the airline management and the Cypriot CAA. NO accident is caused by one failure but somewhere along the lines rulebreaking is involved in most! So in this case, the paper misunderstood the report on the helios accident in respect of carrying defects (as opposed to missing a pre flight check item i.e. the pressure controller setting). However, lets not think this slight mis reporting makes us all feel ok. There is a bigger issue here and it is one of companies in aviation taking risks by rulebreaking. there are many accidents/incidents of late where it was a factor!

The information about the Helios flight is available in the official accident report, which categorically states nothing that the author of this article says it does. A switch was left in the wrong position by a maintenance person, which shouldn't have mattered as, technically, the pilots should have checked its position as part of their pre-flight check. But the accident chain did not even "partly" include failure by pilots to report a fault. That is completely untrue. With such a stupid disregard for the facts, why should anyone believe any other so-called facts in the article? July is the time when people go on holiday and more than one news editor I have encountered has got in touch asking for scare stories for the holiday season. Mr Savage, and Mr Independent, you really should hang your heads in shame. You are a disgrace to journalism.

Steve,
As Jimmy said you have to walk it like you talk.
Example we can design and certify an uplock actuator as an LRI ( Line replacement item) which saves you having to take the whole uplock out but its kind of pointless if your mates can't be arsed to put the right length or correct bolts in and then torque it correctly with a correctly calibrated wrench.
I can only speak for a certain European manufacturer (Based off the M5&M4 junction if you get my drift) and say that the guy I worked with who was part supportability was a time served engineer such as yourself ( and as you are ..very proud of the work he had done and was doing) and he made it his sole purpose to be as big a pain to us in the design community ( for landing gear systems ) to ensure we made these things as easy to maintain as possible so when parts needed changing the whole operation was as error proofed and time consumed was minimal.
My point is ( to Paraphrase Jimmy) if this is happening you need to tell the CAA this is happening.
How are you going to feel if you knowingly stand by while your collegues dispatch something that is later on involved in an accident?.
WRT to the Boeing incident my take on that (if it hasn`t been done already would be to make the system fail safe ( Ie no battery power to start the engines unless the pressure controller was correctly set with no manual overide possible.. a simple interlock system) then at least that would one less system to worry about but sadly one more item to be looked at on the various checks ( A b & C for example) by maintenance. Maybe this could be another system that could be included in that rush to enter into service a totally electric aircraft.

Steve, thanks for being so open. It really is time that this came out into the open. But first lets make a few points a bit clearer. Aviation activities are extremely well documented (rightly so). This however has one rather large drawback, traceability of not only work performed but also who did it. In real terms this would mean a pilot in effect reporting himself if he logged a fault and completed the paperwork correctly before continuing flying. So the reality more often than not is that he doesn't log the fault until the end of the day to save all the hassle. This is obviously ok for minor issues but with industry under so much pressure since 9/11 pilots are increasingly stepping outside acceptable boundaries.

In addition, due to the amount of information recorded each and every flight leg an engineer wishing to report would immediately put himself in the spotlight because within 2 minutes the company has narrowed down the field to one or two individuals involved at the time.

However the issue is real and in fact we have just witnessed flyglobespan in the news for breaking the law.
It went to court, they were found guilty and yes the court case came about because a captain flew a plane he shouldn't have done. Rest assured for this to come to court it was serious.

But parallel to this and unknown to the general public there have also been cases of engineers having to fight for their jobs because they were honest enough to report or integrity would not allow themselves to be forced into a bad decision. For colleagues witnessing such injustices a clear message is sent out; thinking of reporting an incident....don't.

Therefore I for one have enormous respect for and thank those who have chosen to speak out. This problem is real, very real and passengers should be rightly concerned.

Late again with this one. Just back from Greece, in fact - so kind of glad we didn't see it! Anyhow, here's an experience of being even later, from last year:-

What we didn’t get to do on our holidays: Flyjet flight FJE862 from Manchester to Mytilene was due to take off at 0600 hours on Thursday 6th September 2007, usual flight time 3 hours 55 minutes max. A delay was announced in the boarding lounge and attributed to engine problems which required inspection and gave our sphincters the first clench. We were told at 0630 by an attendant that the inspection wouldn’t happen until around 0650 at the earliest. To our surprise, the flight was called at 0700 and we were coached out to the plane. Once on board, the pilot made an announcement blaming all the problems on the ground agents: sphincters remained in the fastened position.

One hour into the flight, the pilot announced that we were about to enter turbulence and we should all fasten our seat belts. The plane immediately started to buck and yaw violently, in a regular “rowing” motion that felt nothing like “turbulence” to those of us who conferred – several of us surmising this to be the engine problem that was supposed to have been sorted out prior to departure. The alarming motion continued for about an hour; during this, the pilot again made a brief speech about the movement being “associated with fast-moving air at high altitude.” This did nothing to relax my glutei maximi.

When the plane began what we, as regular Lesbos-visitors, recognised to be its descent towards Mytilene, speed and height diminished and the motion appeared to stabilise. Cabin crew announced that we were now, indeed, in our descent to Mytilene and so should remain belted in (as we had done all this time, including cabin crew and with all forbidden to leave their seats). The pilot, however, suddenly came on air and practically blurted that we would “probably have noticed” that we were “out of the turbulence” but that “a small engine problem” had “also been noticed” and that we would land instead at Thessaloniki, where engineers were available. I’m surprised his nose, Pinocchio-style, didn’t come down the aisle as he made the announcement.

The plane landed swiftly at Thessaloniki and we were told by cabin crew that we would need to take all hand luggage into the terminal with us, otherwise it would be “discarded” should the plane be grounded. Passengers then spent four hours unattended in Thessaloniki Airport, before an announcement was given out by Olympic Airlines – actually, it was made to a group of militant passengers from whom the news spread out – that we would be taken by coach to a nearby hotel and that a replacement flight would be sought, possibly for take off around 2200.

Passengers were taken to the hotel in a series of coaches. They remained there, again, uninformed, until a tour rep went around at 2100 to tell us that coaches would now return us to the airport. Duly collected, we spent a further three hours waiting for information. Again, a “rumour” finally went around causing us all to collect near a departure gate at around 0030. We were subsequently boarded (“free seating” in unallocated, first-come, first-served style) on the replacement plane (Danish, I think) and finally arrived in Mytilene at 0245.

During the above debacle, several passengers tried to contact Flyjet or our various operators. The travel agents contacted had no information from Flyjet, whilst Flyjet’s own phone-lines remained unattended or inoperable. A journey from Manchester to Lesvos that should have taken under four hours eventually took seventeen! We lost a night of our seven-night holiday and experienced stress and fatigue that took at least a further day’s recovery and a lot of extra expenditure on drinks, hot springs dunking and other emollients.

Flyjet went bust shortly after the above incident. No compensation has been paid to anyone, to our knowledge. The tour operators (then Manos, now they’re Thomas Cooked) were no help at all and ABTA just wanted copies of everything, including any toilet-paper used in-flight. Subsequent rumours were circulated amongst the survivors about concerns that the faulty engine – probably in the tail – was in danger of “shaking the plane to bits,” whilst the landing at Mytiline was refused by ground control who apparently realised that, had the plane landed at their smaller facility, they’d never have been able to get it out of the way and the airport would have effectively been put out of action.

Conclusion – whatever the technology might be capable of doing to drop you out of the sky, things can be hideously compounded by the attitudes of those “in charge” with regard to concern, honesty and the profit motive.