Swiss adopt EU airline blacklist

No smoking: the EU has banned 92 airlines from landing at European airports swissinfo.ch

Switzerland has taken on board a European Union list of 92 airlines banned from landing at European airports due to shortcomings in international safety standards.

Switzerland has long pushed for a common EU blacklist and actively contributed to the list, published on the European Aviation Safety Agency website on Wednesday.

The list includes both cargo and passenger carriers judged to have an “inadequate system for regulatory oversight” or insufficient safety standards.

However none of the 92 airlines, most of which are based in Africa, flies to Switzerland, which integrated its own blacklist into the EU list.

EU transport commissioner Jacques Barrot said the EU was barring 50 carriers from the Democratic Republic of Congo alone.

He said some planes used for flights to Europe and possibly elsewhere were “flying coffins”, adding that safety controls in the listed nations were too weak.

Pressure

The EU moved to set up a single blacklist after several fatal airline crashes in Greece and Italy last year and the crash of Egypt’s Flash Airlines in the Red Sea in January 2004 which killed 148 people.

Switzerland’s aviation authorities had come under pressure to publish their blacklist following revelations that Flash Airlines was one of more than 20 aircraft banned from Swiss airspace at the time because of security deficiencies.

In January 2004 Swiss authorities named only seven companies already mentioned by the media and kept others secret.

Switzerland had previously refused to reveal who was on its blacklist, citing data-protection reasons.

In September 2005 Switzerland – following France and Belgium – published its blacklist of airlines banned from Swiss airports (Flash Airlines and, from Armenia, Air Van Airlines).

Consumer groups in Switzerland welcomed that decision, saying it would provide travellers and travel agents with useful information when booking trips, but not all Swiss commentators are convinced.

“Such blacklists are in effect meaningless – their purpose is to reassure the public,” aviation expert Sepp Moser told swissinfo on Wednesday. “Blacklists are drawn up for political rather than safety reasons.”

He added: “The tests which decide whether a plane features on the list take 20 minutes per plane. It’s impossible to judge the safety of a plane in so short a time.”

Streamlining

Barrot was asked by EU governments to draft an EU-wide blacklist plan to close loopholes allowing carriers deemed unsafe in one EU member state to operate in another EU country.

Up until Wednesday, European governments used different criteria to ban unsafe airlines, meaning that planes banned in one country could still land in neighbouring EU states.

Those lists will now be streamlined into one common EU file which will apply across the 25 EU member nations in addition to Norway and Switzerland.

The EU said it would review the list every three months, either adding new airlines or taking off carriers that meet EU safety standards.

Barrot said the EU would also provide aid to African nations trying to upgrade airline safety standards.

swissinfo with agencies

In brief

All foreign airlines wishing to operate flights to and from Switzerland require a licence issued by the Federal Civil Aviation Office (FCAO).

A licence will be issued if the airline concerned is able to provide evidence that it complies with the applicable operational and technical requirements (of the International Civil Aviation Organization) and that the authorities of the country of origin carry out effective supervision of the airline.

Airlines that have been refused permission to fly to and from EU or EFTA member states and apply for new landing rights in Switzerland will not receive a licence from the FCAO.

FCAO inspectors carry out random checks at Swiss airports to ensure that foreign airlines comply with safety standards.

Key facts

The European Union has banned 92 airlines from landing at EU, Swiss and Norwegian airports including 50 carriers from Congo, 14 from Sierra Leone and seven from Swaziland.
The list is supposed to be brought to the attention of customers by travel agents, both at ticket sales offices and on their websites, who will have an obligation to inform passengers on the identity of the carrier.
Under the new rules, passengers also will have a right to compensation if the airline on which they were to fly was included on the blacklist or replaced by a blacklisted airline after they bought the ticket.