mr. rosenker and i worked together on the 235 bridge collapse, and mr. schogol, thank you. i was working at the beginning of this hearing to get a speech done in honor of paul wellstone, he and his wife are getting a big award from a medical help association and across of the part about their approach tragic accident because it was too negative for this award ceremony as sat here listening i flipped over what we were doing thinking their plane went down, it was a private plane but because of icing conditions and pilot issues that were not similar to those with training and things like that. so that hit home to me. my colleagues have done great job asking great questions on the area of fatigue so i thought i would follow up with some of these ideas i am trying to get with a clear problem of the issues and training issues with these pilots and one of the things i thought about a lot with the regional carriers and senator dorgan and i are both in states where we have regional airlines and flight the when they typically fly short flights to hub airports and this means regional

mr. rosenker if i can.ur testimony regarding the background of the pilot of the flight, you noted the captain had a multiple faa check disapprovals before his employment. he had not initially pass tests for the flight rating in 1991, the commercial pilot certificate, may of 2002 and the multiengine certificate in april 2004. in each case, with additional training, the captain subsequently passed the flight test and was issued the rating or the certificate. now, recognizing, you know, not every pilot is going to pass various flight tests on the first attempt, my question is, what is the general pass/fail percentage when it comes to instrument flight ratings, commercial pilot certificates and multiengine certificates? >> i can't give you the specific metrics. perhaps the administrator would have a better idea to that. before i turn it over to the administrator, if that's okay with you, senator. theier themselves should have the ability when they are comparing new hires and candidates to say, here is somebody

mr. rosenker, i & one of the top six recommendation at mtsb is that all turboprop aircraft the handblown during icy conditions; is that correct? >> it is something we have recommended, yes, sir. >> and mr. babbitt, they have no use of the hand pilot or turbo flying in a i see conditions? >> it may well be but might newness and preparation for the hearing i am not aware of a requirement. >> i think from a transcript from the cockpit there was the first officer although she had 2600 hours flying but had never flown in icy conditions, i believe that's correct? >> i believe my understanding reading some of that transcript was she was describing -- she had flown in icing conditions however she did in fact have early line experience and she was describing that earlier experience await concern her and she was actually looking to get more experience building time. she suggested it should be promoted to captain she wanted more time northeast before she could accept it. >> my time is running out but when mtsb makes a recommendation which they have made regarding icing and turboprops, how does faa c

mr. rosenker. in your testimony regarding the background of the pilots of flight number 3407 you noted that, and

mr. rosenker you may proceed. >> thank you. thank you mr. chairman. ranking member demint, distinguished members of the committee, i would like to begin my testimony this afternoon with a short summary of the ntsb's investigative actions to date. regarding the accident involving colgan air flight 3407. this is still an ongoing investigation and there is significant work left for our investigation. my testimony today therefore will be limited to those that sui of identified to date and i will steer clear of any analysis of what we have found so far and avoid any altman conclusions that might be drawn from that information. on february 12, 2009 at 10:17 eastern standard time colgan air flight 3407 crashed during an instrument approach to runway 2-3, buffalo niagra it and report. the flight was operating as a 121 scheduled passenger flight from liberty international airport in new york new jersey. the four crew members and 45 passengers were killed. the aircraft was destroyed by impact forces. one person and a house was also killed and two individuals es

mr. rosenker, you have stressed several times today that the investigation is not complete. i understand that. having read a lot of what the ntsb has done and learned, it's pretty impressive to me. what is the that you have to learn to back at this stage of the investigation it appears to me that you are well down the road. so what remains that you expect to learn >> senator, mr. chairman, we actually only yesterday and did before yesterday were getting to the simulator where we could find those same parameters and same patterns, the same actions to understand more about the human performance factor and the aircraft performance factor. there is analysis going on at this moment. read literally sent to accrue to that simulator to enable us to understand more of what happened in that cockpit. their is a good deal of analysis which still must be done if we are going to cross every t and down every night. that is what we do in our investigations. >> why are you only able to get in the simulator in june. >> we just finished a public hearing on this. we go through of process, which

mr. rosenker, it is i assume a fact that the major carriers in this country have an enormous stake in the records of commuters because they painted airplanes with their colors and their name, and consumers often aren't able to make a distinction or don't make a distinction whether they are on the commuter or the main carrier. do you think that what has happened is we have migrated to standards and if so, is that not contrary to the interest of the major carriers? >> i don't believe, mr. chairman, we have migrated. what i do believe is, as other witnesses have indicated, we are looking to achieve one level of safety. and that is a high level of safety. in fairness, about 50%, perhaps a little more, of the air passengers based excuse me, the air miles for flights that are made are done by the commuter carriers. we want to make a safe industry, and overall as you indicated in your introduction, we enjoy a very safe aviation industry in the united states. the objective is to raise that even higher. not only with the regional carrier, but the major carrier as well. we just recently investigate

mr. rosenker, you've obviously been looking at this issue. your reaction? >> we have issues about commuting. we want to make sure that both management and the pilots have a responsible outlook on how this can be done in a safe and efficient way. the reality of life is these people are going to live where they wish to live. many of these bases don't exist where they would like to live and some of the bases are in very, very high economic cities where, in fact, it costs a fortune to try to buy a home or rent an apartment. the business of and the practice of commuting has been around since commercial aviation. pilots are allowed to pretty much get inexpensive if not free transport any time they wish. so we realize this is a fact of life. and what we are trying to strive for is the most safe way we can get there because we can't ignore it. but we've made recommendations to the faa concerning fatigue. fatigue is a very insidious condition and many times people won't know they are fatigued until it's, unfortunately, too late. we're hoping that the faa will be tak

inspector general's office next to hear from mark rosenker the acting chairman of national transportation safety board. you may proceed. >> thank you mr. chairman, distinguished members of the committee i would like to begin my testimony this afternoon with a short summary of the ntsb investigator actions to date regarding the accident involving cold air flight 3407 this is still the ongoing investigation and there is significant work left for our investigators but my testimony today will be limited to those facts we have identified and i will steer clear of any analysis of what we have found so a