this will be the first of two hearings and our witnesses today are a babbitt randolph administrator faa's, calvin scovel inspector general at department of transportation and general brian -- john o'brien who was a member of the flight safety foundation. i will call on the ranking member for an opening statement and chairman and ranking member of the full committee then call on witnesses and a round of questions a. >> thank you mr. chairman i want to thank you for your diligence and a sense of urgency to have these hearings to have the answers to american people and all passengers. i appreciate the witness is being here today i would not give a full opening statement because i want to get to you. but the possible weaknesses on the carrier side are important and they agree with everything the chairman says but in interviewing some of the carrier's there may be things on our side that we can do such as our privacy regulations to keep carriers from having access to some other records that we no fault the carrier for not responding to. of by to hear more about that but you have met with me of

the ntsb for the extraordinary work they are doing and i'm going to begin with the honorable randolph babbitt, administrator of the faa. i am very pleased to decided to serve your country in this way. you are new to that job but i recognize you and i would say to all four witnesses your entire statement will be made part of the permanent record and we will estey to summarize. mr. babbitt, you may proceed. [inaudible] i am sorry. chairman dorgan, senator demint and members of the full committee, thank you for inviting me here today to discuss the faa's role in the oversight of air carriers. let me start by saying that we faa more tragic loss of kuhlman air flight 3407 and as well as the families and crew members aboard the air france for 47. this is an agency that is dedicated to air safety. and the loss is felt keenly by all of us and our sympathies go out to both the families of 3407 and air france for 47. as you noted senator this is my first appearance at a hearing since i was sworn in as at the eight administrative and i want to thank this committee again for both your support and your co