[Brian Nelson, Cnn Anchor:] Universities often charter planes to trips to sports games; this in order to cut down on lost time and to cut down on money as well corporations do the same thing. But CNN's Charles Feldman, a pilot himself, reports that some of the regulations that govern commercial airlines do not apply to the smaller fleets.
[Charles Feldman, Cnn Correspondent:] Just why a Lear jet charter flight carrying famed golfer Payne Stewart crashed in South Dakota in 1999, killing Stewart and five others, remains somewhat of a mystery. Although the National Transportation Safety Board has determined that the probable cause of the accident was the flight crew's incapacitation, following the loss of cabin pressurization, the NTSB has not been able to determine why the de-pressurization occurred in the first place. And why is that? Because the 23-year-old aircraft was not required to be fitted with a flight data recorder the way big airliners are.
[Jim Hall, Former Chairman, Ntsb:] So, we ended up with what was a very important investigation, without having the information available to the board to make recommendations to prevent an event like that from occurring.
[Feldman:] The business jet fleet in the United States has just about doubled in the last decade; some 7,000 of these small jets now fly either for hire from charter companies, or as part of a corporation's very own aircraft fleet. But the federal aviation regulations that govern the large commercial airlines, regulations on everything from pilot training to aircraft safety systems don't always apply to the expanding business jet fleet.
[Hall:] Training is an important issue in that area and I think the board would like to see training get more attention, and see an increased use of simulators on these type of aircraft, similar to what we see with scheduled air service and the larger aircraft operating in that service in the United States.
[Feldman:] Business jet travel is no longer just for the CEO. An estimated 50 percent of passengers on business air craft are now middle managers. Mark Cobza's construction company in Florida uses this business jet to transport engineers and executives to various sites.
[Mark Cobza, Ceo, Aerial Companies:] Performance in our business means everything; it saves our executives time, and it also saves customers time and money.
[Feldman:] Time, yes, but what about safety? The safety record of business jet is apparently roughly equal to or even better than the scheduled airlines, but that may change. More and more companies are chipping in to buy a piece of a business jet, a practice called fractional ownership, often cheaper than chartering a jet. But these corporately owned plans operate under less stringent rules than do charter flights for hire. Nevertheless, some point out that there is more to safety than government regulations.
[Jack Olcott, National Business Aviation Assn:] It's also a culture. Business aviation, use of jet airplanes for business travel, adopts a very stringent culture of training, of maintenance...
[Feldman:] Aviation technology may be leaping far ahead of aviation regulation. [on camera]: Some new business jets coming on the market are certified to be flown by just one pilot, as opposed to the two pilot crews currently mandated for most commercial airliners. The question is: just because a jet plane can be flown by one pilot, does that mean that it should be? Charles Feldman, CNN, Los Angeles.