Political Quotes

“Mr. President, FAA authorization expired in Octobeer of 2007. For more than 2 years, we have been operating on short-term extensions. I thank Chairman Rockefeller and Senators Hutchison, Dorgan and DeMint for working together to bring this bill to the floor. The bill before us will improve the safety of air travel, modernize our air traffic control system, boost the economy and create thousands of jobs. Senator Dorgan and Senator Rockefeller have had many hearings over the last few years on aviation but each hearing had one theme: safety. This bill will improve safety by creating an Aviation Safety Whistleblower Investigation Office that can catch problems before they result in serious accidents. The bill also requires the FAA Administrator to re-evaluate flight crew training and certification. We also require FAA to establish safety standards for training programs for flight crew members and aircraft dispatchers. Another key component of this bill is NextGen. NextGen is the term we use to describe our transition to a more modern, satellite-based air traffic control system. NextGen will give pilots and air traffic controllers the ability to ccurately pinpoint aircraft in the sky--to avoid problems, to monitor traffic, to move things more smoothly, safely and efficiently. The FAA released its aviation forecast study last Tuesday. Last year, we saw 704 million passengers carried on U.S. airlines. Soon, hose numbers will increase significantly.…”