Summary: Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO: (1) identified Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) regulations regarding commercial airline pilot hiring practices; (2) assessed the type and availability of FAA pilot safety background information; and (3) determined whether airlines verified pilot safety background information.
GAO found that: (1) FAA required airline pilots to have a valid FAA certificate; (2) FAA required airlines to perform a security background check, which included employment verification for the last 5 years, but not a check of pilot accident, incident, or violation histories; (3) airlines were largely responsible for developing their own hiring criteria; (4) many airlines required pilot applicants to undergo physical examinations and psychological, drug, and proficiency tests; (5) FAA maintained databases containing records of all pilots' safety histories and certificates, which airlines could inspect; and (6) almost all airlines surveyed knew that the FAA databases existed. GAO also found that: (1) all the airlines surveyed obtained a copy of pilot certificates, but 62 percent did not verify certificate validity with FAA; and (2) 92 percent of the airlines surveyed obtained safety background information from pilot applicants, but 23 percent of these airlines did not verify reported safety transgressions with FAA, and 56 percent did not verify applicants' reported lack of transgressions.
