Evidence of meeting #5 for Transport, Infrastructure and Communities in the 43rd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was transport.
A video is available from Parliament.
5:05 p.m.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Viking Air Limited, Longview Aviation Capital Corp.
Jodi, if you want to talk about the Dash 8.... I mean, you've seen an aircraft that's evolved from a 37-passenger aircraft—
5:05 p.m.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
Specifically with the 737 Max, should that have been—
5:05 p.m.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Viking Air Limited, Longview Aviation Capital Corp.
I'm not qualified to understand the technical differences in the 737.
5:05 p.m.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
Okay.
Ms. Diamant, I'll ask you the same question.
5:05 p.m.
Chief Engineer, Airworthiness & Certification, Pratt & Whitney Canada, As an Individual
You asked it differently before, I would say, but that's fine.
The evaluation of changed product rule means that every area of change would have to be evaluated for the impact at the product level. When people talk about certifying the whole aircraft, in essence, those 1,200 requirements have to be looked at and a decision made about the extent of the change—38%, different engines, different performance—and the airframer has to reconfirm compliance with the requirements.
5:05 p.m.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
Given your background with the TCCA, would that be something, given the new specs of the aircraft coming out, that would be questioned by the TCCA?
5:05 p.m.
Chief Engineer, Airworthiness & Certification, Pratt & Whitney Canada, As an Individual
Every time we do a change, we have to evaluate—and you heard this already—whether it's significant or not significant. So you look at the extent of change.
We, as an applicant, have to go to our regulator and say, this is what it is. It's either significant or not significant. Even if it's not significant, we still have to demonstrate compliance with every single requirement. None are left out; it's a product-level evaluation.
Changed product rule requires you to look at later safety requirements in the certification basis. Part of the evaluation will be to look at the extent of the change and determine if there's sufficient change to warrant going to later certification requirements. Certification, no matter what the change, always requires you to look at all the changes and re-evaluate against the certification basis.
5:10 p.m.
Conservative
5:10 p.m.
Airworthiness Specialist, Bell Textron Canada Limited
I can't specifically talk about the 737 Max, but from a CPR standpoint, we've gone through changes on our products. Every time we go through a change on our product, we have the same process we have to follow. We need to look at the amount of change we're making on the aircraft in accordance with the guidance material that is available from Transport Canada and make an assessment in terms of whether or not that is a significant or non-significant change.
We make that recommendation to Transport Canada, but at the end of the day, it's Transport Canada's decision in terms of whether or not a change to an aircraft is significant or not significant. They have the final say in terms of the certification basis.
I know that Transport Canada also asks the same questions of foreign applicants as well. When they are looking at a foreign product, they are asking the same questions in terms of the certification basis and how that basis was established.
5:10 p.m.
Liberal
March 10th, 2020 / 5:10 p.m.
Conservative
Scot Davidson Conservative York—Simcoe, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you for appearing here today. We'll always support great Canadian aviation, for sure.
With regard to our focus, we're trying to stay around the 737 Max. We owe it to the families. There was definitely a red flag that came up when the first one crashed. I think things were missed.
We're not trying to complicate things or make it tougher for Canadian aviation. We're trying to get answers, answers for the families, and to make sure that what has happened never happens again.
To pick up where Mr. Doherty left off, when the 737 Max was certified to fly, there were over 71 design changes provided by the FAA and Boeing engineers. That's a substantial list compared to the NG model.
5:10 p.m.
Conservative
Scot Davidson Conservative York—Simcoe, ON
Okay. Anyway, do you have any comment on all those design changes that took place?
I'll take this to you, Mr. Curtis.
5:10 p.m.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Viking Air Limited, Longview Aviation Capital Corp.
Again, I have no information on how the 737 Max was certified. The only equivalency that I would mention is that at De Havilland Canada we had a product like the Dash 8 that evolved from a 37-seat aircraft to a 90-seat configuration today, which involved fuselage stretches and all these things. But they went through an incredibly robust process where new and current certification requirements would have to be applied to the aircraft. That aircraft has been in production for 20 years with nearly 700 built, so the process works.
I don't know about the 737, honestly.
5:10 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Vance Badawey
Thank you, Mr. Curtis.
Thank you, Mr. Davidson.
Go ahead, Mr. Rogers.
5:10 p.m.
Liberal
Churence Rogers Liberal Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, NL
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Welcome to our witnesses.
Again, condolences to the family members as we discuss this very important topic.
Today we saw a CBC report commenting on two reports. One was from the Ethiopian investigation team, which clearly points a finger at Boeing. The other was from the U.S. House of Representatives, which I find somewhat disturbing, when we think about the comments they make in the report about the tremendous financial pressure to get things done, the culture of concealment, hiding flaws with the MCAS system from 737 Max pilots and failure to identify key safety problems. They're questioning the certification process of the FAA, obviously. I found that somewhat concerning.
Given the comments about the FAA and the failure, the shortcomings in what they did and how they collaborated with Boeing on some of these certification processes, why should we continue to trust the certification process? I guess the question is this. How would you expect other countries to react if we withdrew from the international system and stopped recognizing their certification process? What might some of the implications be for Canadian companies if other countries no longer recognized Canadian certification?
I'll ask Ms. Diamant to comment on that, and maybe Mr. Curtis.
5:15 p.m.
Chief Engineer, Airworthiness & Certification, Pratt & Whitney Canada, As an Individual
If I understand your question, just repeating back what you said, you would like to understand what the impact would be if we withdrew—
5:15 p.m.
Liberal
Churence Rogers Liberal Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, NL
Yes, how would you expect other countries to react if we withdrew from the international system and stopped recognizing the certification process? What might the implications be for Canadian companies?
5:15 p.m.
Chief Engineer, Airworthiness & Certification, Pratt & Whitney Canada, As an Individual
Basically, what would happen is that we would have every country recertifying our aircraft and our engines with in-depth reviews. They would not be trusting Transport Canada, presumably, and that's an exceptionally difficult and challenging process. It would be very difficult for us to produce products and deliver them to customers around the world, because they would have to recertify them themselves.
5:15 p.m.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Viking Air Limited, Longview Aviation Capital Corp.
I think it would bring our industry to a grinding halt. I'll give an illustration of a situation where some countries have competing products. In the instance of the Twin Otter, when we were selling to China, we needed Transport Canada to work with the equivalent Chinese airworthiness authorities to stand behind how Transport Canada had certified the aircraft. There were a whole bunch of political issues that were preventing the entry of our product into China. Without Transport Canada defending the basis of certification, we wouldn't have aircraft in the country.
5:15 p.m.
Liberal
Churence Rogers Liberal Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, NL
Thank you.
Mr. Deer, how does Transport Canada assist you with certification? How lengthy or rigorous is the process?
5:15 p.m.
Airworthiness Specialist, Bell Textron Canada Limited
When we start a new certification program, we engage with Transport Canada right away. The delegation system we have is based on the relationships we have with Transport Canada. We're in constant communication using the relationships we have with Transport Canada to make sure they understand the configuration of our product and the complexity in certain areas, and then they can make a risk-based decision in terms of where they will get involved in the certification process.
Transport Canada will familiarize themselves with our product through the interaction with us. They will make an assessment of risk and which areas would have the most influence on product safety, and they will target those areas in terms of their level of involvement and where they get involved in the product.
At the end of the day, our delegates are the ones who are making the findings of compliance, but the product will never get approved unless Transport Canada involvement has been completed and they are satisfied that the product is safe.