Thank you, everyone.
First, on behalf of all cabin crew I represent at CUPE, I want to express our sincere condolences to those affected by the Ethiopian Airlines tragedy, most of all the victims' families.
My role is to represent the health and safety interests of the cabin crew who get on these planes day in, day out; and to work tirelessly to ensure their interests are heard. Passengers and our cabin crew get on planes and come home to their families and loved ones. They trust that the companies manufacturing them and the regulator certifying them for flight have their backs and that every safety aspect, both big and small, has been accounted for.
While the 737 Max events are obviously most concerning, similar trends of aircraft manufacturers placing profitability before safety and going either unnoticed or ignored by regulators persists at all levels. We have noted this just over the past two years as we get new aircraft.
We work in the aircraft cabin, so my focus today will be how a profit-first approach affects crucial interior safety systems and devices.
I testified before this committee a few years ago about tombstone legislation, among other things: how with aviation it often takes tragedy to bring about change and improvements.
CUPE has a history with aircraft cabin systems and tragedy. Air Ontario flight 1363 crashed on March 10, 1989, in Dryden, Ontario. One of our flight attendants perished because, at the time, cabin jump seats did not have shoulder straps.
Air Canada flight 797 landed in Cincinnati on June 2, 1983, after a horrific cabin fire, and this led to an emphasis on how important it was not to overlook the aircraft cabin when it comes to safety. It led to oxygen systems, emergency lighting, smoke detectors and smoke protection for flight attendants, and on-board firefighting equipment, among many other things.
In the past two years, a lack of consultation with our professionals, the cabin crew who work in and occupy this space, has highlighted great safety shortcomings. On the 737 Max, this led to an interior option being provided to airlines that maximizes seating to the detriment of functional lavatories, galleys and, most of all, cabin crew jump seats. The galley area is so restricted in the aft section that passengers can't access the lavatories without cabin crew either having to get out of their jump seats or the passenger having to either crawl or climb over them. Imagine the safety issues this presents in turbulence.
The narrow galley space precludes a second jump seat at the aft right, as exists in other cabin configurations. Once again, in the event of sudden turbulence, which the industry acknowledges as an emerging hazard due to climate change, where are cabin crew to go?
These are the people who will help you get off the aircraft in the event of an accident.
The lavatories on this plane are so notoriously narrow that when customers go to wash their hands, a copious amount of water lands on the floor. This is due to the tiny sinks.
Water is a known hazard on board, and training for cabin crew includes the risks of having water leaks in galleys.
It is unacceptable to have such a problem literally engineered into an aircraft to add a couple of seats. This aircraft was certified by the FAA, but it was purchased and flown by Canadian carriers. How has our regulator permitted this? Were they even aware of these problems, and if not, how? These may seem small, but they are important.
On the Airbus A220, a Canadian-designed and certified plane, option designs are offered to airlines that either omit important safety equipment or include equipment that is unacceptably difficult to use.
The aft jump seat is a pullout option, and it's prone to jamming. As well, if certain switches are accidentally depressed in the wrong order, it will not latch in place and therefore will not secure the occupant.
Most concerning, perhaps, is that the jump seat cannot be retrieved if any galley equipment is in the way, which is a common threat, as it is housed in the same frame as onboard meal carts.
The aft jump seat handset needed for emergency communication is positioned such that it is completely unreachable by most occupants unless their shoulder harness is unbuckled. As you will recall, one of our members died because of a problem with or a lack of a shoulder harness. This invites a dangerous scenario of a cabin crew member having to choose between emergency communications and their personal safety.
When asked how this could possibly have been approved by Transport Canada, officials I spoke to could not answer my question. We've never heard from them again on this issue.
Although there is ample room for additional jump seats at the back of this aircraft, it was approved to be sold to operators with only the single pullout jump seat available, what can only be assumed to be a classic cost-saving measure.
No alternate jump seats are available at the aft of the plane in the event of sudden turbulence. Furthermore, if any jump seat is to fall inoperative, someone is going to go without a seat.
CUPE is also very concerned about cabin air quality, which affects on-board crews both front and back. Canadian aviation regulations, in the airworthiness chapter of the manual at section 525.831, call for systems, even in cases of probable and expected failure, “to provide a sufficient amount of uncontaminated air” to ensure crew members can “perform their duties without undue discomfort or fatigue”. The section also states, “Crew and passenger compartment air must be free from harmful or hazardous concentrations of gases or vapours.”
Amazingly, despite the possibility of various contaminants with the potential to cause discomfort, fatigue and illness entering the cabin on commercial aircraft, only one gas is cited here, which is carbon monoxide, although “gases” and “vapours” are used in the plural form. One might be even more surprised to know that we do not have carbon monoxide detectors installed on board in our cabins, although these sections persist in our regulations.