What Difference Does it Make

By Lee McGarr

 

What Difference Does It Make? is a true story of one individual who still believes in the democratic system that is now being stripped away from the honest American, and the struggle this one person went through to attempt to preserve it. With over seventeen years with the FAA and numerous excellence awards with cash bonuses, my car

• Language: English
• Publisher: Palmetto Publishing
• Release date: Jun 2, 2022
• ISBN: 9798885906340

Lee McGarr

Lee McGarr is a retired pilot with Degrees in Electrical Engineering and Biology

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

Saying Goodbye to Alaska

In 1996, I was requested to apply for a job with the FAA, flight standards office in Anchorage, Alaska. At the time, I was out of graduate school and had been flying in Alaska for K2 Aviation as their chief pilot. At first, my immediate answer was, No! Having worked for customs in the eighties, I really had all of the bureaucracy I cared for. Then after weeks of being indecisive and my Principal Operations Inspector (POI) repeatedly asking, I decided I should research it a little more and consider that option. I recall a discussion with my now ex-wife of not to get too excited, as the government will take forever and we may never even hear back from them at all.

At the same time of my application, another mountain operator had an accident on Mount McKinley, and the FAA was under a great deal of pressure to get inspectors on the mountain. Unfortunately, their only way to do that at that time was to hire one of the mountain operators to fly them there. That never yielded anything, as when they were there, they, the other operators, would simply not go or go elsewhere.

Having this event occur, in a period of less than two weeks, I was given an offer and immediately went into service flying to and from the mountain in a plane equipped with skis, as I had been doing for a private company for the past few years, only now for the FAA.

After completing all of my classes that are required for an aviation safety inspector, I was assigned a number of air taxi operators in Alaska. These I found to be some of the greatest people in the world.

They were very interested in aviation and loved their work and where they operated. Spectacular was the best way to describe the position and the operators. What a great group of people and aviators.

A very challenging case came to me from some of the investigations groups in Oklahoma City. A Designated Pilot Examiner (DPE) from California had apparently been selling Airline Transport Pilot (ATP) ratings for high dollars, and a particular Asian operator was buying the licenses for the crews they wanted. This individual had moved to a remote village in Alaska, and I was assigned to research the background and complete the investigation. From my earlier career within the Treasury department, it was right up my alley, and I dove in with both feet and set out to conclude this assignment. After over three months and trips all over Alaska, California, and Florida, we finally were able to conclude the investigation and proved our case. I was given a large merit bonus for my work and a Job Well Done Award.

My years there were overall very fun and fulfilling. From accident investigations to assisting operators and pilots, even talking to the general public about flying in Alaska, all was very rewarding. Even though I had flown most of my adult life, I was provided with numerous classes on regulations and rules that all in aviation were to adhere to! I had heard rumors of what went on in the lower forty-eight, as it is called in Alaska, with the FAA but remained isolated from all where I was located. In the near future, I would get an education as to what really was the focus in the FAA, and air safety was never an issue.

In 1999, my now ex-wife stated that she could not take another long, cold, dark winter in Alaska (which I never found cold or dark) and was going to take my daughters and move to Arizona. I was amazed, as she typically went to Arizona around Christmas time and returned around the first week or so of March. This I could not take, my daughters being away from me, so I began looking for a job with the FAA in the lower forty-eight.

When I found an opening in Oklahoma City, I was cautioned by numerous people with whom I worked and told that it was not a good idea and had it explained to me as to what went on. My now ex-wife said that she would like Oklahoma (which lasted about six months), and I accepted a new position within the training department of flight check, AVN as it was called, with my primary task of ensuring regulatory compliance for all flight check crews! I recall thinking at the time this job was going to be a breeze and involve very little investigation. I had no idea at the time how corrupt the organization I was going to was. It far exceeded even what I had been told. Looking back now over thousands of files and notes, I honestly wish I would not have taken such a move.

I was accepted to my new position in November of 2000 and prepared for the large move with my wife and two daughters.

Goodbye, Alaska. Hello, Oklahoma!

CHAPTER 2

Welcome to Mike Monroney

Aeronautical Center (MMAC)

Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

I found that my new position was, to say the least, odd. I suppose it could be described as we have an important mission, but we will only deal with it when and if the mood strikes us. We are here for an all-expense-paid trip courtesy of the American taxpayer!

The first days at MMAC were very full of surprises. The man who disappeared from the planet after the ValuJet accident in the Everglades reappeared as our new overall manager called the director. A smiling piece of political work at its finest, straight out of Washington, and had just been reassigned after the heat of the accident had blown over. With him came his entourage of ass kissers and those who had done favors for him for years to keep him and themselves from being thrown to the wolves, or more appropriately in prison. My particular supervisor was one of them. To describe him to a tee, two hundred pounds overweight, quite slovenly, and rarely ever in his office before ten thirty in the morning but always gone by two o’clock in the afternoon. As it turned out, he had taken a hit for a sexual discrimination suit against the big manager, so he was good to do anything or nothing without repercussion. He chose nothing! As I saw the management, how, over the years, it would only rotate with the same managers over and over again. No new faces, they only wanted to keep the same without any change. This for this group was, to say the least, job security.

I recall an event, having a meeting scheduled with a training contractor that this manager was supposed to attend/conduct, that was scheduled at nine o’clock in the morning. Shortly after eleven o’clock, he, my manager, arrived with two bags of burgers in hand, which he brought to the meeting and ate. His demeanor and actions were, as usual, disgusting. He remained a manager there for nearly six years and accomplished nothing! He is now retired, and we the people are still paying for him to do nothing.

I would have thought this to be the ultimate in fraud, but later in my journey through the FAA in Oklahoma and Washington, D.C., I had the displeasure of getting to know a person who was nicknamed Squealy-Boy because of his association with management and telling or fabricating stories on pilots who were not in the club! With nearly four years remaining to retire, he had a stroke and was debilitated to a point of doing nothing at all besides sitting at home. He was left on flying status for the remaining time with a valid flight physical until his retirement was completed (about four years) and continued to collect flight pay, full-time employee status, and never showed up at work again!

It was around this time in 2001 that I was assigned to investigate a flight check pilot who had intentionally flown an un-airworthy aircraft after instructed to not do such, or so I was told. After researching the event, obtaining the records, I began interviewing the crew, and with them came the union representative, a Mr. Hardy Jack Vance. Upon first contact, Mr. Vance was quite abrasive and difficult. The airman, a Mr. Dennis Sandlin, was cooperative and provided me with what I needed. After nearly two weeks and with all the records in hand, I presented my findings to a Mr. David Boulder, the chief pilot, and his boss, a Mr. Edward Wallace Lucke Jr., the director of operations, who had called for the investigation. When I explained to them that Mr. Sandlin had done nothing incorrect and followed the regulations to the letter, Mr. Lucke looked quite upset. His statement to me was, Well, you must have overlooked something? I responded, No, sir, he did nothing outside the regulations, and if there was any fault, it was in maintenance! Mr. Lucke flew into a tirade and told me that I needed to find something. I stated that if that meant that I was to lie, I could not do that, and he would need someone else to do that job. With that, I walked out of the office and returned to my office in Hangar 8 at Will Rogers World Airport.

More of these events came to light, and if the airman was on board with the management in The Club, there was to be no finding. However, if they were not, all of the federal aviation regulations and the associated penalties would apply and be pressed to the fullest. This I and another inspector, Steven Schroeder, entitled The Club. Because of my action, Mr. Sandlin could be charged with no regulatory violations, so instead, he was resigned to sitting at a grade school-type desk in the hall near Mr. Lucke’s office and do nothing eight hours a day until he finally decided to retire. This, I would like to add, was an exceptional flight check pilot who knew his job extremely well and a very gifted pilot. For the closing months of his career, he did nothing. Another clear case of federal management gone array and talent lost!

After only about eight months of my new position in the training department, I elected to change departments and fly for flight check. I was downgraded in my change of position, and from an FG-14 pay grade to an FG-13, most people would see that as a loss of pay; however, my step grade went to the highest level possible, and it became a raise. Our federal government at work and we the people wonder why the spending is so out of control.

In the first eight months in Oklahoma, I found that if you fell out of favor, for any reason, they would try to persuade you to leave. If you did not, they would attempt to force you to retire, transfer, or, if nothing else, fire you for trumped-up charges that did not actually exist. We will get into this with documentation in chapter 14. This was accomplished by our management people who, in some cases, had been rifted from the military and got hired into the government through the buddy system. Other people would call this the Peter Principle! In effect, totally incompetent people were now in charge. As a dear friend used to say, The loonies are running the nuthouse!

I decided that I would focus on doing my new job and learning all I could do so that I could do it not just well but better than anyone else. I had overlooked my confrontation of Mr. Lucke and refusal to lie for him. Upon parting with the training department, I was very clearly told by my supervisor that he would make damn sure that I never got checked out as a flight check pilot! I responded to him, Give it your best shot! He did exactly that, and nearly a year later, I finally received my check pilot certification but without any of the usual fanfare. Most club members receive their certification in about three months as a comparison. All club pilots would be greeted at the plane with lots of congratulatory speeches and handed their certs and have their picture taken. With me, my new supervisor walked by my desk, threw my certificate on my desk, and said nothing at all. I did respond, Thank you!

The flying public has this very ignorant feeling of safety/security where I have to refer back to Mr. Franklins’s quote that states, Those who surrender freedom for security will not have, nor do they deserve, either one.

After watching flight check pilots dummy reports, overflying inspections in the flight levels, and later calling the inspection complete, it is only by the grace of God and truly professional pilots who fly passengers that we are not confronted with overwhelming air tragedies.

Now is when I really started to get my eyes open as to the actual operation of flight check. The system it is founded upon is very good but exceedingly corrupted by those who wish to write themselves checks on the taxpayer account. Everything from a tremendously bloated staff to paying ten to twenty to one hundred times what items are worth, from paper clips to aircraft, the King Airs that were to cost the taxpayer 40 million dollars ended up exceeding 83 million, goes on daily as a business-as-usual attitude. Meetings to establish meetings to new places to have these meetings all paid for by us, the American taxpayer. Each chapter ahead will outline trips around the world to fraud contracts that are always just under the watch-ful eyes of the DOT/OIG per the 1994 Congressional approval of setting the FAA under its own scrutiny. This was called the Federal Aviation Administration Reauthorization Act of 1994.

So here we go, welcome to Mike Monroney Aeronautical Center, Oklahoma City, and the Federal Aviation Administration.

CHAPTER 3

The Regulations Do Not Apply to Us!

Out of the pan and into the fire. As the weeks started flying by, I began to see and understand that maintaining regulatory compliance was an impossible task, as the managers who ran flight check had no earthly idea what applied and what did not. After the N82 BeechCraft 300 accident in October of 1993 in Virginia, where the entire crew perished, Congress mandated that AVN/flight check would operate as a commercial operator under Federal Aviation Regulations (FAR) Part 135, which covers charter operators and flying for hire. This may have been where the real problem began.

An ex-Air Force club member was set as the director of operations, and he did not, under any condition, meet the requirements for the position he was to have, or even have an idea of what he should do. He then set out to write the operations manual of which he knew nothing about and employed a coworker who knew less than he on the Federal Aviation Regulations. Therefore, the flight check department remained as a flying club with no leadership or direction. Even the simplest of requirements were not understood: What constitutes a passenger! Clueless was the answer for them. Not a single solitary idea or concern, and off we went again not knowing. This time, with a whole new level of government bureaucracy to expand their mushrooming employment numbers, the net outcome to the American public would be a loss. More people doing the same job with no mission in mind. With all of the requirements that were in place in 1993, the FAA still took nearly two days to locate and accept the fact that an airplane was gone. Or did they not want to address this issue? The pilot in command (PIC) of the aircraft had dug up piles of dirt on the management of the FAA from local management to the administrator in Washington. In the FAA’s usual approach, they tried to paint the PIC as hothead, crazy, and even initially drunk. All other terms were to ensure that few, if any, would believe his documents, if they were ever found, which they were not. The administrator immediately sent one of his trusted emissaries to the office the aircraft came out of with a mission. His job, as he told the existing crews, was to conduct an after-accident office investigation. However, it was noted that every night, when the last person left the office, he, this investigator, would still