NASA - National Aeronautics and Space Administration

By: Jim Hodges

NASA Langley's contribution to answering a challenge issued by then-Vice President Al Gore in 1997 was recognized Tuesday night, when the center's members of the Commercial Aviation Safety Team (CAST) were honored for their role in earning the 2008 Robert J. Collier Trophy.

Members of the CAST executive team – John White, Mike Lewis, George Finelli, Frank Jones, Sam Morello and Sharon Monica Jones – received certificates. That team, plus other CAST representatives, received a medallion marking the occasion.

Members of Commercial Aviation Safety Team (CAST) hold a replica of the Collier Trophy. The actual trophy is on display at the Air and Space Museum at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington. Credit: NASA/George Homich

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"There's a novelty in CAST getting the trophy," Amy Pritchett, director of the Aviation Safety Program Office, told a gathering at the Virginia Air and Space Center. "Before, it always went to the fastest, the highest."

She pointed to previous winners, such as those associated with the X-15 and the crew of Apollo 11.

"I love X-15. I love Apollo 11," Pritchett said. "But we've made aviation safer."

CAST analyzed data from more than 500 aviation accidents and thousands of safety incidents worldwide, then used that analysis to devise critical safety measures that have contributed to a reduction in accident risk and to lives being saved.

Gore's challenge in 1997 was to reduce the commercial accident rate by 80 percent over 10 years. In 2008, commercial aviation reported the safest year ever, and CAST reports that the risk of a fatal accidents has been reduced by 83 percent.

Today, the probability of a fatal accident is 1 in 22.8 million flights.

"If you think about that, it's mind-boggling," said Jaiwon Shin, NASA's associate administrator for Aeronautics Research. "NASA played such a huge role in doing that."

That role was perhaps even more valuable because "CAST was an all-volunteer organization," Shin added. "It was a self-motivated organization."

Cindy Lee, NASA Langley's associate director, put the award in perspective. "In the Olympics, it's the gold medal," she said in hosting the event. "In aeronautics, it's the Collier Trophy."

First awarded in 1911 to Glenn Curtiss and two years later to Orville Wright, the Collier has gone to a NASA entry 22 times, and Langley Research Center has had pivotal roles in seven of those awards.


 
NASA Langley Research Center
Managing Editor: Jim Hodges
Executive Editor and Responsible NASA Official: H. Keith Henry
Editor and Curator: Denise Lineberry