AFA and Unions File Comments Opposing Delay in Use of Secondary Barriers

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, representing over 55,000 Flight Attendants at 20 airlines, with Association of Professional Flight Attendants, Communications Workers of America, and the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, filed comments strongly opposing to the Airlines for America (A4A) Petition for Expedited Exemption to delay use of Installed Physical Secondary Barriers (IPSB).

The comments read in part:

"It is clearly in the public interest for the FAA to deny the requested A4A Petition for Expedited Exemption. For aircraft manufactured after August 25, 2025 with an IPSB, Flight Attendants can be properly trained at any time prior to departure on the relatively small number of IPSB-equipped aircraft in their fleet, even if they have not yet been so trained in recurrent or initial training.


"There can be no justification for allowing airlines to leave any properly functioning IPSB unused. A single successful terrorist attack on an aircraft with an unused IPSB would be inexcusable and certainly not in the public interest. From an economic standpoint, based on the cost benefit analysis for this rule, if only one successful 9/11 type terrorist attack occurred every 151 years, the benefits of IPSB would essentially equal the costs. This analysis, of course, assumes that IPSB, once installed, is actually put to proper use, and not “kept on the shelf” by dubious arguments over a purported inability to train crewmembers."

Read the full comments.

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The Association of Flight Attendants is the Flight Attendant union. Focused 100 percent on Flight Attendant issues, AFA has been the leader in advancing the Flight Attendant profession for over 79 years. Serving as the voice for Flight Attendants in the workplace, in the aviation industry, in the media and on Capitol Hill, AFA has transformed the Flight Attendant profession by raising wages, benefits and working conditions. 55,000 Flight Attendants come together to form AFA, part of the 700,000-member strong Communications Workers of America (CWA), AFL-CIO. Visit us at www.afacwa.org.

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