Rotorcraft Operations Transparency and Oversight Reform Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. ONDER. Mr. Speaker, the ROTOR Act is an urgent piece of legislation that implements proven technology to help pilots see the real-time location of other aircraft. Had it been law, it would have prevented the needless loss of 67 lives in last January's DCA crash.

In the past 15 years, there have been an average of at least one near miss per month at DCA. Since 2008, the National Transportation Safety Board has recommended 18 times that all aircraft install ADS-B equipment that allows pilots to see and be seen when flying in busy airspace.

NTSB Chair Hormendy testified if the ROTOR Act had been the law last January, the jet and the helicopter would have had nearly a minute of advanced warning and the crash would have been prevented.

The ROTOR Act's ADS-B requirement is neither expensive nor burdensome. General aviation can meet the requirement with a receiver like this one that costs about $400, roughly the cost of a routine oil change for most planes.

American Airlines has installed ADS-B for about $50,000 per plane with only 1 to 2 days of downtime.

ROTOR's ADS-B requirement applies only to our Nation's busiest airspace, not to pilots flying in rural America. The families of flight 5342 are here today to support the ROTOR Act so that what they needlessly suffered will never happen again.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ``yes'' on the ROTOR Act.

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