Contributor - Accidents and Regulations

Gordon Gilbert

<p>Commercial pilots with color-vision-deficiency waivers might face stricter screening in the future. Based on its recently completed investigation into a FedEx Boeing 727 that crashed short during an approach to Tallahassee Regional Airport, Fla., on July 26, 2002, the NTSB doesn’t believe that the FAA’s current certification standards are appropriate for detecting serious color-vision deficiencies. The Safety Board said the first officer, who was the pilot flying, had in the past been able to compensate for a severe color deficiency that could result in difficulties interpreting red, green and white. However, during the visual approach the night of the accident, the FO had to “rely more heavily on his color vision because the PAPI lights were the only reliable source of glide path information in the black-hole environment,” the Safety Board said. All four PAPI lights would have been red during most of the accident aircraft’s final approach.</p>


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