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Flight 3407 families celebrate D.C. victory

Posted at 8:24 AM, Apr 15, 2016
and last updated 2019-01-22 16:26:51-05

The 'Families of Continental Flight 3407' victims are joining with Senator Chuck Schumer to celebrate the death of a proposed law that they say would have given new pilots a "shortcut" during their training.

Senator Schumer called it "unthinkable" that lawmakers even considered the amendment, and said it was "an affront to the Colgan Flight 3407 families' dedication over the last seven years." 

"The good news is, there's a dagger through the heart of that awful bill," Schumer said. "The laws we worked so hard to pass that will make flying safer and avoid the terrible kind of tragedies that we saw at 3407, those laws are going to continue, thank god."

The amendment to the FAA Reauthorization Bill that would have allowed entry-level regional airline officers to receive flight hour credit for their initial training at their hiring airline.  The victims' families and Senator Schumer said the amendment would have provided a shortcut to stricter pilot qualification standards that were enacted in the wake of the crash of Flight 3407.

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