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You're welcome Cindy, but the questions remain, who cut them and what was the intent?

After mechanics at Northwest Airlines went out on strike on Aug. 20, 2005, Federal Aviation Administration safety inspector Mark Lund began to see troubling signs. One replacement mechanic didn't know how to test an engine. Another couldn't close a cabin door. Many did not seem properly trained. In Lund's view, their inexperience resulted in dangerous mistakes. One DC-10, for example, had a broken lavatory duct that allowed human waste to spill onto vital navigation equipment. The leak developed during a flight from Amsterdam to Minneapolis. Northwest (NWA) planned to let the plane continue on to Honolulu with the perilous and putrid problem unfixed—until one of Lund's fellow safety inspectors in Minneapolis intervened.

Just two days after the strike began, Lund fired off a "safety recommendation for accident prevention" letter to his supervisors and to FAA headquarters in Washington. It was the loudest alarm he had the authority to ring. Claiming that "a situation exists that jeopardizes life," Lund proposed cutting back on Northwest's flight schedule until mechanics and inspectors could do their job "without error." But instead of taking harsh action against the airline, the agency punished him. On Aug. 29, Lund's supervisors confiscated the badge that gave him access to Northwest's facilities and gave him a desk job. That happened to be the same day the airline sent a letter to the FAA complaining about Lund's allegedly disruptive and unprofessional conduct. The FAA says it treated Lund fairly.