Department of Transportation December 1, 2015 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

FRA is issuing Safety Advisory 2015-06 to notify freight railroads of the circumstances of a head-on collision at Hoxie, AR, and the risks automated inputs that reset alerter warning timing cycles pose. A small number of Union Pacific Railroad (UP) locomotives were equipped with alerters that the horn sequencer reset without direct engineer action, reducing the alerters' effectiveness. UP has appropriately modified its locomotives to resolve the issue and FRA is not aware of any other locomotives equipped with alerters that automatically reset without direct engineer action. However, all freight railroads should review the operation of their locomotives equipped with alerters, and modify them as necessary, to ensure no system resets the alerter warning timing cycle without direct engineer action.

We are publishing a new airworthiness directive (AD) for Airbus Helicopters Model AS350B3 helicopters. This AD was sent previously to all known U.S. owners and operators of these helicopters and supersedes Emergency AD 2015-22-52, dated October 28, 2015. This AD requires revising the rotorcraft flight manual (RFM) to stop performing the yaw load compensator check during preflight procedures and instead perform it during post-flight procedures after rotor shut-down. This AD also requires the yaw servo hydraulic switch to be in the ``ON'' position before taking off. This AD is prompted by two accidents and one incident of Airbus Helicopters Model AS350B3 helicopters. From preliminary investigations, loss of tail rotor (T/R) control during takeoff was evident in each event. These actions are intended to prevent takeoff without hydraulic pressure in the T/R hydraulic system, loss of T/R flight control, and subsequent loss of control of the helicopter.