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14 COMMUNICATING FOR SAFETY • 2023 Jennifer Homendy Chair, National Transportation Safety Board N ATCA is pleased that National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Chair Jennifer Homendy will address CFS 2023. The NTSB is an independent federal agency charged by Congress with investigating every civil aviation accident in the United States and significant events in other modes of transportation. As the agency's chief executive, she manages an annual budget of about $129.3 million and more than 411 full-time employees across the country. She is the fourth woman to serve as Chair since the agency was created in 1967. Chair Homendy has used her national platform to advocate for the implementation of NTSB safety recommendations. She often speaks about the need for a holistic approach to managing safety, preventing crashes and injuries, and saving lives— an approach that has proved successful in commercial passenger aviation. It has been a priority for Chair Homendys to ensure the NTSB's readiness to carry out its mission amid rapid technological advancement in all modes of transportation, including advanced driver assist systems, automated vehicles, commercial space transportation, uncrewed aircraft systems, advanced air mobility, supersonic aircraft, high-speed ground transportation, and clean energy sources to fuel vehicles. In aviation, Chair Homendy is focused on addressing NTSB's long history of concerns with the safety of revenue passenger-carrying aviation operations, including parachute jump flights as well as sightseeing flights conducted in hot air balloons, helicopters, and other aircraft — that are not subject to the same maintenance, airworthiness, and operational requirements as other commercial flight operations. Chair Homendy is focused on ensuring that commercial aviation in the United States continues to be held to the highest standards of safety. While a Member of the Board, Chair Homendy reviewed and debated recommendations that would ensure that the National Air Space continues to be the safest in the world and that lessons are learned from every fatality, injury, or near miss that the NTSB has investigated. Earlier in her career, Chair Homendy worked at the Transportation Trades Department (TTD) of the AFL-CIO, where she spearheaded transportation labor's efforts to reauthorize the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA) and the USDOT hazardous materials safety program. Speaker Spotlight

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