FAA Lowers Mexico’s Air-Safety Rating

The FAA said its Mexican counterpart, the Agencia Federal de Aviación Civil, fell short of international standards. The FAA said it would help Mexican aviation authorities improve their safety oversight.

An FAA official said the agency’s concerns included political independence, training and compensation at Mexico’s air-safety regulator.

A senior official from Mexico’s Transport and Communications Ministry said Monday that the FAA’s audit started in October and found 28 issues with the country’s air-safety oversight. The official said Mexico had worked to address those issues and is hiring and training 280 inspectors in response to the audit.

Mexico’s Communications and Transport Ministry said the country’s civil aviation agency would work with the FAA to recover its Category 1 rating promptly and that flights by Mexican carriers are safe.

“Domestic airlines currently operate with high levels of security and quality of service, comparable with the international standards of any airline that flies to the U.S.,” the ministry said.

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said Monday that he didn’t think Mexico’s air safety should be downgraded and that Mexico had been meeting its requirements. “Those who benefit when there is a decision like this are the U.S. airlines,” he said. “They’re the ones that benefit, and it could hurt domestic airlines.”

As a result of the downgrade, plans for which The Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday, Mexican airlines operating to and from the U.S. such as Volaris and Grupo Aeromexico SAB de CV won’t be able to add service to U.S. cities at a time when travel between the two countries has exceeded pre-pandemic levels.

Other countries with a Category 2 air-safety rating include Ghana, Malaysia and Pakistan, according to the FAA. The U.S. has far more flights between it and Mexico than any other Category 2 country, according to aviation-data provider Ascend by Cirium.

The downgrade also will restrict marketing deals between U.S. and Mexican airlines, such as code-share arrangements between Aeromexico and Delta Air Lines Inc. and Frontier Airlines ’ pact with Volaris.

Aeromexico’s shares fell 5.9% on Tuesday on the Mexican stock exchange, while shares of Volaris declined 1.6%. Frontier’s shares slipped 0.1% in the U.S. and Delta’s stock rose 1.1%.

A Delta spokesman said the downgrade wouldn’t affect the airline’s operations into Mexico, and that it may automatically reissue any reservations for customers booked on code-share flights operated by Aeromexico.

Aeromexico said the downgrade wouldn’t affect its flights to and from the U.S., or tickets and reservations. “Safety is our maximum priority, and we will continue to operate under the highest international standards,” the airline said, adding that it is ready to assist Mexican aviation authorities in working to return to Category 1 status.

Volaris said it would maintain its level of operations in the U.S. but focus on domestic growth in Mexico and other countries where it can add service. The carrier said it would work with Mexican authorities to help restore the country’s higher safety ranking.

Low-cost carrier Viva Aerobus said it maintains the highest safety standards and that its routes to the U.S., which account for 14% of its operations, won’t be affected by the downgrade. Like Volaris, Viva Aerobus said its growth plan is largely focused on the domestic market.

Mexico’s National Air Transport Chamber, a trade group representing airlines and other companies involved in the industry, said the downgrade would have a severe impact on the recovery of domestic airlines at a time when Mexico’s most important foreign market for air travel—the U.S.—is picking up. It called on Mexican authorities to urgently take the “technical, human and budget measures” needed to return to Category 1.

The U.S. previously downgraded Mexico’s air-safety oversight in 2010 before restoring its Category 1 status several months later, following various steps to correct regulatory lapses.

Mexico has remained open to U.S. tourists throughout the Covid-19 pandemic and became the largest international destination from the U.S. through much of the past year as global air traffic plummeted.

More than 2.3 million passengers flew nonstop between the two countries last month, with four times as many seats being flown in May compared with the second-ranked U.K.-Spain market, according to aviation-data provider OAG.

Air travel to Mexico has picked up this year after income from foreign tourists fell by 56% in 2020 to $9.2 billion and the number of visitors arriving by air fell by 57% to 8.4 million, according to Mexico’s National Statistics Institute. In 2019, before the pandemic, the 19.6 million visitors who flew in spent some $19.7 billion, according to the institute.

Write to Andrew Tangel at [email protected] and Anthony Harrup at [email protected]