Three years after death at airport, mother is still waiting for answers

By DEBBIE MESSINA
The Virginian-Pilot

NORFOLK - Jeanne Earley checks a federal investigators' Web site daily, hoping for closure three years after her daughter was killed while working at the airport.

Every day, she longs to see that the inquiry has ended and to know, finally, what really happened.

Every day, she is disappointed.

Denise Bogucki, a customer service agent for Northwest Airlines for 13 years, was crushed against the nose of an airplane at Norfolk International Airport as she prepared it for takeoff on Sept. 12, 2003.

A National Transportation Safety Board investigation originally blamed Bogucki, but officials reopened the case when it became clear that inaccurate information was used to reach that finding.

That was more than a year and a half ago.

"It's never going to end for me," said Earley, an executive assistant in the airport's administrative office. "But it would be nice to have this part of it over with and settled once and for all."

It doesn't help that a September issue of a Northwest newsletter referred to two recent accidents that resulted in "potentially life-threatening injuries" while doing the same job Bogucki was doing when she was killed.

Safety board spokesman Keith Holloway said last week that the investigation of Bogucki's death would be complete "before the end of the year, if not sooner." He added that the agency is not investigating the recent accidents.

Earley's heard it all before. About this time last year, the agency said it would finish by the end of 2005.

"I don't know if they're afraid to address it because of big business," she said. "We're just the little guys, and they're dragging her through the mud again."

The original investigation found that Bogucki, 43, made a decision to use "improper equipment" to push back an airplane from the gate, causing the accident that pinned her against the plane.

Bogucki was driving a small tractor called a push-back tug when she was killed. The report said there were two tugs and two tow bars to choose from, and that she used a tow bar that was too short. A tow bar is a long, straight bar that connects the tug to the plane's front-wheel assembly

Union officials contend that she was using the only equipment Northwest provided to do the job - that the airline had just one push-back tug, and that only one of the two tow bars would fit the DC-9 plane at the gate.

As a result, the investigation is "being reevaluated due to new information," according to agency records.

"It's like there's no value to human life," said Bob Bennek, safety and health director of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers Air Transport District 143, which includes Norfolk.

"You would think a fatality would get some type of resolution sooner than this," Bennek said. "The family deserves to have a resolution."

Earley would like to see the new NTSB report address staffing at the time her daughter was killed.

Bogucki was trying, alone, to do a job that many in the industry say takes two to do safely. Before she died, Northwest workers had complained that staffing cutbacks had jeopardized safety.

Airline spokesman Roman Blahoski said Northwest is still "deeply saddened" by Bogucki's death and that it has spurred the company to "overstress the importance of safety."

Shortly after the accident, Northwest began requiring two people for push-backs. The airline also replaced the open-cab tug used in the accident with a closed-cab tug. And the airline began installing protective roll bars on all of its tugs nationwide.

The airline is contesting a Virginia Occupational Safety and Health Administration ruling that fined Northwest $6,300 for a "serious" violation of workplace safety laws as a result of Bogucki's accident. The maximum penalty for that violation is $7,000.

Virginia OSHA officials say the case is pending. Northwest, however, says the case is closed and no fines were assessed.

State safety officials wrote that Northwest failed to provide a work environment that was "free from recognized hazards that were causing or likely to cause death or serious physical harm." They also stated that employees were exposed to crushing hazards while conducting aircraft push-back operations.

"Our investigation showed it to be an accident and not the result of a violation of OSHA standards," Blahoski said.

The two recent accidents mentioned in the Northwest newsletter also occurred "during the push-back of an aircraft." The newsletter said two employees "suffered injuries, one of which was serious."

Blahoski said the accidents, which occurred over the past few months, were different from Bogucki's because they injured ground crew members, not the driver of the push-back tug.

He said an internal investigation concluded that proper procedure was not followed in one case and that the other is still under review.

Bennek, the machinists union's health and safety director, would like to see the safety board issue recommendations for making push-backs safer, including specifying push-back tractor designs, tow bar lengths and inspections criteria.

"They could make some findings that could forever change the industry," he said.

For more than a year after her daughter's death, Earley faced looking out over the flight line and ramps every day in her job in the airport's administrative office.

"I was planning on working another year, until I was 65," she said, "but I truly could not stand it anymore."