May 22, 2011 - The Office of Inspector General plans to conduct a follow-up review of Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and industry efforts to enhance safety in response to the 2009 fatal crash of Colgan Air flight 3407. 

OIG will conduct this review at the request of the Ranking Member of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure and the Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on Aviation. 

Several safety initiatives were introduced following the Colgan Air crash through FAA?s Call to Action on Airline Safety and Pilot Training and subsequently became requirements under the Airline Safety and FAA Extension Act of 2010.

The aircraft had been cleared for the ILS Runway 23 approach to the nearby Buffalo Niagara International Airport when it disappeared from radar. Weather conditions were a wintry mix in the area, with light snow, fog, and winds at 17 miles per hour (15 knots).

Two other aircraft reported icing conditions around the time of the crash. The last radio transmission from the flight occurred when the plane was 4.8 kilometres (3.0 mi) northeast of the airport radio beacon known as KLUMP (see diagram), when First Officer Shaw acknowledged a routine instruction to change to tower frequency.

After several attempts to hail the crew, controllers requested the assistance of Delta Air Lines Flight 1998 from Atlanta, GA and US Airways Flight 1452 from Charlotte, NC to make visual contact with the missing airplane; the Delta crew members responded that they did not see the plane.

During the flight and continuing through the plane's landing approach, the crew had been flying on autopilot. The de-icing system was turned on 11 minutes into the flight by the crew, who had discussed significant ice buildup on the aircraft's wings and windscreen shortly before the crash.

Following this, the pilots extended the aircraft's flaps and landing gear for landing. According to the NTSB's official report, after the landing gear and flaps had been extended, the flight data recorder (FDR) indicated that the airspeed had decayed to 145 knots (269 km/h).

The captain, who was the pilot flying, then called for the flaps to be set at the 15 degree position. As the flaps transitioned past the 10 degree mark, the FDR indicated that the airspeed had further slowed to 135 knots (250 km/h). Six seconds later, the aircraft's stick shaker, a device intended to provide aural and tactile awareness of a low speed condition, sounded. At this time the cockpit voice recorder (CVR) recorded the autopilot disengaging.

The FDR now indicated that the aircraft's speed was a dangerously slow 131 knots (243 km/h). Unfortunately, instead of following the established stall recovery procedure of adding full power and lowering the nose to prevent the stall, the captain only added about 75% power and continued applying nose-up inputs. As the aircraft came even closer to stalling the stick pusher activated.

The stick pusher is designed as a last ditch effort to lower the airplane's attitude to fly out of the stall. The captain overrode the pusher and continued pulling on the control yoke resulting in the upset and subsequent loss of control.