Southwest Airlines, initially combative in the face of a $10.2 million fine from the Federal Aviation Administration for inspection lapses, took a more conciliatory tone on Tuesday.
But the case was another blemish on a Buildings Department that has been reeling from construction deaths and inspection lapses this year, and for which deadly crane accidents are part of a lingering series of problems.
Since then the Buildings Department has been cited for regulatory oversights in connection with demolition work at the former Deutsche Bank building, where two firefighters lost their lives in a blaze that prosecutors tied to inspection lapses by the agency.
In October, the Obama administration expressed concern that if the deadline for a new pact passed and official authority for inspections lapsed, the United States would be unable to monitor the Russian nuclear stockpile.
It would also require the resumption of on-site inspections that lapsed last December when the original Start treaty expired.
It would also resume the on-site inspections that lapsed last December with the expiration of the original Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, or Start.
The treaty, known as New Start, would forbid each country to deploy more than 1,550 strategic warheads and 700 launchers seven years after ratification and resume on-site inspections that lapsed with the original Start treaty last December.
What makes the fierce showdown over this treaty so surprising is that compared with most of its predecessors, it is a relatively modest agreement that mainly resumes on-site inspections that lapsed last year and pares down each side's deployed strategic warheads to 1,550 and deployed launchers to 700.
The treaty, which would force both countries to pare back nuclear arsenals and resume mutual inspections that lapsed last year for the first time since the cold war, is the centerpiece of two of Mr. Obama's signature goals: restoring friendly relations with Russia and putting the world on a path toward eventually eliminating nuclear arms.
The New START would accomplish a 30percentt reduction in strategic deployed nuclear weapons and restart a system of inspections that lapsed when START expired in December 2009.
