UDC 629.735:656.71.06:621.31 (045)

S.S. Devyatkina, candidate of technical sciences (National aviation university, Ukraine)

THE CONCEPTION OF FLIGHT SAFETY MANAGEMENT FOR CIVIL AVIATION AIRPORTS

The conception of flight safety management for civil aviation airports based on risk modeling is suggested. Main advantages of the implementation of this conception for civil aviation airports are considered and analyzed.

Nowadays flight safety in civil aviation is the most important task of government aviation branch worldwide. In spite of all efforts spent on achieving zero accidents and incidents level, they are happening with different types of aircraft in different countries. That is why the aviation experts of world famous organizations such as ICAO, IATA, FSF, FAA made the conclusion that the existing approach to flight safety providing became not effective and does not satisfy modern demands to aviation transportation. According to last ICAO standards and recommended practice [1, 2] the new concept of flight safety must be implemented in aviation practice of whole world.

The main sense of this new concept is that only flight safety providing approach is not enough and it must be changed by safety management approach. Safety management approach has to be implemented on two levels – government policy level and in all civil aviation organizations such as airlines, aerodromes, aviation service and factories, aviation educational institutions. Practically the new safety management approach is realized as Safety Management System.

The Safety Management System is a systematic approach to managing safety, including the necessary organizational structures, accountabilities, policies and procedures. There are three main aspects of Safety Management System:

  • Systematicof activity – safety management activities is based on pre-determined plan, which takes into account the individual features of organization.
  • Pro-activeapproach – an approach that emphasizes hazard identification and risks control before negative events that affect safety occur.
  • Transparency of activity – all safety management activities are documented and visible.

In order to understand safety management, it is necessary to consider what is meant by safety. The previous definition of flight safety was the follow. Flight safety is a ability of aviation transport system that provides passengers and cargo transportation without hazards for human life’s and health. While the elimination of accidents and serious incidents would be desirable, a one hundred per cent safety rate is an unachievable goal. Unfortunately it is impossible to create human-machine system free from technical failures and human errors, hence free from any risk.

The new definition of flight safety recommended by ICAO standards [2] is the next. Safety is the state in which the risk of harm to persons or of property damage isreduced to, and maintained at or below, an acceptable level through a continuing process of hazard identification and risk management.

Safety management system is based on risk control conception. However it is impossible to control something having no possibility to measure it. That is why the risk control process consists of the next steps:

  • risks definition –at all stages of technological process, which creates risk;
  • risks normalizing – having normalized values of risk for risk assessment procedure;
  • risk assessment – to make a conclusion about risk acceptability;
  • risk prognostication – to make the forecast about risk’s level in the future.

This report is devoted to Safety Management System implementation in civil aviation airports.

There are special requirements in the last edition of ICAO standards and recommended practice [1] concerning the necessity of creating an effective Safety Management Systemsin every civil aviation airport.

These demands form the normative basis and powerful aid for creating an effective system for controlling risk on every civil aviation airport. It is necessaryimplement Safety Management System in aerodromes because these organizations provide very important flight safety stages – taxiing, take-off, final approach and landing. The activity of every airport should provide the minimum risk during every stage of flight and create maximum comfortable conditions for the aircraft’s crew.

Statistics data show that most accidents and incidents occur during take-off, approach and landing. All these parts of flight are fulfilled in the aerodrome zone (Pict. 1). This picture demonstrates that about 55% of accidents/incidents are happened during the flight which takes 6% of the whole flight time. These statistics proves the importance and necessity of risk controlling by implementation of modern Safety Management System.


Source: Statistical Summary of Commercial Jet Airplane Accidents, 1959 - 2008, Boeing

Picture 1. Accidents and Fatalities by Phase of Flight

Civil aviation airport or even aerodrome is a branchy organization which contains aviation personal, different equipment, normative documents and rules, areas of responsibilities, special bureaucratic structure. Safety Management System must become a significant part of airport’s structure and take all responsibilities connecting with risk control function.

The main idea of risk concept is that the safety is considered as a condition under which the risk of harm or damage is not equal to zero but limited to an acceptable level. The safety hazards creating risk may become evident after an obvious breach of safety, which may be classified as an accident or incident. This approach is retroactive and archaic and it may not be used anymore. In modern approach risk must be proactively identified through formal safety management programs before an actual safety event occurs.

After the identification of safety hazard, the associated risks must be assessed and made the conclusion about its acceptability. If the risk level is not acceptable, i.e. its value is more than normalized value, it is necessary to develop some effective actions to reduce risk’s value and make it in compliance with standard values.

Picture 2 demonstrates the triangle of risk’s acceptability. This triangle shows the correlation between acceptable, not acceptable and minimally achieved risk.

One of the main tasks of Safety Management System of civil aviation airport is by analyzing costs and profits connecting with flight safety providing make all risk levels acceptable or minimally achieved.

Picture 2. Triangle of risk

The Conception of flight safety management for civil aviation airports suggested in this report provides the risks identification method based on the mathematical approach as an alternative approach to the method of expert estimation and risk matrix.

Conclusions

The advantages of mathematical approach are: the higher accuracy, clearness and the possibility to reduce risk level at every stage of its creation. This mathematical approach requires the creation of mathematic models of risks for take-off, taxiing, final approach and landing.

These models consider all potential safety hazards may be created by each aerodrome departments. The transparency of these risks models provides the possibility of development the defense at every necessary stage of flight providing process hence reducing risks values.

Literature

1.. Annex 14 to the Convention of International Civil Aviation Organization.Aerodromes.Vol. 1. Aerodrome Design and Operations, in 2 vol. / edit. 5, july 2009.

2. Doc 9859. Safety Management Manual (SMM). - 2nd edit. – 2009., AN/474.International Civil Aviation Organization.