Aviation Safety: Slow and Steady Wins the Race Continued from page 67 The safety improvements that got us to this incredible record did not happen by increased enforce- ment actions and notches on FAA safety inspectors’ belts. Progress has come from a deliberate and proven approach to addressing risk through information sharing, analyzing data for accident precursors and then, making changes before the precursors rise to a level of an incident or event. While the FAA absolutely has enforcement procedures in its compli- ance toolbox, they should not be the “go to” for inspectors in most situa- tions. Don’t get me wrong, as a former regulator I am a firm believer in using enforcement actions to address blatant disregard of the regulations and intentional non-compliance. However, I also subscribe to the FAA’s Compliance Philosophy of identifying safety issues that are devi- ations from the regulations and cor- recting them. The goal is to enhance the safety performance of individuals and organizations. Neither the FAA nor industry can achieve that goal if you follow the knee-jerk actions so often called for after an incident. The same is true with the SWA accident. The industry will pay atten- tion to the NTSB report and look for ways to implement the recom- mendations, just as we have done before—repeating the pattern of investigation and analysis that has led to so many critical safety improve- ments. The FAA’s Lessons Learned Library shows how hard lessons from the past have been used by aviation professionals to identify key factors and take measures to prevent another accident from occurring under similar circumstances, or for similar reasons. 68 The following are three accidents that significantly changed the way the FAA, manufacturers, operators, and maintainers conduct business and comply with the regulations: The ValuJet accident in 1996 led to the complete overhaul of the FAA’s oversight process to develop the Air Transportation Oversight System (ATOS) based on system safety princi- ples and risk management. It encom- passes continuous improvement and the FAA’s own Safety Management System (SMS) to create a more mature safety assurance system that the FAA uses to conduct oversight. The Alaska Airlines MD-80 that crashed near Point Mugu, California in 2000 resulted in the FAA and industry coming together to make huge steps in aviation safety infor- mation sharing. Programs such as Service Difficulty Reporting (SDR), the Aviation Safety Reporting System (ASRS), the Voluntary Disclosure Reporting Program (VDRP) and Aviation Safety Action Program (ASAP), have all grown and improved to support the FAA’s Aviation Safety Information Analysis and Sharing (ASIAS) program. ASIAS connects approximately 185 data and information sources across government and industry to track and identify precursors, as well as monitor the effectiveness of deployed safety enhancements. Finally, the Colgan Air crash in February 2009, the last fatal accident in U.S. commercial aviation until this year, brought great pressure to bear on the FAA and industry about pilot professionalism and whether pilots receive sufficient experience in a mul- ticrew environment. The investigation highlighted questions about whether a pilot acting as second-in-command (SIC) should be held to the same training and flight-hour requirements as one acting as pilot-in-command (PIC), and whether a pilot’s overall academic training and quality of flight training were as important as the total number of flight hours. This accident resulted in industry and the FAA producing safety recom- mendations that, ultimately, resulted in a final rule to address training requirements for air carrier pilots. These are just three examples of industry and the FAA respond- ing to tragedy and improving safety. The point to remember is that all of this takes time. It takes critical thinking, analyzing all the facts and identifying risks to develop the best mitigations to maintain the best com- mercial safety record in the world. Just like the tortoise and the hare, slow and steady wins the race. It does no one any good to act without all due investigation and consider- ation, which can lead to unfortu- nate, unintended consequences. Every day, the professionals at NATA, and its committees that represent maintenance, safety and charter and fixed base opera- tions, work with our members, other associations and the FAA to contribute to aviation safety. Every day, you make a difference. Carol E. Giles is President of The Giles Group, global aviation consul- tants. Previously, Giles led the FAA’s aviation maintenance division. Aviation Business Journal | 2nd Quarter 2018
