Safety ... First???

 

All those with a more or less directly relation with the aviation industry are clear that their main goal is Safety, or at least that's the illusion that authorities and operators want to give to the general public. But sometimes decisions made by Aviation authorities to ensure that everyone is safe in the air leave much to be desired from this safety point.

 

Case # 01 - Boeing 787

Everyone is by now more or less aware of what happened with the "Dreamliner" by Boeing.

Long story short for those who do not have information. About two months ago international authorities, following the example of the Japanese authority, ordered the immediate detention and suspension of flight permits of the 50 Boeing 787 aircraft into service. This decision was taken after successive incidents during the operation of the aircraft, the most critical being a fire aboard an aircraft from JAL (Japan Airlines) at the Boston airport while the plane was ready to leave on a flight, and less than a week later, the emergency landing and subsequent evacuation due to smoke on board and failure of an aircraft electrical system of an ANA (All Nippon Airlines) aircraft.

Both situations were caused by the same component: the aircraft's lithium batteries. And this is where we ask: how is it possible that in the super rigorous certification process a passenger aircraft, no one had been able to determine the true level of risk of these components, or the possibility that they might be the source of fire, smoke or toxic fumes in flight? The answer is simple: complacency by the authority.

And I say complacency because during the investigation of these incidents have arisen comments and evidence that the certification process has a lot to be blamed, because it haven't been done in the most appropriate way. Supervision of this key components have relied excessively on the manufacturer's control processes and I don't see an adequate level of supervision, since in this case the batteries and charging systems have never been tested together but individually.

This clearly would not be a big problem if all or most components were manufactured dictly by Boeing, but this is not the case and these components came from multiple vendors around the world. It is illogical to think that, despite being the components individually certified, it will not be possible to fail when installed together.

And well, that's what happened. Apparently the system was not prepared or tested enough to be sure it do not generate risks during the operation, and the result of that lack of supervision is being paid today by operators who have to deal with the financial loss of having the aircraft grounded, flights canceled and pending expansion processes.

The good news is that a few days ago the FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) initially approved the contingency plan from Boeing to modify the battery system of the aircraft. This will authorize them to install these patches on two aircraft and begin test flights, which will be monitored "very closely" by the FAA to certify the safety of modified and ensure that there is not any possibility fire on board as a result of its operation, and eventually remove the restriction and return the fleet to operation.

 

Case # 02 - knives, bats and other desserts

A few days ago the TSA (Transportation Security Administration), an agency created in the U.S. to prevent attacks using civil aircraft on American soil like those of 9/11, reported that as of April would be reauthorized as part of hand luggage dangerous items such as small knives, baseball bats, sky poles, etc., assuming that these do not represent a greater risk to flight crews of comercial aircraft as these are protected by reinforced doors in the cockpit .

Pardon?, So what about cabin crews that have no protection against unexpected attacks by passengers, or is it that they do not count?

Now flight attendants not only will have to take care of the verbal and physical abuse of drunk or angry passengers, but also from the possibility that one of them in a fit of "air rage" do not stabs or hit them with a bat. Of course, as always, in situations like this airlines can restrict these elements in their cabins, as they may be more restrictive than the norm, but this process would be very cumbersome and expensive.Don't know what logic might be behind this new rule, because I do not understand, but the justification of "improving the transport of passengers and provide more easily checks at points of control" is not enough for me. Moreover, it seems that this "initiative" only serves to "facilitate" the work of the TSA agents, but has no technical justification for its implementation; since it is not taking into account the safety of flight attendants who are the first, and last, line of defense against acts of unlawful interference, sabotage or problematic situations with disruptive passengers in flight.

 

These are the news for this week, hopefully Boeing will solve the 787 problems fast and we will soon have the "Dreamliner" returned to service, but as always keeping an adequate level of safety, primary and supreme end of all our operations.

 

Safe flights!!!

 

How to reduce Human Error and Increase Safety

Thanks to all for your comments, they help me to make this blog better every day.

I have seen lately that there are really great ideas to reduce human error in the aviation industry, but sometimes lack of leadership or interest from the Top Management create a wave of latent conditions that sooner or later will end in a mayor incident or accident.

For me, the are three big items to be considered that will help to increase safety levels inside any operation:

1. TRAINING: Training is the most important defense against human error. You can manage the most complex task or system with proper training. I Feel like the industry and regulators have forgotten that effective and continius training is the key to a safe operation.

But training is not only for the operative personel (pilots, flight dispatchers, mechanics, ATC controllers), Top Management should also be trained in matters such as Human Factors and SMS, so they can interact with the operative personnel and get a better picture about the importance of their decisions in daily operations.

With training we are also able to increase experience and problem solving skills, and those skills will help the human operator to take action, think and take effective decisions if problems affect the operation.

When humans are properly trained and have the required skills to manage technology, the safety of a system is increased and the possibility of mismanaging errors and undesired states is reduced.

2. TECHNOLOGY: Technology is so important nowadays that no one can live withou it. We have technology involved in almost everything, but technology needs to be a tool for the human, not a threat.

When humans have the proper knowledge to use that technology everything goes well, because the he/she is in the capacity of using that technology to reduce workload; having more time to monitor the progress of the flight and increasing the situational awareness levels.

But when technology is not understand, or humans have insufficient training to manage that technology, it will probably have catastrophic results. Just take a look at AF447, those guys were completely lost when the auto pilot disengaged due to unreliable speed, and have no idea of what to do with that particular situation. Humans need to manage technology, but they can't let technology manage them. If technology fails during a flight we can't loose and airplane full of people because of it, we need to take control and fly that aircraft to safe.

In order to use technology as a tool to increase safety, humans need to be properly trained and acquire the required skills to understand that technology and be able to manage it.

3. SAFETY CULTURE: And finally to complete our task we need the proper environment to let humans feed and grow safety inside the system. This can only be done if the required tools are installed and humans have faith and confidence in the safety system.

But to archive this goals we need that Top Management understands and backs changes (and investment) in how safety is managed inside the organization. We also need them to understand that error is a normal component of aircraft operations, and blaming and punishing people won't help to reduce error incidence. That's what we call safety culture.

A strong and reliable safety report system does a lot to help us in this task, but we also need some proactive tools like FDA to acquire data from normal operations. We also need hi skilled personnel in the safety department to analyze and convert that data in safety recommendations, and once again we need Top Management to get involved in this process, and give resources to comply with those safety recommendations.

When Top Management of an organization understands safety as a priority, not as a problem, the system will have the required tools and personnel to create a proactive safety system dedicated to recommend changes to avoid risks.

Those are my five cents, and I will talk deeper about this three concepts in later posts. What is important now is that we all need to help the aviation industry to increase safety, and we also need regulators to understand that the safest way to operate is not always the one big airlines and aircraft manufacturers want, because sometimes they are only aimed to reduce costs.