A spate of recent accidents and serious incidents has raised awareness of the increased risk involved in nonrevenue flight operations and has spurred action to address those risks. Nonrevenue flights, also called nonroutine or nonstandard flights, include functional check flights, ferry and positioning flights, and training flights.
In the past decade, about 25 percent of turbine aircraft accidents occurred during nonrevenue flights, according to the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). A similar figure emerged from studies performed by a Flight Safety Foundation task force that examined approach and landing accident data in the late 1990s. The safety specialists found that although non-passenger-carrying flights represented only about 5 percent of the flights conducted by commercial operators, they accounted for 25 percent of the 287 fatal approach and landing accidents that occurred from 1980 to 1996.
In February, a symposium organized by the Foundation to examine functi…
