The aviation industry has learned a lot from its mistakes and has applied that learning over the decades. Accident investigative work has matured, as has the industry’s ability to capture data to inform those investigations so that they can produce robust mitigations, which have been applied in better technology, procedures and training.
In some areas of the world, and with some aircraft equipment types, we are witnessing a plateau in accident rate improvement curves. It is clear that we have entered an era in which we must look harder for performance improvements, and we must be sure that what we introduce will advance our performance. A growing industry and the travelling public are counting on continual safety improvement.
One of the most potentially significant and impactful developments that may help break through the plateau is the introduction of safety management systems (SMS). Using a performance-based approach to improving safety, combined with gathering releva…
