ORLANDO, FLORIDA – At the last NBAA BACE last November in Orlando, we talked with Susan Lausch, Vice President, Business Operations, Flight Safety Foundation.
Founded in 1947 by Jerome F. “Jerry” Lederer, Flight Safety Foundation has, for nearly 70 years, initiated projects and developed products to reduce risk and improve aviation safety worldwide. Known as ‘Mr. Aviation Safety’, Mr. Lederer, an American aviation-safety pioneer, received a BSC in mechanical engineering with aeronautical options in 1924 and an M.E. in 1925. In 1940, he was appointed as Director of the Civil Aeronautics Board Safety Board before becoming two years later, director of the Airlines War Training Institute. He stayed director of the FSF until 1967.
Since 1947, Flight Safety Foundation has been an independent, non-profit, impartial, international, impartial organization financed by its members exclusively chartered to provide impartial, independent, expert safety guidance and resources for the business and commercial aviation and aerospace industry.
FSF Jon Beatty.
Photo: FSF.
Lead by Jon Beatty, an engineer by trade and president of International Aero Engines before joining the FSF in April 2014, the Foundation is in a unique position to identify global safety issues, set priorities and serve as a catalyst to address these concerns through data collection and information sharing, education, advocacy and communications. The Foundation’s effectiveness in bridging proprietary, cultural and political differences in the common cause of safety has earned worldwide respect. The common good of safer air travel continues to inspire individuals and organizations to rise above competitive interests towards shared objectives.
Today, membership includes more than 1,000 organizations and individuals, OEM, flight departments, business aircraft owners, pilots, airlines, regulatory bodies, companies providing safety products, in 150 countries. About 50% of its membership comes from the business aviation community.
The Foundation which employs eleven people is based in Alexandria, Virginia, in the suburb of Washington, D.C. and has a regional office in Melbourne, Australia.
Since its founding, the Flight Safety Foundation has launched numerous technical initiatives that have contributed to improvements in aviation safety around the world. In addition to organizing the first civil aviation accident investigation workshop and sponsoring the first international air safety seminar, the Foundation is responsible for the first computer modeling of human reactions to accident forces, which led to improved passenger-seat restraints; the first international civil aviation safety-oriented anonymous pilot safety-reporting systems; and worldwide efforts to prevent accidents involving controlled flight into terrain.
5th FSF Safety Forum.
Photo: FSF.
Focusing only on safety issues as the leading voice of safety for the global aviation community, its mission is to:
FSF Susan Lausch.
Photo: FSF.
As underlined by Susan Lausch, VP of business operations, there are many advantages for business aviation to join the Flight Safety Foundation.
The Foundation gives access to members of small flight department to a lot of information on human factor, duty rest guidelines, fatigue management, mental health issues lore easily accessible to large airlines crews ‘We do a number of projects in conjunction with others organizations for everybody in the industry but some are especially focused on business’.
FSF collaborates with the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) as well as with the International Business Aviation Council (IBAC) and sometimes with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and makes the info available industry wide by posting it on the Foundation website and by the means of presentations at FSF seminars.
The financing of the Foundation is made through membership fees and occasionally through grants from organizations like the FAA for making research in house or not on their behalf. With a staff of only eleven people, the FSF relies on its board or committee members who will volunteer their time to work on those projects.
3rd SASS.
Photo: FSF.
The Foundation is not in any case a lobby organization because it is totally
impartial and one of its strong points is to bring competitors together to discuss safety issues. FSF does not endorse any company or any product but will issue recommendations according to what is best for the industry. It is not a rulemaking body but proposes guidelines to rulemaking bodies like the FAA or ICAO.
FSF mains issues for business aviation are:
Go-Around Safety
About 96 or 97% of approaches are stable but 3 or 4% are unstable but do not end up in a go-around. In these cases, the pilot either thought they could land or because they were getting pressure from the back of the cockpit or because the rule for an unstable approach are too strict.
In 2008, the Foundation’s International Advisory Committee (IAC) received a briefing about concerns that go-arounds often were not being conducted when an unstable approach occurred below the stable approach height. The ensuing discussion concluded in an agreement that the issue should be studied further and monitored. Interestingly, the Foundation’s European Advisory Committee (EAC) began its own discussion related to go-arounds, the lack of unstable approach policy compliance, the risk of the go-around maneuver itself, and what effect air traffic services providers could have on the issue. These discussions led the Foundation to look more deeply into the empirical data supporting such concerns.
Based on further analyses, better awareness of the problem, and new questions, Flight Safety Foundation initiated the Go-Around Decision-Making and Execution Project in 2011. It was designed as a joint EAC and IAC project, with each committee focusing on one specific aspect of the issue; the IAC focused on go-around decision making and the EAC focused on the execution of the go-around. As part of the initiative, the FSF Go-Around Safety Forum was held on June 18, 2013, at Eurocontrol Headquarters in Brussels.
Resources are available on the web for more information about go-arounds and the research that is being done to understand the human factors side of the decision-making process like SKYbrary and its Go-Around page. Several articles on go-arounds and the Foundation’s project have been published in AeroSafety World.
The final report on the Foundation’s Go-Around Decision Making and Execution Project is due to be published late in 2016.
Fatigue Management.
For decades, Flight Safety Foundation has taken a leading role in fatigue management projects
FSF collaborated with ICAO and the International Business Aviation Council (IBAC) in presenting and publicizing the Fatigue Management Guide for General Aviation Operators of Large and Turbojet Aeroplanes, which is available for download on the FSF website. The Fatigue Management Guide is based on the work of the ICAO Fatigue Risk Management Systems Task Force and includes input from experts with experience in general aviation operations. The 96-page document is intended to familiarize GA operators with contemporary concepts of fatigue management and to provide guidance for implementation in day-to-day operations. In addition, FSF participated in the Fatigue Management Approaches Symposium and the FRMS (fatigue risk management system) Forum’s Conference at ICAO headquarters in Montréal in early April.
In 2014, the Foundation, working with the National Business Aviation Association, released Duty/Rest Guidelines 2014 for Business Aviation, an updated version of a 1997 document produced by the FSF Fatigue Countermeasures Task Force.
Safety Information Protection.
There is significant variation in the degree to which safety information is protected, legally, within and across various jurisdictions around the world. FSF is involved with the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) Safety Information Protection Task Force to assist in addressing this issue. The Foundation will also be working on separate projects aimed at developing a legal framework for the protection of safety information, per the guidance provided in ICAO Attachment E to Annex 13, and a legal toolkit to assist states create voluntary safety reporting systems. Information protection also will be addressed in the toolkits being developed as part of GSIP.
Global Safety Information Project (GSIP).
GSIP is an unprecedented multiyear effort to gain a comprehensive understanding of the state of aviation data collection, sharing and analysis in two key regions, Asia-Pacific and Pan-America, and to develop toolkits that will include strategies for getting the most from safety data collection and analysis processes.
‘A couple years ago FAA came to the Foundation to take the lead on Global Safety Information Project’ said Susan Lausch, ‘because the Foundation was well suited to conduct the surveyas an honest broker.’
The Foundation hosted a dozen or so focus groups throughout Pan America and the Asia-Pacific regions in 2015 to collect information, plus a like number of workshops earlier this year to discuss project findings and to get feedback on preliminary toolkit ideas.
The project aims to ascertain what types of safety data are being collected within the regions, what systems are used to collect and store that data and how this information is used to assist with improving aviation safety. Big data is here and GSIP is designed to help the aviation industry around the world harness this information and make the safest mode of transportation even safer.
As underlined by Lausch, ‘We are not taking their data. The goal is to give other regions of the world the kind of tools so they could share the same way that we are doing and give to other regions the kind of tools we use in the US’.
In 2015, the project’s first year, FSF conducted focus groups in 12 cities across the two regions to collect information. With the focus groups FSF began drafting a toolkit and to planning a series of 13 workshops during which FSF shared its ideas for GSIP toolkits, which included methods for getting the most out of safety data collection and analysis processes. The feedback from the workshops will be important in building the final version of the toolkits that are scheduled to be completed by the end of the year. Their content will be shared and further refined in 2017.
According to madam Lausch, a business aircraft manufacturer or an business aircraft operator will benefit for joining FSF even if they are flying a small number of aircraft. By themselves, they may be unable to learn from their mistakes through data because they are generating too little.
Pilot mental health.
Since the Germanwings Flight 9525 Airbus A320 crash into the Alps deliberately caused by the suicide of the copilot, Andreas Lubitz on March, the 24th, 2015, pilot mental health has become more widely recognized. Some of the FSF members who are doctors are focusing on this problem and gave presentations on it.
Lithium Battery Flight Crew Guidance.
The FSF published a document on the transportation of lithium batteries in aircraft as well in crew and passengers electronics devices and in the cargo.
Business Aviation.
Many years ago, the FSF established the Business Advisory Committee
(BAC) as a conduit for informing the Foundation about key existing and
emerging safety risks within the business aviation community.
At this time, the BAC is working on:
Library.
The Jerry Lederer Aviation Safety Library was created by Flight Safety Foundation as an independent source of aviation safety information for FSF members, as well as the news media and the public.
Publications
The FSF produces a journal titled AeroSafety World available electronically for all FSF members as well as executives at air carriers, maintenance organizations, industry manufacturers and suppliers, and civil aviation authorities.
Besides AeroSafety World, the Foundation from time to time takes on a big theme and examines it top to bottom. Some have been published as special issues of ASW, others as stand-alone productions. Some have been commissioned from outside sources and issued as part of an industry initiative.
Awards
The FSF gives out, administers or facilitates annual awards to recognize individual achievements and group achievements in aviation safety, as well as heroism by civil aircraft crewmembers or ground personnel. Many of the awards are named in honor of past heroes and presidents.
The Laura Taber Barbour Air Safety Award
Joe Chase Award
FSF Cecil A. Brownlow Publication Award
The Richard Teller Crane Founder’s Award
FSF President’s Citation
FSF – Airbus Human Factors in Aviation Safety
FSF – Boeing Aviation Safety Lifetime Achievement Award
FSF Business Aviation Meritorious Service Award
Several other awards given over the decades have been discontinued and archived.
Events.
In partnership with other safety authorities, FSF presents two annual summits: the International Air Safety Summit (IASS) and the Business Aviation Safety Summit (BASS). FSF also organizes and sponsors smaller, regional safety events throughout the year.
Last month, on November 15th and 16th, the 69th annual International Air Safety Summit or IASS 2016, the Foundation’s largest event of the year, was held in Dubai and hosted by Emirates Airlines.
Next March, the 3rd annual Singapore Aviation Safety Seminar or SASS 2017 will be held from March the 28th to the 30th, 2017, at the Singapore Aviation Academy in partnership with this Academy which has a seat on the FSF Board.
On May 4th and the 5th, the 62nd Business Aviation Safety Safety Summit or BASS 2017 will be held at the Sheraton Wild Horse Pass in Phoenix, Arizona.
The 2017 Safety Forum co-hosted by the Flight Safety Foundation, EuroControl, and the European Regional Airline Association, will take place in Brussels, Belgium on June 6th and 7th.
In Washington DC, on July 20th, the FSF will present his 5th Annual Networking Dinner and Silent Auction.
Finally, from October 23rd to 26th, will take place the 70th Annual International Air Safety Summit or IASS 2017 hosted by Aer Lingus in Dublin, Ireland.
Diplômé universitaire en histoire, journalisme et relations publiques, en 1993, Philippe Cauchi amorce une carrière de journalisme, analyste et consultant en aérospatiale. En 2013, il fonde avec Daniel Bordeleau, le site d’information aérospatial Info Aéro Québec.
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