By Chris Oswald
On Jan 11, I had the opportunity to attend a session at the Transportation Research Board’s annual conference that was focused on airport safety management systems (SMS). Airport SMS has been a significant FAA initiative over the last 18 months.
Keri Lynn Spencer, who is managing the FAA’s “external” airport SMS program, provided an update regarding the FAA Office of Airports’ SMS program. During this discussion, Keri noted that the FAA still has not determined whether airport SMS will undergo a formal rulemaking process. She added that if FAA decides to pursue rulemaking, a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) would likely be issued for public and industry comment in late Calendar Year 2010.
Heidi Benniman followed Ms. Spencer with a practically-focused discussion of the lessons her firm—the Faith Group—learned when it assisted three U.S. airports with SMS implementation. During her presentation, Ms. Benniman emphasized two points that I feel are worth repeating:
- Common definitions of consequences and the probability of occurrence of potential hazards are needed early in an SMS process are essential to effectively characterizing airport hazards and prioritizing mitigating actions.
- Differences in airport facility characteristics, hazards, safety valuations and perceptions make it difficult to establish a “one-size-fits-all” SMS for airports. Rather SMS programs at airports need to be developed taking into account local airport realities and stakeholder concerns.
A common element in both of these points is the need to involve stakeholders directly in the development of airport SMS.
Darreyl Adams concluded the presentation with a discussion of the FAA Air Traffic Organization’s safety risk analysis process.
Unfortunately, what seemed to be missing from all of these discussions was a description of the data that ought to be collected and evaluated—both at individual airports and throughout the aviation system—regarding the consequences and frequency of airport accidents, incidents, and accident/incident precursors. Absent these data, it seems to me that many SMS-driven capital and operational decisions will be heavily based on incomplete anecdotal information or subjective opinions, rather than on facts. Also missing from this discussion were descriptions about how SMS initiatives can operate together with regulatory requirements, particularly those contained in 14 CFR Part 139. Finally, there was very little discussion of how much airport deployment of SMS will cost.