Aviation Safety and Modern Challenges

This assignment delves into the critical topic of aviation safety within the context of contemporary technological advancements. It examines the evolving landscape of aviation safety regulations, highlighting the complexities of implementing and enforcing these rules in an increasingly interconnected world. The discussion extends to human factors influencing aviation safety, exploring how cognitive biases, fatigue, and training effectiveness contribute to potential hazards. Furthermore, it analyzes the role of automation and emerging technologies in shaping aviation safety, considering both the benefits and risks associated with their integration. The assignment emphasizes the importance of effective risk management strategies for mitigating threats and ensuring the continued safety of air travel.

Running head: AVIATION SAFETY SYSTEMS
Aviation Safety Systems
(Challenger Spacecraft)
Name of the student:
Name of the university:
Author Note

1AVIATION SAFETY SYSTEMS
Executive summary
The report is developed to highlight the fact that a fully imposed system of safety management aids
the organizations to create and maintain the safety culture positively. It has demonstrated a literature
review the Challenger Spacecraft Disaster with the importance of safety culture within the safety
management system. The study analyzes the literature review, the methodologies and incorporated
real-life examples supporting the answer to the queries.

2AVIATION SAFETY SYSTEMS
Table of Contents
Introduction:..........................................................................................................................................2
Literature review:...................................................................................................................................2
The background:................................................................................................................................2
The importance of the safety culture:................................................................................................4
Importance of Human Factors and Organizational Factors on the evolution of safety culture:........7
Methodologies followed:.......................................................................................................................8
Critical analysis and discussion:............................................................................................................9
Conclusion and recommendations:......................................................................................................11
References:..........................................................................................................................................12

3AVIATION SAFETY SYSTEMS
Introduction:
The SMS or the Safety Management System is the explicit and systematic method to define
the tasks by which the safety management is done by any organization. This helps in achieving the
tolerable or acceptable safety. On 28th January 1986, OV-99, the tenth flight of the Space Shuttle
Challenger broke apart with the NASA shuttle orbiter named STS-51-L. It killed some crew
members consisting of astronauts and payload experts (NASA, 2017).
The aim of the report is to highlight the fact that a fully imposed system of safety
management aids the organizations to create and maintain the safety culture positively. The report
refers to the process of the engine as the “positive safety culture” in any organization by developing
particular cultural elements.
The report has demonstrated a literature review the Challenger Spacecraft Disaster with the
importance of safety culture within the safety management system. It has discussed the significance
of both the organizational and human factors in the evolution of the safety culture. In has undergone
through an effective analysis literature review, the methodologies and incorporated real-life
examples to support the answer to the queries.
Literature review:
The importance of the safety culture:
Various organizations have been developing the different procedures and policies about the
safety and health at the workplace like Chittaro and Buttussi (2015) writes. Those procedures and
policies have been a response to the myriad of the federal and myriad laws requiring the compliance

4AVIATION SAFETY SYSTEMS
the legislative initiatives. However, they have been evolving from the real effort on the part of
various organizations for providing the safe and healthful environment for work.
As the intentions are positive in various situations the developing of the written health and
the safety programs has been contributing the less and fewer severe occupational accidents. Various
organizations have possessed the paper safety measures and the programs of loss control. This
indicates that the written programs have been in place for complying with the regulations imposed.
However, according to Rungta et al. (2013) only a little has been done for fostering the truly
effective safety culture under the organization. For developing the safety culture the organizations
must integrate the written safety and the various health programs within their regular operating
processes influencing the behavior of the employees. Various researchers have shown that most of
the accidents at the workplace have been because of the unsafe acts. Through concentrating on the
unsafe behaviors the organizations have been capable of generating the quick and the tangible
decrease in the accident severity and frequency. This kind of approaches has been the entailing a
shift to the more active stance in the way of safety. This is not the usual reactive approach where the
accident cause is determined. However, less has been done to alter the behaviors that cause the
accidents.
The space shuttle accident of Challenger at NASA has been the devastating tragedy killing
many astronauts. It shocked the world at that time. The event turned out to be one of the most
important events of that year as it was viewed by many on television as mentioned in (Disaster,
2017). Moreover, it empathized with more of the several crewmembers who were killed. Hence the
effect to develop the safety culture must not be underestimated. As various procedures and policies
were been looking good at the paper, they were not enough incorporated to the regular operations
and then consistently reinforced. They have been likely turning out to be ineffective. Using the

5AVIATION SAFETY SYSTEMS
above instance of the space-shuttle it is seen that the safety culture was needed to be included in the
general operating practices along with the minimum extra burden perceived. NASA has developed
the safety culture now and effectively realized the tangible and fast outcomes in decreasing the
accidents and its related expenses. This also included the decrease in productivity, the morale of the
employees and the rise of hiring and training costs. Similar to the safety programs Tanguy et al.
(2016) discusses that the visible commitment by the senior management to the program has been the
gateway to the success. Further, the commitment should be communicated at every level of the
companies.
SMS or Safety Management System has now evolved as the continuous development in the
safety in aviation. At the earlier stages the pioneers possessed few safety regulations, engineering
knowledge or practical experiences for guiding them, Over the time the proper and careful regulation
in the activities of aviation, development of technologies and operational experiences have
contributed a huge in safety. While the improvement in safety has been undergoing a major shift, the
concentration on a single individual and the performance of the crew or the “Human Factors”
reduced the accidents further.
Ornato and Peberdy (2014) clears that every approach has made vital gains in terms of safety.
Despite all these important developments, there are many scopes to take safety preventive measures
against those accidents. Thus the question for the aviation community is what should be the
following step.
Careful analysis at NASA has typically revealed various scopes of actions breaking the
sequence of events and preventing the accidents possibly. Those scopes denote the role of NASA in
preventing accidents. Organizational accident describes the accidents having casual factors that are

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related to the attitudes and decisions taken by organizations like NASA. The safety management
system has been the approach for NASA to take safety to the organizational level.
The safety management system needed NASA to examine their operations and all the
decisions across their operations. The system has allowed NASA to adopt the changes, rise in
complexity and the limited resources. The SMS, moreover, has promoted the consistent
improvement of safety by particular methods for predicting the hazards from the data collection and
the report of the employees. NASA then used the data to examine, analyze and control the risks
(Chen, Yang and Chang 2014). Some section of the procedure also included the monitoring of the
controls and the system regarding effectiveness. The SMS has also helped the companies to comply
with the current regulations through predicting the requirements for the future action through sharing
the information and knowledge. Lastly, Davies and Delaney (2017) ensure that the safety
management system necessities also improved the safety attitudes of NASA through changing the
safety culture in terms of management, employees, and leadership. Every change is designed to help
NASA incorporate all the three forms of rationale. They are the predictive, proactive and reactive
thinking.
Yeun, Bates and Murray (2014) highlights that the reactive risk management has been used
as the based strategy in the new SMS programs lacking the requisite safety data for practicing.
Moreover, it is utilized in response to the safety events and in dealing with the threats leading to the
operating environment at a glance. The proactive strategy has been used best to determine the
potential challenges prior to the occurrence of risks like when the threats emerge or the hazards rise
in severity. While trying to make sense of the inputs in a program, underlying the actions attitudes
and behaviors directly correlating to the safety performance is a chance to use proactive strategies.
Lastly, the strategy is also used to uncover the precursors to risk like the relation between particular

7AVIATION SAFETY SYSTEMS
hazards, threats, and risks. The predictive risk management turned out to be extremely helpful in the
activities common to aviation in the safety programs like managing of change, risk analysis in the
hypothetical scenarios and forecasting the performance data like the stakeholders.
Importance of Human Factors and Organizational Factors on the evolution of safety culture:
As per as the Human Factors are concerned, the how the tasks are being carried out and the
scenario in which they are done. The people doing the analysis must have the understanding of
various kinds of failures and the factors making them less or more likely to happen (Wilke,
Majumdar and Ochieng 2014). The human failures are needed to be determined to lead to the
accident of the incident. This also includes the performances influencing the factors. This has been
making the failures more or less likely to happen. Proper control measures are to be determined to
prevent or to mitigate the human failures that are identified. Moreover, organizations like NASA
have been aiming to design out the effectiveness of human failure and design in the potential to
recover where the human failure has been happening as claimed by Matthews et al. (2013). The
dependencies in the training and procedures have been not enough. Ultimately it must be checked
how the control measures have been working, Along with this, the risk assessment must be viewed
on a regular basis as any future enhancements could be made.
On the other hand, at the organizational level, some key components of the safety culture are
to be analyzed. The first one is the informed culture where the people managing and operating the
system needs to have the upgraded knowledge of the state of the system. It has been including the
environmental, human and technical elements of the system. The next one is the reporting culture
where the people managing the system need the mechanisms to report the problems with the
systems. This has been a crucial source of information for supporting the informed decision-making.
Mills (2016) here analyzes that the challenge has been how to create the system where the people

8AVIATION SAFETY SYSTEMS
have been feeling that they need to report the negative information regarding their individual
performance despite any fear of the excessive consequences.
Clothier and Walker (2015) help in understanding that the next one is the “just culture”. This
has been continuing to emphasize on the accountability. Although the immunity has been provided
with some few minor and self-reporting errors, there have been some necessities to be the strong
culture of responsibility. The next one is the flexible culture that has been responding to the
emergency cases through changing from a centralized culture to a decentralized structure. This
allows the small groups to create the primary decisions very fast to react to the developing situations.
Lastly, there is the learning culture where the organizations like NASA have required improving
their individual methods as it has been gaining the experiences.
Methodologies followed:
The aviation has shown a very safety record and as per as the ICAO Safety Record, the
events certainly or probably stemming from the various international acts. This has resulted in more
number of fatalities in the crashes of the commercial aircrafts (Melnyk et al. 2014). However the rate
of the accidents including both the fatal and non-fatal, as decreased from seven percent from 2014 in
per million departures. This has been the lowest accident rate annually ever for aviation.
The numbers of the unscheduled and scheduled flights of the commercial aircrafts have been
continuing to rise every year (Oster, Strong and Zorn 2013). Hence the plateauing in the safety
performance has been slightly illusory in that every year huge numbers of flights have been
generating the standstill in the sum total of the accidents.
Under the GSIP or Global Safety Information Project, nevertheless, the part of Flight Safety
Foundation or FSF’s mandate has been to work closely with the FAA or Federal Aviation

9AVIATION SAFETY SYSTEMS
Administration, for understanding the world of the aviation safety information. This also included
how it was collected, analyzed and then exchanged (Schelkun 2014). Moreover, it also considered
how the collection has been the analysis and the dissemination of the safety data could be enhanced
by reducing the rates of accidents for every kind of aviation.
The primary tool for attempting to gain the goal is the mandating and structural description
by the ICAO, provided in the Chicago Convention of the SMS or safety management system. This
has been needed to be adopted by the entire product and the service providers (Brown Jr 2017).
They also needed to adopt the safety management system including the manufacturers,
aerodromes or airports aircraft operators and the maintenance companies. It also included various
kinds of organizations performing the functions in and across any aircraft as it has been on the
ground (Denney and Pai 2014). This kind of providers has been including the caterers, fuelers,
baggage-handlers and the other organizations of aviation ground handling.
Critical analysis and discussion:
The aviation system management has undergone huge development through the past years.
At first, it was negatively oriented and depended on the mishaps and inspections to let the
organizations be aware of the problems existed. It has been a very expensive and reactive system. In
due time, the risk management, assessment, and identification concepts were added to the safety
programs. In the last decades, the approach of the system is adopted. The safety along with the
quality assurance became a group tasked with fetching the errors in the system. It needed the
managing of the organizations to undertake liabilities that the quality or safety team gets educated in
their jobs and the roles.

10AVIATION SAFETY SYSTEMS
On the other hand, the aim of SMS or Safety Management System is to deliver the structured
approach towards managing the controlling of safety risks in the operations. The effective safety
management should consider the specific structures of the organization and the processes relevant to
the safety of the operations. The safety management uses are generally regarded as the application of
the approach of quality management for controlling the risks of safety. Same as the other functions
of management, the safety management also needs the organizing, planning, communicating and
supplying directions. The beginning of the safety management systems starts with the setting of the
safety policy of the organizations. This has been the defining generic principles on which the SMS is
created and operated. The initial step outlines the strategies to achieve the acceptable levels of the
safety under the organizations.
The safety plans and the implementing of the procedures of safety management are the
upcoming key methods to the processes designed for mitigating and containing the risk in the
operations. As the controls get ready the techniques of quality management are used for assuring that
they gain the expected objectives as they get failed to develop them. It has been accomplished
through the development of the assurance of safety and processes of evaluation. This, in turn,
delivers the continuous monitoring of the operations and to identify the sectors of the safety
improvement.
The effective safety management systems use the quality and risk management methods for
achieving the safety goals. Moreover, the SMS also delivers the organizational framework for
establishing and fostering the developing of the positive corporate cultures of safety. Further, the
implementing of the safety management system provides the management of the organizations the
structures set of methods for meeting their roles regarding the safety as defined by the regulators.

11AVIATION SAFETY SYSTEMS
The SMSs have been of primary importance as they have been working in various ways to
manage the aviation safety and the development. They have been establishing the organizational
structures through which the organizations could establish the policies and accountabilities of safety.
This included the formal safety management roles and appointing the experienced and qualified
personnel for filling them. Next, the SMS has been formalizing the managing of the safety risks
through supplying the processes and procedures to identify the actual and potential hazards. This has
been including the analyzing of the safety risks and mitigating them. Next, the SMSs have been
delivering the surety that the safety is maintained. NASA has been doing this by establishing the
benchmarks of the safety measurement and controlling the safety performance of NASA. This is to
assure that the safety performance must continue to face those benchmarks.
Hence in practice analyzing the way how FSF and FAA have developed their flow of
aviation safety information assures the analysis and information is disseminated as broadly as
possible. Thus FAA and FSF could use the information from the safety management programs for
looking for the highest risks and dealing with those things before they turn out to be accidents.
Thus it is seen that as the SMS re been properly structured and supplied with the proper
regulatory requirements of reporting, the information on the safety hazards, benchmarks, risks and
measurements and the managing of the safety and change promotion could be utilized to recognize
those risks. These need more urgent attention and provide the attention. The serious risks and
incidents like the landing accidentally over the pilots and taxiway have been taking actions to avoid
the aircraft. This has been colliding with the others following the TCAS advisory of resolution. As
the information on the vital precursor incidents of the safety risks is to be made more broadly and
available generally the organizations such as FSF could learn more about the causing factors for the
risks.

12AVIATION SAFETY SYSTEMS
Thus have they been able to take such initiatives and communicate with the outcomes of the
findings efficiently on the complete aviation industry, the safe aviation environment of today has
become safer. Further, the rates of accidents are continuing to decrease also.
Conclusion and recommendations:
The reviewing of the above aviation system indicated the redefining of the roles of
organizations like NASA. However, it has discussed how NASA has been taking all the relevant
measures to develop the aviation safety. They have also realized their roles to assume the aircraft
safety and the new areas for which they could be delegated the responsibilities. Apart from the
development of aerospace technologies and the alterations in the international situations, the
scenario surrounding the aviation system also witnesses various changes. It has been imperative to
react sufficiently to the changing needs of tikes for assuring the system continues to function
normally. This has been against the backdrop that all the concerned parties must continue the
ongoing review of the system safety in aviation sectors.
Some of the recommendations regarding the discussion are as follows.
 A system must be developed where the crews are encouraged and enabled to report the
unusual events. These events must include the result from their inadvertent actions instead of
any fear of punitive actions. Especially, the renewed efforts must be made to develop the
reporting of events to current safety reporting systems.
 NASA must also analyze the flight data recorders regarding their adverse impacts for
detecting the trends and the head off accidents before they take place.
 The parameters that are recorded by the sampling rates and the flight data recorders must be
selected for enabling the determination of the causes and events.

13AVIATION SAFETY SYSTEMS

14AVIATION SAFETY SYSTEMS
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