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ICAO SMS – Safety Assurance Tools You Can Use

One of the most important aspects of an ICAO SMS program is the safety assurance function. The basics of SMS call for identifying all of the risks associated with your aviation operation. You then analyze these risks to determine what risks are acceptable and which risks are not acceptable. For any risks that are unacceptable, procedures are developed to mitigate that risk to an acceptable level of risk. If mitigation is not possible that particular operation will not be allowed in the future due to the high level of risk.

However just because the risk was identified, analyzed and mitigated does not mean it was actually reduced to an acceptable level. The safety assurance function of an ICAO SMS is designed to ensure that your new procedures and processes for mitigating risks are acceptable and actually working. Your procedures may not keep your risk within an acceptable level because of two main factors. The first reason is that they are flawed in some way. Unfortunately no procedure is perfect and any process or procedure will have its flaws and imperfections. These flaws and imperfections can lead to a situation where the procedure you just designed is not working as intended and the risk was not mitigated.

The other reason that your risk may not be mitigated is because of individuals disregarding the new procedure and policy by not following it correctly. They also may not be doing it all. The reasons they are not following the procedure could be one of many. It may because they were not trained correctly and do not know how to carry out the procedure correctly. It may also be due to the fact that they do not understand the importance of the new procedure and have decided it is not worth the effort to actually follow the new procedure.

When either of these factors occurs, the outcome will be a higher level of risk than what was anticipated when the procedure was originally developed. This increased level of risk may become unacceptable. If a company only conducts ICAO safety risk management and does not follow up with safety assurance, this high level of risk would likely not be identified. An accident or incident is likely in the future. This is why the safety assurance function of an ICAO SMS is so important. This process will allow you to identify if new processes and procedures that are not working as designed leading to an unacceptable level of risk. These hazards can be identified and then corrected before they lead to an incident or accident.

An ICAO SMS is basically a continuous decision making process loop. You will identify risks.  You will then develop procedures to mitigate these risks. Once these procedures are in place you will keep analyzing your operation to ensure that you are maintaining your desired level of risk. If any procedures are not working as planned or you identify new risks, they will be analyzed and fixed using the safety risk management procedures. Then the loop continues as these new procedures are continually analyzed and then fixed as need.

Without safety assurance, your operations safety will be at jeopardy due to the missing ingredient in the ICAO SMS loop. It is not enough to just analyze your risk but you need to monitor it as well.

About the Author

Brian Bowie has over 10 years of aviation management for both FAR Part 121 and 135 airline operations. Check out his easy solution for an SMS system that can be implemented in a cost effective and efficient manner. Get started today and have your SMS program within a week. Do not delay, get your SMS manual at www.themanualmasters.com

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