NASA Aviation Safety Program Working to Improve on Excellence
by Michael S. Lewis
Director Aviation Safety Program Office
NASA Langley Research Center
umans and flying
machines are capable of extremely complementary attributes. Humans, especially
well-trained and motivated ones, are able to mentally and physically adapt
to a nearly infinite variety of circumstances with a high level of performance.
Machines, especially those that are as well developed as the ones in the
aviation world, operate with extraordinary performance within a finite
set of circumstances. This fortunate marriage, operating within well-
developed and regulated procedures, has resulted in an aviation system
that safely completes a given flight over 99.9999 percent of the time.
Yet this success rate must dramatically improve over the coming decades if the aviation system (both commercial and general aviation) is to continue to grow and prosper. The disheartening specter of a major accident nearly every week has been well publicized as the direct result of the forecast upward trend in airline departures and a constant accident rate. Today's environment of instant worldwide media communications, coupled with the public's intense interest in air travel, means that a major accident anywhere affects the perception of safety everywhere. More and more frequent accidents will assuredly dampen the public's enthusiasm for air travel. Thus, the accident rate must go down for the aviation system to continue to grow to its full potential.
Indeed, the current period presents us with a unique and fortunate confluence of political focus, coordinated government and industry activity, incredible new technologies and significant resources available to get the job done. How? There are five steps that are fundamental for timely success.
First, work together: NASA, the FAA, manufacturers, operators and other parties (both in this country and internationally) all have unique and valuable contributions to make for enhanced safety. Teamed together, new ideas can be developed, tested and implemented faster and better than any individual organization working alone could produce.
Second, identify safety issues based upon the data. A data-driven approach is a common theme of joint NASA-FAA safety research activity, as well as industry's coordinated efforts. Multiple accident cases are now undergoing detailed examination to identify common critical causes, factors and precursor events. These studies are forming the basis of an emerging systematicÑas opposed to judgmental and reactiveÑapproach to focusing safety improvement efforts.
Third, take maximum advantage of emerging technologies. Although the list of new technology advancements is too long to detail, four can be considered especially critical in providing the foundation for an operational revolution: the global positioning system (GPS) and all of its incredible uses; worldwide high-bandwidth digital data links; ever cheaper and more capable digital data storage and general-purpose on-board processing; and affordably retrofittable liquid crystal and head-up displays. With these basic capabilities in every cockpit, the opportunities to improve both air and ground decision making are nearly boundless.
Fourth, aggressively implement improvements. There is no question that safety improvements that are also economic improvements are clear winners. Beyond that, it is up to industry and government to work together to incorporate enhancements into the fleet as early as possible. Industry needs to keep in mind that the long-term effect of improved safety is a barrier removed to a huge total market; government needs to streamline the process needed to turn good new ideas into certified applications. Recent actions with the enhanced ground proximity warning system are a good example.
Fifth, measure the results. Monitoring the aviation system through the intelligent combination of flight operations quality assurance programs and new information technology tools is the feedback process required to assess the impact of changes from established baselines.
None of these steps is a grand new idea. What is new is how they can be taken together and aimed at a unifying and challenging goal. NASA is committing $500 million over the next five years. The FAA is committing the full force of its agency. Industry is joining together.
Let the race begin.
