The first airlines to be involved in the experimental phase of the International Air Transport Association's (IATA) "flight safety buddy" system could be paired-up within a year says IATA director general, Pierre Jeanniot.
The "buddy" concept is a major plank of IATA's seven-point safety strategy to halve the annual hull loss rate by 2004. "This means removing nine or ten hulls per annum altogether from the crash statistics," said Jeanniot, speaking at the Flight International-supported Technology and the Flight Deck symposium in Vancouver. He warns that if nothing is done, however, then accidents will double, along with air traffic.
Recognising that "80% of all accidents are caused by 20% of the airlines", IATA's buddy plan involves transferring experience and safety practices "from a more-capable airline to a weaker, and less experienced" carrier. Jeanniot says that "a number of airlines" have already expressed interest in the scheme, which would initially focus on Latin America and the Caribbean. "We're matching partners right now for an initial experimental phase in South America which would begin in about a year," he adds.
A major airline would volunteer to host the senior flight-safety manager from an airline in the region for up to five days, providing comprehensive briefings on its flight-safety organisation, policies, procedures, safety reporting, training, crew-resource management and risk management. The plan also includes promotion of flight-data analysis, incident reporting, and fitting of ground-proximity warning systems.
Source: Flight International
