Premium On Safety - Issue 11, 2013 - 5

(continued from page 4)

The severity of these events ranged from small fires involving
flashlights, personal electronic devices like cell phones, and even
personal air purifiers and electronic cigarettes, to large-scale thermal
runaway events resulting in significant damage to the aircraft.
The FAA Technical Center has done extensive, proactive studies of the nature of lithium battery fires in aviation-type conditions,
and the agency has extensive documentation available in the form of Safety Alerts for
Operators (SAFOs) and Advisory Circulars
(ACs) (www.fire.tc.faa.gov/). Independent
safety organizations have also published
guidance for lithium battery fires.
While much of this guidance is available
through a simple online search, Hare also
cautioned operators from taking advice
“they see on blogs” to use fire containment bags on lithium battery fires.

“The FAA has repeatedly pointed out
these bags don’t work, because the bag
does not extinguish the fire or stop thermal runaway,” Hare noted. “In fact, the bag
accelerates those conditions, because it
contains the heat, and the fire may generate a flammable gas—creating a potential
bomb if it’s not vented.”
Freelance aviation writer Rob Finfrock
has authored more than 300 articles
for numerous aviation organizations and
publications. He flies a Remos GX light
sport aircraft.

FLIGHT VIS

“Flight Vis” shares opinions on safety issues from
professionals operating on aviation’s front lines.

Next Generation Safety Tools
for Business Aviation
By STEVE CHARBONNEAU

Accident Rates per 100k Flight Hours
Accident Rates per 100k Flight Hours
2000-2011

Accident Rates per 100k hours

14.00
12.00
10.00
All GA

8.00

Corporate
Business

6.00

Instructional
Personal

4.00
2.00
0.00

2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011

In the last ten years business aviators
have put forth a significant effort to implement systemic safety solutions in flight and
ground operations. Safety management
systems have led us to develop numerous
safety strategies including hazard identification and reporting, threat and error management, flight data recording, and operational

flight risk assessments; the question is, is it
enough? Last year, National Transportation
Safety Board Member Earl F. Weener, PhD,
unfortunately reported that general aviation
accident rates were statistically unchanged
from 2000-2010. We need to do more with
the tools we have all worked so hard to put
in place. The key to breaking the statistical
logjam is taking our newfound information
and using it to effect.
So what more can be done? I believe
that the work done in the last ten years
is just now beginning to allow us to learn
about our underlying risks, and engage in
meaningful solutions. For example, using
flight data monitoring, the Corporate Flight
Operations Quality Assurance (C-FOQA)
Centerline users group identified a tendency for high energy approaches, resulting in
long and fast landings. They collaborated
(continued on page 6)

ASI MESSAGE

Super Automation
Revolution
By BRUCE LANDSBERG

Helicopters have always
fascinated me for a variety
of reasons—not the least
of which is the tremendously useful jobs they do
in tough situations such
as, for instance, landing
on oil platforms, which is how many of the
world’s petroleum workers get to their jobs
so we can get to ours.
So it was of some interest when Sikorsky
Aircraft announced it had certified a new
system that claims to reduce pilot workload
by 60 percent in the critical approach phase
to a platform. According to the Sikorsky
press release, “Rig Approach will be available as an option on the S-92 helicopters,
providing a fully coupled and automated
approach capability with a higher safety
margin than currently is available with any
other offshore approach procedure.”
To the staid universe of fixed-wing operations this seems like old news—an autopilot
function that guides one to touch down better
than a human. But the complexity of helicopters hasn’t allowed this to be done before.
The airlines have long been advocates of
autopilots, and while there’s the occasional
miscue, they do provide a consistency of
operation that humans can’t. Automation,
however, cannot always manage the outlier
events that can have catastrophic consequences. After all, we are generally lousy
monitors for long periods of time—it’s the
attention span thing. But we can be highly
effective for limited periods to manage
those unusual events provided the criticalevent skills have not atrophied. If we get
too mentally disengaged, however, it’s hard
to get back in the game—and therein lies
the difficulty.
As super-automated flight control equipment becomes more commonplace, it falls
on us to define the hows and wherefores to
maintain those old skills while developing
new ones.
Safe Flights…

Bruce Landsberg
President, AOPA Foundation

http://www.fire.tc.faa.gov/

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