Building an EASA - FAA SMS - Understanding Safety Assurance Processes

Sofema Online (SOL) www.sofemaonline.com looks at the process of delivering assurance within an FAA - EASA Compliant Safety Management System.

Introduction - Considering the Definition of Safety Assurance

» EASA – Safety assurance – all planned and systematic actions necessary to afford adequate confidence that a product, a service, an organisation, or a functional system achieves acceptable or tolerable safety.
» FAA – Safety assurance – Processes within the SMS that function systematically to ensure the performance and effectiveness of safety risk controls and that the organization meets or exceeds its safety objectives through the collection, analysis, and assessment of information.

Safety Assurance Activities Include:

» Organisational arrangements and systematic processes for continuous surveillance and recording of the organisation’s safety performance.
» Evaluation of the safety management processes and practices.
» Used as a means to demonstrate that organisational arrangements and processes for safety achievement are properly applied and continue to achieve their intended objectives.

Note: Safety Assurance should be intrusive and enquiring and not simply an administrative “box-ticking” exercise.

According to the ICAO Doc 9859 – Safety assurance includes the following activities:

» Safety performance monitoring and measurement to validate the effectiveness of safety risk management.
» Measuring the outcomes of activities that operational personnel must engage in for the delivery of services by the organisation.
» Management of change – the aviation service provider organisation shall develop and maintain a formal process to identify and manage the changes within the organisation which may affect established processes, procedures, products, and services.
» The management of change should ensure that required safety performance is achieved by reducing or eliminating the safety risks resulting from the changes in the organisation, the provision of services, or the operational environment.
» Continuous improvement of the SMS – the aviation service provider organisation shall develop and maintain a formal process to identify the causes of sub-standard performance of the SMS, determine the implications of sub-standard performance in operations, and eliminate such causes.

SMS Safety Assurance Components include:

» Safety Surveys – Carried out as a matter of routine, to recommend improvements where needed, to provide assurance to managers of the safety of activities within their areas, and to confirm conformance with applicable parts of their safety management systems;
» Safety Monitoring – shall ensure that methods are in place to detect changes in systems or operations which may suggest any element is approaching a point at which acceptable standards of safety can no longer be met, and that corrective action is taken;
» Safety System Records – shall be maintained throughout the SMS operation as a basis for providing safety assurance to all associated with, responsible for, or dependent upon the services provided, and to the safety regulatory authority. Safety records include all documentation produced and maintained throughout the operation of the SMS processes, including the risk assessment and mitigation documentation.

Next Steps

Sofema Aviation Services www.sassofia.com & Sofema Online www.sofemaonline.com offer Safety Management System Training as Classroom, Webinar or Online. For additional details, please see our websites or email team@sassofia.com