In addition to independent 'no blame' investigation
of transport accidents and other safety occurrences, the ATSB
contributes to improved transport safety in Australia through:
• safety data recording, analysis and
research; and
• fostering safety awareness, knowledge and
action.
Awareness and understanding of transport safety issues is
increased through a range of activities including consultation,
education, and the promulgation of research and investigation
findings and recommendations. These contribute to the national and
international body of safety knowledge and foster action for the
improvement of safety systems and operations.
As part of this commitment, the ATSB will publish its safety
research program for the financial year including a list of all
active and proposed safety research projects. This program may be
updated during the financial year to reflect changes to priorities
and scope.
_________
Research Investigations & Data Analysis Program January -
June 2012
Runway excursions: overruns and veer-offs in general
aviation and low capacity operations: 2000-2011
There are about 50 to 60 runway excursions each year involving
general aviation and low capacity aircraft. Excursions can happen
during a takeoff or landing, and can involve an overrun of the
runway or a veer-off from the side of a runway. This report will
document the runway excursion accidents from 2000 to 2011, and look
for evidence for runway, pilot, weather, and other factors that
contribute to these accidents.
This report will be useful for flying instructors and pilots to
help determine which factors are more likely to lead to runway
excursions so that such factors can be trained and planned for.
Expected release: February 2012.
Unreported wirestrikes: The collection and analysis of
aviation wirestrike data from wire infrastructure
holders
Anecdotal evidence suggests that many aviation wirestrikes are not
reported by pilots, either to the ATSB or the wire infrastructure
holder. It is possible that the ATSB database is significantly
under-populated with wirestrike incidents and accidents compared to
the actual number. To help determine the true extent of aviation
wire strikes in Australia, the ATSB commenced a research
investigation under the Transport Safety Investigation Act to
obtain wirestrike occurrence information from wire (electricity and
telephone) infrastructure owners across Australia from July 2003
until present. These will populate the ATSB occurrence database and
a report will be written summarising the extent of wirestrikes
across Australia. Information about activities to reduce aviation
wirestrikes conducted by wire infrastructure owners will also be
gathered and documented as part of this investigation.
Expected release: March 2012.
Wildlife strikes: Bird and animal strike statistics:
2002 to 2011
A significant proportion of all occurrences reported to the ATSB
involve aircraft striking wildlife, especially birds. While most
birdstrikes do no result in damage or affect the safety of the
flight, a small proportion do, and as seen in overseas accidents,
there is always a possibility of ingesting birds into all engines
or strikes resulting in significant damage to an aerodynamic
structure. As such, aerodromes, airlines and others in the aviation
industry must remain vigilant of birdstrike risks and mitigate as
much as practicable through aerodrome wildlife control,
observations, reporting and avoidance.
This report will provide aviation birdstrike and animal strike
occurrence data for the period 2002 to 2011, updating the previous
report released in 2010. It will document the number and rate of
birdstrikes and animal strikes by operation type, locations,
aircraft damage and injury, species and bird/animal size involved,
and number of birds struck. It will be useful to aerodrome
operators to compare strike-rates between locations and for
aircraft operators to help determine where and what are the largest
wildlife strike risks lie for their operations.
Expected release: March 2012.
Aviation Occurrence Statistics: 2002 to December
2011
The ATSB now receives over 7,000 occurrence reports from all areas
of the aviation industry every year. This annual statistical
publication documents these incidents and accidents, and represents
the official source of Australian aviation safety occurrence data.
It will present the data as meaningful information through the use
of charts and directed commentary, and arranges data by operation
type, year, aircraft types, and occurrence types. It will also
document ATSB investigations initiated in the previous year.
Expected release: April 2012.
Australian shipping safety statistics:
2005-2011
This report will document marine safety reportable matters from
2005 to 2011 to document the number and types of marine safety
occurrences involving Australian registered ships anywhere in the
world, foreign flag ships within Australian waters. As the second
edition, this year's report will build on the first edition and
include accident rate data where ship movement data is
available.
Expected release: April 2012.
Amateur-built and experimental aircraft Part 2: Accident
analysis
Non-factory amateur-built and experimental (ABE) aircraft are a
popular alternative to general aviation aircraft. Despite this
popularity, there has been very little information about the
relative level of safety of these aircraft when compared with
similar factory-built general aviation aircraft.
This report will explore the accident data of VH-registered ABE
and similar factory built aircraft over a 20 year period. It will
investigate whether the same types of accidents are occurring and
explore reasons for any differences found. In particular, it will
investigate whether differences in ABE aircraft, such as
user-modifications and limitations, are associated with accident
rates and types.
The results will be useful for guiding future policy and
procedural directions within the Civil Aviation Safety Authority
regarding the operation of ABE aircraft. It will also be useful for
current and prospective owners of ABE aircraft to assess the risks
associated with operating these types of aircraft.
Expected release: April 2012.
Australian Rail Safety Occurrence Data: 2002 to December
2011
Rail safety occurrence data is collected from the industry by
state and territory-based regulators. This data is provided to the
ATSB biannually to be compiled into a single statistical report as
the National Rail Occurrence Database on behalf of the Rail Safety
Regulators Panel. The report is designed to assist rail safety
professionals and researchers in understanding and mitigating risk.
In addition, it can be used for international comparative research,
while informing the public about emerging issues in rail
safety.
The data is presented as counts of occurrences, and normalised
through train kilometres travelled or kilometres of track, to
assist in comparisons between jurisdictions. Data presented
includes: fatalities; serious injuries; derailments; collisions;
level crossing occurrences; signals passed at danger; loading
irregularities; and track and civil infrastructure
irregularities.
Expected release: April-May 2012.
Factors affecting quality of an organisation's safety
management processes
This literature review will be a detailed and rigorous
examination of the published research into the efficacy of safety
management systems, safety programs and related management
processes that are applicable to high-reliability transport
operations. The examination aims to identify which characteristics
of these systems, and/or other organisational characteristics or
external influences, are most related to the quality of an
organisation's safety management. That is, what evidence exists
that various aspects of safety management systems increase
safety.
The potential contribution to safety for this review is that
findings could help organisations prioritise on those areas most
likely to improve safety performance. It could also help the
development of future guidance and standards in safety management
systems, as well as guidance for reviewing, auditing or
investigating an organisation's safety management processes.
Expected release: June 2012.
July - December 2012
Identifying risks in transport: Safety issues and safety
actions from ATSB investigations from July 2011 to June
2012
Each year, the ATSB conducts about 100 investigations into
transport safety matters in aviation, rail and marine. Most of
these reports document safety issues (factors that have a potential
to adversely affect the safety of future operations) identified
during the investigation, along with the assigned risk level for
each safety issue. The ATSB also individually documents safety
actions completed by industry or the regulator in response to the
identified safety issues. When no or inadequate safety action
occurs, the ATSB may also release a safety recommendation, which is
required to be responded to by 90 days.
This report will document the ATSB identified safety issues and
related safety actions and recommendations for the 2011-2012
financial year and trends across three financial years. It will
explore the risk levels assigned and provide an understanding of
where the greatest risks to each transport mode appears to lie. The
results will be useful for government decision makers, regulators
and the aviation, rail and marine industries to understand if and
where attention to risk needs to be applied.
Expected release: October 2012.
Regional airline safety study Part 1: Current status of
the regional industry and changes since 1997
In May 1999, the Bureau of Air Safety Investigation released a
research report titled Regional Airline Safety Study Project
Report, which sought to identify safety deficiencies affecting
regional airline operations in Australia and identify measures to
reduce the impact of such deficiencies. Since this time, the
regional airline industry in Australia has experienced a number of
changes, both regulatory and operational.
The purpose of this report is to provide a comprehensive review
of the regional airline industry and identify current and emerging
issues.
This report will be able to be used by policy makers and those in
the regional airline industry to help identify what changes have
occurred in the regional airline environment and how they may
continue to evolve.
Expected release: July-Dec 2012.
Australian Rail Safety Occurrence Data: 2002 to June
2012
Biannual rail statistics report, as described above.
Expected release: October 2012.
Airprox: A summary of near mid-air collisions in
aircraft not under air traffic control
An airprox event refers to a serious incident in which two or more
aircraft come into such close proximity that a threat to the safety
of the aircraft exists or may exist, in airspace where the aircraft
are not subject to an air traffic separation standard or where
separation is a pilot responsibility. This report will document
data trends for airprox events, including location mapping, from
recent years. It will be released in conjunction with a special
Factual Aviation Investigation Bulletin containing a number of
investigations of airprox occurrences.
Expected release: Jul-Sep 2012.
Avoidable Accidents: Experience is no
defence
Over the past few years, a number of high-profile pilots in the
Australian aviation community have been involved in fatal
accidents. These pilots were considered by many to be at the
pinnacle of flying experience, skill and ability. Yet, their own
actions ultimately contributed to their fatal outcomes.
This educational booklet will document a number of fatal
accidents involving very experienced pilots and explore some of the
reasons contributing to their fatal accidents. Intended for pilots
in general aviation, sports aviation and recreational aviation, it
will outline lessons learned and hopefully help instil a culture of
healthy respect for the risks posed by aviation no matter what
level of skill and experience the pilot has.
Expected release: June-July 2012.
Future research and analysis topics
Accidents from mishandling errors
Accidents can have a range of contributing factors, but one of the
most basic can involve the pilot's ability of appropriately handle
the aircraft, often in non-normal and difficult conditions. This
research will investigate accidents where inappropriate aircraft
handling contributing to the outcome and document the prevalence of
the various handling errors.
This report will be useful to the aviation training industry and
the regulator. The results will be able to feed into the
development of the required flying training syllabi and provide
advice to training organisations as to what skills need to be
emphasised during flying training.
Technical failures related to Australian aviation
accidents
While the reliability of aircraft has improved significantly as
aviation developed into an established transport industry,
technical failures still continue to feature and have the potential
to increase the risk of accidents. This report will document the
technical failures associated with aircraft accidents and
incidents, including the types of failures and the contributing
factors for these failures (design, manufacture, maintenance,
operation); and investigate why some failures result in more
adverse outcomes than others.
An understanding of which technical failures are the most common
and which failures are more likely to lead to accidents will help
airlines and other operators focus their effort in terms of pilot
training and procedures to prepare and manage technical failures
when they occur.
High capacity aircraft - landing gear
problems
Landing without the landing gear extended has been a common
accident since the beginning of aviation. Landing without landing
gear will result in aircraft damage, sometimes fire, and sometimes
injuries. Although today's high capacity aircraft have engineering
and procedural controls to guard against pilots forgetting to
extend the landing gear before landing, sometimes these last-line
defences have been all that have stopped an accident. Mechanical
issues, both indicated on the control panel, and/or actual
problems, also have the potential to lead to a wheels up
landing.
This report will document landing gear related occurrences over a
ten-year period in high capacity operations. This includes both
mechanical issues and human-related issues, their causes, related
factors, and any consequences. The report will be useful for high
capacity aircraft operators to enable them to compare the
occurrence rates and contributing factors.
Runway Incursions
Runways are critical locations for aviation safety as they involve
high-speed and high-energy aircraft movements. As aircraft are
sharing the same physical space for takeoffs and landings, aircraft
separation relies on managing the timing of runway use. While
collisions between aircraft on runways are rare, the potential for
two aircraft or an aircraft and a vehicle to be on the runway at
the same time are numerous and the ATSB receives many reports of
every of such runway occur, it can be of high consequence, such as
the incidents year incursions. If a collision does worlds worst
aircraft accident at Tenerife in 1977 resulting in 583
fatalities.
This research report will investigate runway incursions at
airports operated to by high capacity aircraft. It will determine
which airports are the most affected by runway incursions, what
types of aircraft and vehicles are causing the incursions, and the
trends associated with runway incursions in general. If possible,
it will review and document the factors contributing to runway
incursions. This investigation should assist air traffic
controllers' and pilots' awareness of runway incursions.
Recreational aviation incidents and
accidents
Recreational aviation, in particular non-VH-registered powered
ultralight and light sports aeroplanes, have become an increasingly
significant proportional of non-commercial aviation in Australia.
However, little is known about the relative safety of this part of
the aviation industry.
This report will document the types of safety incidents and
accidents reported to the ATSB from aircraft registered through
Recreation Aviation Australia. The results will be valuable for
regulators and decision makers in government and within the
recreational industry to gauge the level of safety and understand\
where the largest risks to safety, if any, within this sector
lies.
Regional airline safety study Part 2: Accident and
incident analysis
A continuation of the regional airlines project, this report will
explore safety occurrences reported to the ATSB over the past
decade in relation to regional airlines and investigate whether the
nature of these have changed and where the major risks to regional
airlines safety now lies.
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