Bucharest ( Romania) – 6 February 2009 – Today, 30 representatives from 6 States with responsibilities regarding the implementation and/or oversight of aviation safety management systems (SMS), passed the final examination of the latest ICAO Safety Management System (SMS) course held in Bucharest from 2 to 6 February 2009.

This course, organized and held by Capt. Catalin Cotrut (Representative of Romania at the ICAO Council) and Capt. Niguel Ramos (ICAO Safety Officer), is the latest of a series of ICAO SMS courses which so far have trained more than 1.000 top aviation officers coming from the majority of the 55 States to which the ICAO European and North Atlantic Office is accredited.

The main purpose of the ICAO SMS training is to provide participating Civil Aviation top officials with knowledge of safety management concepts as well as of the ICAO Standards and Recommended Practices (SARPs) on safety management in the relevant Annexes to the ICAO Convention and the related guidance material: Annex 6 (Operation of Aircraft), Annex 11 (Air Traffic Services), Annex 14 (Aerodromes), Doc 9859 (ICAO Safety Management Manual), etc..

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The responsibility of establishing a Safety Programme is imposed upon States through the ICAO provisions. As part of such a programme, air operators, maintenance organizations, air traffic services providers and certified aerodrome operators are requested to implement a safety management system (SMS).

An SMS is a systematic approach to managing safety, including the necessary organizational structure, accountabilities, policies and processes. In fact, as global aviation activity and complexity continue to grow, traditional methods for managing safety risks (known as reactive method) have become less effective and efficient.

The new approach to safety management (known as the proactive/predictive method) recognizes that aviation accident and incidents are not caused exclusively by front-end operators’ actions or inactions (pilots, controllers, maintenance personnel or aerodrome staff) that have an immediate adverse effect. These actions and/or inactions have to be considered as the “triggering factors” which simply highlight the inadequacy of the operators’ organizational processes and policies. Such conditions are present in the system before the safety event occurs and fail to provide the aviation community with a safety net able to prevent human errors or, at least, to mitigate their consequences.

In order to emphasize the notion of safety management as a managerial process and most accidents/incidents being “organizational”, ICAO safety management requirements include provisions for an organization to establish lines of safety accountability throughout the organization, as well as at senior management level.

In line with the new provisions and safety concepts which impose a continuous process of hazard identification and risk mitigation, States have been asked to require (since 23 November 2006) aviation operators and service providers to implement a safety management system. The Safety Management Systems implemented by operators have to be accepted by their respective States.

The ICAO SMS courses also aim at developing participants’ knowledge to certify and oversee the implementation of key components of an SMS, in compliance with the ICAO Standards and Recommended Practices and national regulations.