Ground Operations, Risk Management

SIRM AFI - Ground Operations, Risk Management 

The post pandemic has challenged the Aviation industry in numerous ways, none more so than the Ground Operations domain. This area has been confronted with resource issues, including recruitment, retention, and training. The demands of the industry and the consumer further challenge the resilience of the workforce, placing further pressure on a fragile system; - this fragility has often resulted in the transference of the issue to an incident involving damage to aircraft, threat to life, damage to equipment and infrastructure. So how do we ensure that this critical component in the aviation chain provides and implements the safeguards so required by the industry? This was the question that was explored by one Operator in how to support and evolve the risk management principles within this domain. The airline had a goal, which was to “To objectively elevate Ground Safety to an equal footing with Flight Safety”. During the internal evaluations of the provider, the airline identified several systemic issues, including:

Threats and Hazards

• Inadequate ramp safety standards and oversight.
• Lack of standardized GSE operator training and licensing.
• Reduced focus on Human Factors e.g., Fatigue.
• Language barriers amongst the ground crew.
• Culture of shortcuts e.g., to meet short turn-around deadlines.
• Large skills gap

These items will not surprise many of those reading this article, but consider some of the identified escalation factors, which exposes the systemic failures within the environment:

• Inadequate risk communication to management.
• Failure to implement corrective actions against audit findings.
• Deficiencies not reported, fear culture.
• Financial pressure leading to cost cutting at the expense of safety.
• Rapid growth exceeding the capacity to train staff.

Where there is a limitation on the availability of ground operations provision, e.g., there is only one agent, these issues can be challenging. Furthermore, the lack of competitive market may reduce the drive for providers to improve the quality and compliance of the service provision. So, as is often the case, the affected airline has to make efforts to improve the provision through supportive and targeted programs.

The airline in this scenario prioritised several areas, such as:

• Encouraging a preventative approach to maintenance checks.
• Enhancing focus on skills gaps.
• Deploying fatigue risk management tools within the domain.
• Promoting an anonymous and trust-based reporting system.
• Engendering accountability.
• Pivot to a focus on performance.

As an airline, they considered their role to be:

• Responsible for demonstrating commitment.
• Building strategic partnerships with key players, such as, fuel suppliers, aircraft manufacturers, research institutions.
• Advocacy and Industry engagement.
• Education and communication.

The airline should be applauded for taking the lead in the matters of driving safety improvement in the Ground Operations domain. Understandably, the results will not be immediate, but the short-term wins will no doubt lead to greater long-term success, and we look forward to updates on the progress at future meetings.  

 Useful Links

• Ground Operations | SKYbrary Aviation Safety
• Safety Issue Hub – visit for collated guidance material, (Search keyword “Ground Safety”)