Comment Period Closed On Rule That Would Require Safety Management Systems At Nearly 300 Airports

The FAA is in the late stages of preparing its final rule that will require certain airports to establish a Safety Management System.

The FAA published as Suplemental Notice of Proposed Rulemaking earlier this year, and the comment period closed on September 12. Now, the agency is reviewing those comments as it prepares its final rule, though no date has been set for its release.

In the initial NPRM, published in 2010, the FAA proposed to require all part 139 certificate holders to develop and implement an SMS to improve the safety of their aviation-related activities. An SMS is a formalized approach to managing safety by developing an organization-wide safety policy, developing formal methods of identifying hazards, analyzing and mitigating risk, developing methods for ensuring continuous safety improvement, and creating organization-wide safety promotion strategies.

Based on comments received, the agency determined that application of SMS across all certificated airports was not practical. In response, the FAA revised its assumptions used to calculate overall costs associated with this SNPRM's proposal. The FAA also reviewed additional accident and incident databases to obtain more accurate assumptions of benefits derived from an SMS. These additional databases included the FAA Accident and Incident Database (AIDS), NASA's Aviation Safety Reporting System (ASRS), the FAA's Wildlife Strike Database, and the FAA's Runway Incursion Database.

After reviewing each of the alternatives and the associated costs and benefits of each, the FAA's preferred proposal would require an SMS be developed, implemented, maintained, and adhered to only at a certificated airport:
Classified as a small, medium, or large hub airport in the NPIAS; or
Identified as an international airport; or
Identified as having more than 100,000 total annual operations.

This preferred alternative covers 268 airports across Classes I, II, III, and IV, thus eliminating the NPRM's SMS requirements for 276 airports that have few passenger enplanements and less complex operations. The airports that comprise this alternative account for over 98% of all passenger enplanements in the U.S.

Under the proposal, certificate holders would be required to develop and implement an SMS within 2 years of the effective date of the final rule. The NPRM originally proposed SMS implementation within 1 year from the effective date of the final rule. This change responds to commenters' requests for additional time to implement SMS.

FMI: www.federalregister.gov/documents/2016/07/14/2016-16596/safety-management-system-for-certificated-airports