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Future Safety
How do jet manufacturers promote aviation safety?
Airplane makers focus on safety issues from the earliest design
stage right on through to the end of an airplane’s serviceable
life. Design practices are being updated continually based on
in-service experience. Manufacturers are always turning the lessons
learned from one generation of aircraft into safety enhancements
in the next generation. Every part of a new aircraft model — from
the smallest rivet to the largest assembly or control system —
receives sophisticated testing and analysis. New aircraft models
literally undergo thousands of hours of testing, both on the ground
and in the air, before they’re certified to enter production.
Moreover, every single airplane leaving the factory is flight-tested
before it’s delivered to an airline. Besides helping train airline
pilots and maintenance personnel, jet makers continually work
with airlines to monitor the performance of aircraft. Any reported
problems are exhaustively analyzed, sometimes resulting in fleetwide
safety modifications.
Who’s responsible for ensuring air safety?
Airplane operators, pilots, mechanics, flight attendants, government
regulators, and airplane makers all have a stake in making civil
aviation as safe as possible. Flight and ground crews ensure that
daily tasks are handled appropriately for each flight. Regulatory
agencies set air-safety standards, license airlines, manage national
air-traffic control systems, and regulate the design, construction
and maintenance of aircraft. In addition, accident-investigation
agencies determine the cause of airplane accidents when they occur,
and make safety-improvement recommendations.
Is there any way to make air travel safer?
Since the inception of the jet era, flying has gotten much safer
because of innovations like computerized flight simulators, expanded
radar coverage, and high-tech devices that warn pilots of such
things as nearby aircraft, threatening proximity to terrain, precarious
aircraft altitude or flight angle, and wind-shear conditions.
The industry is continually finding new ways to make flying safer
through better pilot training, better aircraft inspection and
maintenance techniques, and new safety technologies. In the next
century, for example, all commercial jets will use satellites
to navigate and communicate their positions to air-traffic controllers
on the ground — a tremendous advantage over ground-based navigation
aids and radar that lose "sight" of planes once they fly beyond
the horizon.
What’s being done to enhance global aviation safety?
The International Air Transport Association (IATA), the International
Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the International Federation
of Airline Pilots Associations (IFALPA), the Flight Safety Foundation,
manufacturers and others are working together to reduce accident
numbers. National governments around the world are reviewing an
ICAO safety program that will focus safety-related activities
on "those initiatives that offer the best safety dividends in
terms of reducing the accident rate." Several countries have established
national programs to tailor safety programs that best meet their
needs. In the U.S., for example, airlines, aviation associations,
labor unions, government agencies and manufacturers have joined
the FAA in a Commercial Aviation Safety Team (CAST) that is working
to achieve an 80 percent reduction in the rate of fatal commercial
accidents over the next 10 years.
Hasn’t Boeing said there’s going to be an accident every week
in the future?
Worldwide air traffic is expected to more than double over the
next 20 years. So if today’s jet accident rate didn’t change,
major accidents would occur roughly twice as often 20 years from
now; about once a week somewhere in the world, according to Boeing’s
projections. But no one who has a hand in the global aviation
system — airlines, unions, industry associations, manufacturers
or government authorities — is willing to let that happen. Air
travel is not only safe, it’s very safe. And there is no shortage
of effort going into making it even safer.
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