80 Years of Global Aviation Safety Leadership

Partners and Programs:

Home » About the Foundation » 80 Years of Global Aviation Safety Leadership

Looking Back and Moving Forward - Celebrating 80 Years of Aviation Safety Excellence

Eighty years ago, a group of visionary young professionals—pilots, inventors, and engineers in their 20s and 30s—recognized the need for an independent, nonprofit organization dedicated solely to advocating for aviation safety. Among them were Jerome “Jerry” Lederer, Gloria Heath, Richard Crane, and David Morrison. In 1945, they founded the Flight Safety Foundation with a singular mission: to promote and enhance aviation safety in anticipation of the challenges facing a burgeoning post-war aviation industry—one filled with both great promise and profound uncertainty. The rapid expansion of commercial aviation, the transition from military to civilian operations, and the introduction of new technologies brought tremendous opportunity, but also significant risk. These pioneers understood that safety needed to be at the forefront to ensure the industry’s long-term success.

Today, their foresight remains profoundly relevant. As the aviation industry stands at a pivotal juncture, the Foundation has evolved into the singular independent voice advocating for aviation safety, engaging with stakeholders across all regions of the globe.

Be part of our celebration as we reflect on our rich history, recognize the invaluable contributions of our members and stakeholders, and look toward the future of aviation. Together, let’s support the next generation in our industry who will shape the skies of tomorrow. We don’t know what the future holds, but we know who hold the future!

Honoring 80 years of aviation safety. Be part of our celebration as we reflect on our rich history, recognize the invaluable contributions of our members and stakeholders, and look toward the future of aviation.

Through CRM and TEM, communication has been key to safety improvements.

by Thomas W. Young | May 14, 2025

American author and aviator Ernest K. Gann wrote of his experiences in what some call the golden age of the airlines — the late 1930s to the 1950s. He chronicled a world where captains were kings and rarely questioned. In Gann’s memoir Fate is the Hunter, he described his role as a copilot: “I was expected to operate the landing gear and flaps on command, keep the log, the flight plan, and my mouth shut.”

This article is the fifth in a series on landmark events in aviation since Flight Safety Foundation was founded in 1945.

Through CRM and TEM, communication has been key to safety improvements.

by Thomas W. Young | May 14, 2025

But the golden age was not so golden. In 1959, in the United States alone, there were 40 fatal accidents per 1 million aircraft departures. Today, the fatal accident rate is a fraction of that; according to most calculations, it hovers not far above zero.

Improvements in cockpit dynamics and communication, championed by Flight Safety Foundation and other organizations, contributed to that improvement. Copilots, or first officers, are no longer expected to keep silent. Captains are expected to encourage crew input to make better decisions and prevent and mitigate errors. Crew resource management (CRM) can be defined as the effective use of all available resources for flight crew personnel to ensure safe operations, reducing error, avoiding stress, and increasing efficiency.

A 1979 workshop sponsored by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) helped establish the CRM concept. The workshop, titled Resource Management on the Flightdeck, stemmed from NASA research on air transport accidents. Research presented at the event pointed out the types of human error that lead to accidents, including poor interpersonal communication, decision-making, and leadership.

Examples included the worst aviation disaster of all time, the March 27, 1977, collision of two Boeing 747s on the ground at Tenerife in the Canary Islands. The accident killed 583 people.

A KLM 747 began a takeoff roll in low daylight visibility at the same time a Pan American World Airways 747 backtracked on the same runway. The investigation found that the KLM captain:

Took off without clearance;
Did not obey the “stand by for takeoff” instruction from the tower;
Did not reject the takeoff when the crew of the Pan Am aircraft reported they were still on the runway; and,
Replied emphatically in the affirmative when the flight engineer asked if the Pan Am 747 had cleared the runway.

The accident demonstrated in tragic terms what can happen when communication breaks down.

Early research referred to the CRM concept as cockpit resource management. By the time NASA held another workshop in 1986, the name had been changed to crew resource management. Training focused on topics such as team building, briefing strategies, situational awareness, and stress management.

By the 1990s, CRM training had evolved to better reflect the flight deck environment. Airlines began to include modules on CRM concepts in aircraft automation. This led to memory aids that help prevent mistakes in automation use. An example is CAMI, which stands for confirm, activate, monitor, intervene:

Confirm the function the crew wants to use;
Activate that function;
Monitor aircraft performance; and,
Intervene if the automation does not do what the crew intended.

Training also began to look at human factors such as fatigue, and hazardous attitudes that can lead to accidents.

Those attitudes include:

Anti-authority — Don’t tell me what to do.
Impulsivity — The weather is marginal, but let’s just try it.
Invulnerability — I never have a problem with this approach.
Macho — The rules are for average pilots, and I’m better than average.
Resignation — What’s the use?

Further refinements led to the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) approving a major change in airline training, the advanced qualification program (AQP). AQP training includes CRM concepts put to use in a line-oriented flight training (LOFT) simulator session. The “LOFT ride” takes a captain and first officer on a normal line flight from departure to destination. Along the way, they encounter problems ranging from minor issues such as a runway change to major issues such as an engine failure or fire. For most of these problems, there is no right or wrong answer as long as the flight terminates safely. The pilots are graded not only on how they flew the aircraft but also on how they communicated and considered options.

Evolving CRM research brought an acknowledgement that human error cannot be eliminated entirely. This led to the threat and error management concept (TEM): If we cannot eliminate error, then how do we minimize, mitigate, and manage it? The origin of TEM can be traced to line operational safety audits (LOSA) conducted by the University of Texas Human Factors Research Project (UT). During the 1990s, UT conducted jump-seat observations with Delta Air Lines and Continental Airlines. Trained observers categorized the origin of errors and the response to them, along with the result.

This research led to a TEM framework model with three main components:

Threats – events or errors beyond the control of line personnel. Threats can include a wide variety of things such as weather, malfunctions, air traffic congestion, and disruptive passengers.
Errors – actions or inactions by line personnel that lead to deviations from intentions or expectations.
Undesired states – conditions in which an unintended situation results in a reduced safety margin. These conditions can range from relatively minor mistakes such as turning onto the wrong taxiway, to potentially disastrous situations such as a runway incursion.

During TEM-oriented training, pilots are debriefed after simulator sessions and asked to identify the threats they faced, how they handled the threats, and the result. In addition, airlines have begun using threat-forward briefings to stay ahead of potential problems. For example, during approach briefings, instead of a rote recitation of data on an approach chart, a captain and first officer discuss anticipated threats: “There are low-level wind shear advisories for our destination. Let’s review the wind shear escape procedure.” Or for a departure briefing: “This is a low-visibility takeoff. Call out ‘center line’ if you see me drifting off it.”

This type of threat-forward briefing came about in the aftermath of the Aug. 14, 2013, crash of an Airbus A300-600 freighter during an approach to Birmingham-Shuttlesworth International Airport in Alabama, U.S. The crash killed the captain and first officer — the only people in the airplane — and destroyed the airplane.¹ The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) report on the accident said that because the crew did not re-brief when elements of their planned approach changed, they “placed themselves in an unsafe situation because they had different expectations of how the approach would be flown.”

In 2017, an AeroSafety World article noted that the Birmingham accident was an example of how briefings had become a “one-sided, box-checking” event. The article advocated a more collaborative briefing concept.

To facilitate such collaborative briefings, airlines have begun using briefing aids. These are cards or placards that organize potential threats into categories, such as personal issues, weather, mechanical problems, and others. The aids encourage conversations between captains and first officers, such as “What other threats do you see? Did I miss anything?” Ideally, the most imminent hazards become top of mind for the crew, and they become better prepared to handle those hazards.

In the decades since Ernest K. Gann’s career, the aviation community has learned much about how communication on the flight deck can enhance safety. Gann dedicated Fate is the Hunter to “old comrades with wings … forever folded.” His list of those comrades runs for five pages and concludes, “Their fortune was not so good as mine.” Lessons learned from such fortunes continue to benefit the flying public today.

Thomas W. Young is a retired airline captain and a former instructor flight engineer with the West Virginia Air National Guard. Young has logged nearly 12,000 hours of pilot and flight engineer time.

Note

The NTSB said the probable cause of the accident was “the flight crew’s continuation of an unstabilized approach and their failure to monitor the aircraft’s altitude during the approach, which led to an inadvertent descent below the minimum approach altitude and subsequently into terrain.” Among the contributing factors was “the captain’s failure to communicate his intentions to the first officer once it became apparent the vertical profile was not captured.”

Image: YAKOBCHUK VIACHESLAV / shutterstock.com

This article is the fifth in a series on landmark events in aviation since Flight Safety Foundation was founded in 1945.

Wind shear: A potential killer now better understood, detected, and avoided.

by Thomas W. Young | April 21, 2025

An airliner approaches a runway as rain lashes the windscreen. Turbulence rocks the wings, and precipitation static hisses on the radio. Lightning cracks in the distance. The pilots see the airspeed increase — then drop off. The vertical speed indicator shows a steep descent. An aural alert sounds: “WIND SHEAR, WIND SHEAR.”

This article is the fourth in a series on landmark events in aviation since Flight Safety Foundation began in 1945.

Wind shear: A potential killer now better understood, detected, and avoided.

by Thomas W. Young | April 21, 2025

The captain, flying the aircraft, calls, “Wind shear, max thrust.” He thumbs the go-around button, disengages the autopilot. Adds power and pitches up. Then he follows flight director guidance as the aircraft climbs away. The first officer advises the tower that the aircraft is going around due to a wind shear encounter. Another aircraft a few miles behind requests a holding pattern to wait out the dangerous winds before attempting an approach.

What might have spelled disaster turns out to be a mere inconvenience. That’s because the crew knew what they might face, how to recognize it, and what to do about it. Automated systems backed up their training, warned them of the hazard, and guided them out of danger. They benefited from more than a half century of research on wind shear.

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) defines wind shear as a change in wind speed and/or direction over a short distance. Wind shear can occur at any altitude, but low-level wind shear causes the most concern for pilots. The FAA says four common sources for low-level wind shear include frontal activity, thunderstorms, temperature inversions, and surface obstructions.

Pilots watch for indications of wind shear that include:

Airspeed variations of 15 kt or more;
Vertical speed variations of 500 fpm or more;
Pitch attitude excursions of five degrees or more;
Glideslope variations of one dot or more; and,
Stagnation or decrease of indicated airspeed on the takeoff roll.

According to the U.S. National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), wind shear accidents have claimed more than 1,400 lives worldwide since 1943.

In 1964, as awareness of the problem grew, the International Civil Aviation Organization called for research on low-level wind shear.

The phenomenon was little understood prior to the 1970s. Accidents that increased concern included the June 24, 1975, crash of Eastern Air Lines Flight 66 at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York. The Boeing 727, arriving from New Orleans, encountered a strong thunderstorm with heavy rain on final approach. The accident killed 113 people. A report by the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board listed the probable cause: “The aircraft’s encounter with adverse winds associated with a very strong thunderstorm located astride the instrument landing system localizer course, which resulted in a high descent rate into the non-frangible approach light towers.”

According to the FAA, the Eastern Flight 66 crash led directly to the development in 1977 of the low-level wind shear alert system (LLWAS). LLWAS gathers wind speed and direction data from pole-mounted sensors installed around the airport. When algorithms calculate the presence of wind shear, the system alerts air traffic controllers, who pass the information on to pilots.

Further research on the Flight 66 crash and other accidents identified a particularly dangerous form of low-level wind shear: microbursts. The U.S. National Weather Service (NWS) defines a microburst as “a localized column of sinking air, or downdraft, within a thunderstorm and … usually less than or equal to 2.5 miles [4.0 km] in diameter.” The NWS says wind speeds in microbursts can reach up to 100 mph and can cause major damage to homes and other structures.

University of Chicago meteorologist Theodore “Ted” Fujita led research into microbursts and other dangerous weather phenomena. In 1978, Fujita and NCAR researcher James Wilson recorded the first microburst observed on radar.

Initially, Fujita’s theories countered conventional wisdom; other meteorologists believed downdrafts weakened by the time they hit the ground and posed little hazard.

Yet microbursts continued to take their toll. On Aug. 2, 1985, Delta Air Lines Flight 191 crashed on approach to Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport in Texas (U.S.). The accident killed 137 people and spurred further research on microbursts and wind shear.

Eventually, Fujita’s work led to the installation of terminal Doppler weather radar (TDWR) at major airports. Also, airline pilots began to receive mandatory training on microbursts and wind shear.

That work started paying dividends. On a single day — July 11, 1988 — four successive United Airlines flights encountered microbursts on approach to Denver Stapleton Airport in Colorado (U.S.). Each crew flew a missed approach and then landed safety. A fifth aircraft flew a missed approach without entering a microburst. None of the aircraft were damaged, and no passengers were hurt.

Microbursts have an especially sinister trait: On first encounter, they can lure fliers into danger. When a downdraft strikes the ground, winds flow up and out from the impact point. An aircraft approaching this downdraft initially experiences a head wind that causes higher indicated airspeed. This increased performance can tempt a pilot to reduce power. But if the pilot does that, the engines are spooled back as the aircraft flies into the main column of descending air. Airspeed drops and the head wind shifts to a tail wind. Now the aircraft becomes vulnerable to a stall or to powerful downdrafts pushing it toward the ground.

Fortunately, microbursts don’t last long — typically no more than 15 minutes. Pilots can often avoid them with a brief hold.

Researchers and engineers realized an on-board wind shear detection system could help pilots recognize that trap. In 1987, the FAA first proposed requiring airborne wind shear detection equipment on airliners.

Current U.S. rules require on-board wind shear detection on jet airliners, and other regulators, including the European Union Aviation Safety Agency, have similar requirements.

Some aircraft have both predictive and reactive wind shear warning systems. The predictive function alerts pilots to wind shear conditions ahead, and the reactive function alerts when wind shear is entered. Both systems work by measuring vertical and horizontal wind speeds. During a wind shear event, the systems typically provide an aural “wind shear” warning and a visual indication on the primary flight display.

Wind shear escape procedures may vary somewhat, depending on the airline and the aircraft model. But generally, the guidance calls for an immediate go-around with maximum thrust, while maintaining landing gear and flap configuration until out of wind shear. During approaches when wind shear is anticipated, pilots normally increase airspeed up to 15 kts. The added speed provides a wider stall margin, and greater kinetic energy in the event of a missed approach.

Flying wind shear escapes requires simulator practice. When an aircraft emerges from wind shear at full thrust, pilots can easily exceed the published missed approach altitude if that altitude is fairly low, such as 3,000 ft. Pilots can also exceed the 250-kt speed limitation below 10,000 ft. But with training, they can learn to reduce power and pitch down at the right moment. Teamwork is essential — when the pilot monitoring sees vertical speed increasing and calls “out of wind shear,” that helps the pilot flying know when to pull back the thrust levers.

Wind shear detection technology continues to improve. Some of the latest ground-based systems use LIDAR (which stands for light detection and ranging, or laser detection and ranging). The system works by emitting infrared light into the atmosphere and measuring beams reflected by particles in the air.

Sydney Airport in Australia is among the airports that have recently installed LIDAR.

This progress in technology and training has made the skies safer. A 2022 paper prepared for the American Meteorological Society noted that there had not been a commercial microburst-related accident in the United States since the July 2, 1994, crash of a USAir Douglas DC-9 in Charlotte, North Carolina, which killed 37 people in the airplane.

The paper characterized the refinements in wind shear detection and avoidance as “one of the most successful and societally impactful [research to operations] programs in atmospheric science history.”

Image: by-studio/shutterstock

This article is the fourth in a series on landmark events in aviation since Flight Safety Foundation was founded in 1945.

Traffic alert and collision avoidance systems: lifesavers in the skies.

by Thomas W. Young | March 31, 2025

An airliner flies a holding pattern at 3,000 ft, with a solid overcast above. Below, mist limits visibility. The aircraft’s gray paint scheme blends with what little horizon is discernible.

Meanwhile, a Cessna 172 on a visual flight rules (VFR) flight plan approaches the fix where the airliner is holding. The decade-old Cessna’s white paint has dulled and darkened with age. The Cessna presents even less outline than the gray jet. An alert air traffic controller sees the potential conflict and calls out a warning to the airliner.

This article is the third in a series on landmark events in aviation since Flight Safety Foundation began in 1945.

Traffic alert and collision avoidance systems: lifesavers in the skies.

by Thomas W. Young | March 31, 2025

An airliner flies a holding pattern at 3,000 ft, with a solid overcast above. Below, mist limits visibility. The aircraft’s gray paint scheme blends with what little horizon is discernible.

But the call gets blocked by another aircraft checking in on the frequency. Through no fault of his own, the controller does not realize no one heard the warning. The airliner and the Cessna are now on a collision course. The airliner’s pilots cannot see the Cessna. The Cessna pilot is looking down at a chart.

An aural annunciation sounds in the airliner’s flight deck: “DESCEND, DESCEND.” The first officer, acting as the pilot flying, thumbs his touch-control steering (TCS) button to override the autopilot. He pitches down, guided by a green rectangle that appears on his primary flight display (PFD). The captain advises the controller that the aircraft is responding to a TCAS resolution advisory (RA).

The Cessna passes directly over the airliner. A few seconds later, an aural annunciation calls “CLEAR OF CONFLICT.”

This lifesaving technology came about after a number of deadly midair collisions going back to the 1940s. Among them was the June 30, 1956, collision of a Trans World Airlines Lockheed Super Constellation with a United Airlines Douglas DC-7 over the Grand Canyon in Arizona, U.S. The accident took 128 lives. An investigation noted several factors: clouds in the area reduced the time available for each flight crew to see the other airplane, the crews were preoccupied with providing passengers with a scenic view of the Grand Canyon, and air traffic advisories were inadequate.

On Sept. 10, 1976, a British Airways Hawker Siddeley HS-121 Trident collided with an Inex-Adria Aviopromet DC-9 over Croatia, killing 176 people. An investigation blamed improper air traffic control (ATC) operations and inadequate lookout and radio monitoring by the flight crews.

On Sept. 25, 1978, a Pacific Southwest Airlines (PSA) Boeing 727 collided with a Cessna 172 near San Diego [California, U.S.] International Airport. That accident took 144 lives. The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) cited the failure of the PSA crew to comply with a maintain-visual-separation clearance, including the requirement to advise ATC when visual contact was lost. The NTSB also blamed ATC procedures that authorized controllers to use visual separation in a terminal environment when the capability was available to provide vertical or lateral separation. The report also cited contributing factors, including the Cessna pilot’s failure to maintain an assigned heading.

Accidents like these made clear the need for technology to back up controllers and pilots.

A forerunner of present-day traffic-alert and collision avoidance systems (TCAS), the Beacon Collision Avoidance System (BCAS), was developed during the 1970s. BCAS relied on data from ATC radar beacon system transponders — which at the time were installed in all airliners and military aircraft and in many general aviation aircraft — to determine an aircraft’s altitude and distance from other aircraft.

Beginning in the early 1980s, TCAS systems were developed, using the basic BCAS concept with added capabilities. Piedmont Airlines flew about 2,000 hours of operational evaluation flights with TCAS during the 1980s before more widespread evaluations were conducted by regulatory authorities in the United States, Europe, Japan, and elsewhere. and in 1987, the U.S. Congress passed legislation requiring TCAS on all airliners by the end of 1993.

In 1995, the European Air Traffic Control Harmonisation and Integration Programme Project Board established a policy for mandatory collision avoidance systems — which are also known as airborne collision avoidance systems (ACAS).

TCAS works independently of controllers or equipment on the ground. The system uses transponder signals to detect potential conflicts but provides no protection against aircraft without a working transponder.

First-generation TCAS provided traffic advisories (TAs) on the position and course of nearby aircraft, and pilots had to decide how to respond. The second generation, TCAS II, provided specific instructions, or resolution advisories (RAs) in addition to TAs. For example, if two aircraft are on a collision course, one gets an advisory to descend, while the other receives a climb advisory.

In addition to aural advisories, the system also provides visual information on traffic displays through the use of standard symbology. Nearby traffic, or proximate traffic, is depicted as a blue diamond. Closer, or intruding traffic, is depicted as a yellow circle. Threat traffic is depicted as a red square. The symbols are accompanied by relative altitude data. For example, a yellow circle accompanied by a downward arrow and the numbers “-02” indicates intruding traffic that is 200 ft below the reference aircraft and descending. A red square accompanied by an upward arrow and the numbers “+01” indicates threat traffic that is 100 ft above the reference aircraft and climbing.

Current systems provide various types of vertical guidance for collision avoidance. Depending on the circumstances, the aural annunciations, accompanied by visual PFD guidance, include “CLIMB, CLIMB”; “INCREASE CLIMB”; “LEVEL OFF”; “DESCEND, DESCEND NOW”; and “MONITOR VERTICAL SPEED.”

These advisories are calculated by measuring time to the closest point of approach (CPA) rather than distance. An RA can be preventive or corrective. Preventive RAs provide restrictions on vertical speeds, and corrective RAs require a change in vertical speeds. In the event of multiple threat traffic, TCAS II systems give RAs that provide adequate vertical separation from all the threat aircraft.

To calculate these advisories, the system uses slant range between aircraft, divided by the closure rate. According to an FAA publication, this concept is credited to John S. Morrell of Bendix.

When responding to RAs, it’s important that pilots precisely follow TCAS guidance. The FAA booklet notes: “Pilots sometimes deviate significantly further from their original clearance than required or desired while complying with an RA.” The documents adds: “While over-reactions to TCAS RAs are not common, they can lead to loss of separation with other aircraft that were not originally involved in the encounter.” Through simulator training, however, pilots can become accustomed to cockpit indications during RAs and learn to pitch up or down in accordance with TCAS guidance.

On most modern commercial aircraft, pilots make TCAS selections through transponder settings via the multifunction control and display unit (MCDU). On some aircraft, selections can be made on a dedicated control unit for the transponder. Options include standby (STBY), TA-ONLY, and TA/RA. TA/RA is normally used in flight, but pilots can select TA-ONLY if aircraft performance becomes limited by an engine failure or other malfunction. In TA-ONLY, pilots will not receive resolution advisories and must judge how to avoid a traffic conflict based on their knowledge of the aircraft’s degraded capability.

TCAS is considered a last-safety net. Pilots are trained to follow resolution advisories regardless of any instructions from ATC. The primacy of TCAS resolutions became standard after a July 1, 2002, collision involving a passenger aircraft and a cargo aircraft over Überlingen, Germany. The accident killed 71 people. TCAS systems on both the Bashkirian Airlines Tupolev Tu-154M and the DHL Boeing 757 alerted the crews to conflicting traffic. An investigation found the Tupolev crew followed an ATC instruction to descend even though TCAS advised them to climb.

As the technology matures, TCAS/ACAS systems will provide even more flexibility for collision avoidance. The next generation, currently under development, will provide resolution advisories with both vertical and horizontal guidance.

It is difficult to quantify how many lives have been saved by TCAS, but some estimates place the figure in the thousands.

No system is perfect, however, and TCAS/ACAS does not relieve pilots and controllers of basic responsibilities. The FAA’s TCAS booklet notes: “It must be stressed . . . that TCAS II cannot resolve every near-midair collision and may induce a near-midair collision if certain combinations of events occur. Consequently, it is essential that ATC procedures are designed to ensure flight safety without reliance upon the use of TCAS II and that both pilots and controllers are well versed in the operational capabilities and limitations of TCAS II.”

Image: Veltman34 / shutterstock

This article is the third in a series on landmark events in aviation since Flight Safety Foundation was founded in 1945.

ICAO | UNITING AVIATION

Driving continuous improvement in aviation safety requires a collaborative approach among all industry stakeholders around the world. Thank you, ICAO, for the years of partnership in advancing global aviation safety. Our collaboration is enduring, as we address the most pressing challenges together.

A Flight Safety Foundation–led effort helped curtail one of aviation’s deadliest killers.

by Thomas W. Young | February 25, 2025

An aircraft descends through darkness in mist and low clouds. The captain, perhaps because he misreads a chart, perhaps because he gets distracted, loses situational awareness. The first officer, busy with radio calls, does not catch the navigational error. In the cabin behind them, 150 passengers drowse, oblivious to danger. There is nothing wrong with the aircraft, and it remains under the captain’s full control. But aircraft is about to descend into a mountain.

This is the second in a series on landmark events in aviation since Flight Safety Foundation began in 1945.

A Flight Safety Foundation–led effort helped curtail one of aviation’s deadliest killers.

by Thomas W. Young | February 25, 2025

An aural warning sounds in the flight deck: “TERRAIN, TERRAIN.”

The captain’s simulator training kicks in. “Terrain, max thrust,” he calls. The captain punches off the autopilot, shoves the thrust levers, and pitches up 20 degrees. A terrain display appears automatically on his multifunction display (MFD), showing a ridge ahead in red. The first officer calls out altitudes: “One thousand, climbing. Fifteen hundred, climbing.” As the aircraft gains altitude, the color-coded terrain display changes from ominous red, to a less threatening amber, to a safe green.

“Clear of terrain,” the first officer calls. Thanks to technology and training, everyone goes home to their families.

The scenario might have ended differently, especially in years past. According to the International Air Transport Association (IATA), controlled flight into terrain (CFIT) is the second-highest cause of fatal aviation accidents. (Loss of control–in flight is the first.)

IATA said that the most recent batch of 10-year statistics, from 2008 through 2017, shows that aircraft with a maximum takeoff weight of 12,540 lb (5,688 kg) or more were involved in 42 fatal CFIT accidents with 892 lives lost.

“Although few in number, CFIT accidents are almost always catastrophic,” the IATA report said.

That same period was included in a larger Airbus analysis that found a significant decline in CFIT accidents from 1997 to 2017; during that period, the rate of CFIT accidents fell by a factor of seven.

That’s largely due to glass cockpit technology, which improved navigation performance, coupled with advances such as ground-proximity warning systems (GPWS).

The CFIT problem is many decades old. Flight Safety Foundation’s Aviation Safety Network lists 895 accidents in the CFIT-Mountain category alone, going back to 1935.

One of the most infamous CFIT accidents took place on Dec. 29, 1972. Eastern Airlines Flight 401, a Lockheed L-1011, was on approach to Miami [Florida, U.S.] International Airport. According to the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board, the flight crew did not notice an inadvertent autopilot disconnect while they were troubleshooting an unsafe landing gear indication. The aircraft began an uncommanded descent into the Everglades. The resulting crash killed 112 of the 163 people on board.

That accident and others made clear the need for solutions. Airlines began voluntarily installing GPWS in their flight decks, and in 1974, the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration mandated GPWS for U.S. airlines.

The earliest form of GPWS depended on the radar altimeter to measure proximity to the ground. This “basic” GPWS helped reduce CFIT accidents, but it offered little or no look-ahead capability, and, thus, little warning of steeply rising terrain. In the 1990s, Honeywell developed an enhanced ground-proximity warning system (EGPWS) that compared aircraft position with a nearly worldwide terrain and obstacle database. The system “knew” when a mountain loomed ahead. This advanced system, known generically as the terrain awareness and warning system (TAWS), provided comprehensive alerting for a variety of potentially dangerous situations.

Honeywell engineer Don Bateman led the development of GPWS and EGPWS. Bateman held 40 U.S. patents and 80 patents in other countries for aviation safety systems. When Bateman died in 2023, Flight Safety Foundation President and CEO Dr. Hassan Shahidi said, “Don was responsible for saving more lives than anyone else in aviation history. He was a pioneer and innovator who solved one of the highest risks in aviation history, controlled flight into terrain, by his invention of GPWS.” In 2011, Bateman received the U.S. National Medal of Technology and Innovation, the highest U.S. honor for technological achievement.

Flight Safety Foundation helped the industry make the most of Bateman’s invention. In 1992, the Foundation created an International CFIT Task Force that included more than 150 representatives from airlines, equipment manufacturers, aircraft makers, and others. The task force set a five-year goal of reducing CFIT accidents by 50 percent. As the statistics cited earlier in this article suggest, the effort paid off.

The Foundation offered CFIT-reduction aids, including an FSF CFIT Checklist, which helped pilots and aircraft operators assess risks for specific flights. The checklist was published in English, Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian, and Spanish. The Foundation also created a CFIT Education and Training Aid, a two-volume package that addressed issues ranging from CFIT causal factors and avoidance to aircraft-specific CFIT escape maneuvers.

In 1996, the Foundation published an analysis of CFIT accidents in commercial operations from 1988 through 1994. The Netherlands National Aviation and Aerospace Laboratory — NLR (now known as the Royal Netherlands Aerospace Centre) produced the study, which focused on 156 accidents. The study found that the descent and approach phase of flight accounted for about 70 percent of the accidents, and that 75 percent of the accident aircraft did not have GPWS equipment.

The analysis pointed up the catastrophic nature of CFIT accidents. The study noted that in 97 percent of the 139 accidents where full data was available, the aircraft was destroyed. The fatality rate of those accidents was 91 percent.

The study’s recommendations urged all operators to comply with current and future requirements for installing GPWS. Other recommendations included instrument approach charts with colored contours to depict terrain, and visual cockpit terrain displays. The report also suggested radar altitude callouts to improve crew awareness, and better international data-sharing on CFIT accidents.

Airline crews and passengers now benefit from these recommendations. Modern TAWS equipment is classified Class A or Class B, depending on the system’s sophistication. Class A systems provide indications for the following:

Excessive descent rate;
Excessive closure rate to terrain;
Negative climb rate or altitude loss after takeoff;
Flight near terrain when not in landing configuration;
Excessive downward deviation from an instrument approach glidepath; and,
Aural callout of “500” when the aircraft descends to 500 ft above ground level.

Class B systems provide indications for the following:

Excessive descent rate;
Negative climb rate or altitude loss after takeoff; and,
Aural callout of “500” when the aircraft descends to 500 ft above the nearest runway elevation.

Aural alerts include callouts such as “SINK RATE,” “TERRAIN, TERRAIN,” “DON’T SINK,” “TOO LOW–GEAR,” “TOO LOW–FLAPS,” “TOO LOW–TERRAIN,” and “GLIDESLOPE.”

In addition, manufacturers may provide other functions. Common examples include callouts of “100” and “50” as the aircraft descends through 100 ft and 50 ft for landing.

Flight Safety Foundation’s work to reduce CFIT accidents continued into the 21st century. A 2002 report warned against erroneous instrument landing system (ILS) indications that present a CFIT hazard. The report described how the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) had noted a number of incidents caused by ILS signals radiated during testing and maintenance. The Foundation made several recommendations to guard against the problem, including:

Be aware of potential erroneous ILS indications, with or without ILS warning flags.
Check notices to air missions (NOTAMs) to determine the status of ILS components.
Ensure that reported discrepancies with ILS receivers and/or indicators have been addressed.
Ten minutes before beginning descent, conduct a thorough briefing that includes automatic flight control system modes, terrain, and typical vertical speed at the expected final approach groundspeed.
Conduct a stabilized approach.
Be especially alert when conducting an ILS approach to an uncontrolled airport, where ILS-critical areas are not protected by air traffic control (ATC).
Ensure ILS receivers are properly tuned with the signal properly identified.
Use the radar altimeter to enhance terrain awareness.
Cross-check aircraft altitude with published glideslope intercept altitude.
Disregard any ILS indications from components identified as inoperative, regardless of apparent validity.
When in doubt about the status of an ILS component, query ATC.
Cross-check groundspeed and descent rate.
Operators should equip aircraft with TAWS.
Crews should remain go-around–prepared and go-around–minded.

Future technology promises to continue making the skies safer. For example, military fighter aircraft have used automatic ground collision avoidance (Auto GCAS) technology for more than a decade. If a pilot becomes incapacitated, Auto GCAS can automatically pull up an aircraft before it impacts the ground. The U.S. Air Force’s Research Laboratory credits the system with saving at least 11 aircraft and 12 pilots. Although the system was designed for tactical aircraft such as the General Dynamics F-16 and the Lockheed Martin F-35, similar technology could make its way into commercial aviation, especially if future airliners operate with reduced crews.

Image: Denis Belitsky / shutterstock.com

This article is the second in a series on landmark events in aviation since Flight Safety Foundation was founded in 1945.

Flight Safety Foundation began its work at the dawn of a new era in aviation.

by Thomas W. Young | January 16, 2025

When Jerome F. “Jerry” Lederer, Gloria Heath, Richard Crane, and David Morrison, among others, founded Flight Safety Foundation in 1945, aviation stood at the dawn of the jet age. World War II had brought rapid advances, including turbine engines, pressurized cabins, radar, and a better understanding of aviation weather. Technology forged in conflict ushered commercial aviation into a new era. The middle of the 20th century would bring longer flights, faster speeds, higher altitudes, more passengers — and notable improvements in safety and reliability.

This article is the first in a series of articles on landmark aviation safety developments since Flight Safety Foundation was founded in 1945.

Flight Safety Foundation began its work at the dawn of a new era in aviation.

by Thomas W. Young | January 16, 2025

Perhaps the most significant technological advance during the period was the jet engine, which enabled airplanes to accomplish those longer flights at faster speeds and higher altitudes, carrying more passengers than could be accommodated in piston-powered aircraft.

British aviator and engineer Sir Frank Whittle, credited as the inventor of the jet engine, tested his first model on the ground in 1937, two years before the war began. In 1939, the same year that Germany invaded Poland, an engine designed by German engineer Hans Pabst von Ohain powered the first jet flight. Whittle’s engine made its first flight in 1941.

Jet-powered aircraft saw limited action during the six-year war, but the outbreak led governments to invest in the new technology, and a few years after the war ended, Britain produced the first jet airliner, the de Havilland Comet, which entered service in 1952 and was retired in 1968 after a series of accidents. In the years following the Comet’s introduction, other jet aircraft came into service, including, in 1958, the Boeing 707, often considered the first successful jet airliner.

The jet age revolutionized air travel, making it more efficient, reliable and safer.

As jet airplanes revolutionized air travel, safety initiatives proliferated, including a number of projects developed and implemented by the fledgling Flight Safety Foundation.

After the Celebrations

Tickertape from the celebrations marking the end of World War II had scarcely been swept away before it became apparent that the lessons learned by military aviators during the war could be applied to civil aviation operations during peace.

Flight Safety Foundation was formed in 1945 by Crane, a former military pilot and founder of the first regional airline in the United States, and Morrison, an inventor and engineer, as a forum for their research into cockpit design, human factors, and crash injuries. They both worked at Cornell University’s Crash Aviation Injury Research (AvCIR) unit, which eventually became a division of the Foundation.

Around the same time, Lederer, an engineer who had been working for a company of aviation insurance underwriters, and his assistant, pilot Gloria W. Heath, organized the Engineering for Safety committee under the Institute of Aeronautical Sciences (now the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics) to disseminate aviation safety information. In 1947, Lederer and Heath joined Flight Safety Foundation to expand their safety information dissemination effort; that project became the first safety information analysis and sharing.

Lederer became the first director of the new Flight Safety Foundation in 1947, one year after he had organized the first international air safety summit, which drew eight attendees.

Among the Foundation’s earliest post-war projects were the first formal course in aircraft accident investigation; the first computer modeling of accident forces, which led to improved passenger restraint systems; early studies of the use of anti-collision lights, airborne weather radar, and other basic aviation safety devices; the first international, confidential pilot safety-reporting system; the first distribution of aircraft mechanical malfunction reports; and the first technical work on explosion-resistant helicopter fuel tanks.

The Foundation also was an early advocate of real-time remote monitoring of pilot/aircraft performance using telemetry and of what we now call “just culture.” In 1951, Lederer said, “Our answer to the problem of securing information on near-accidents is to have a place where personnel can confess without being ridiculed or punished or [required to] publicly cast [a negative] reflection on fellow workers.”

War and Peace

The industry underwent many other changes in the early years following World War II, as wartime innovations left their marks on civil aviation.

For example, to fly at high altitudes, jets needed pressurized cabins. Boeing built the first pressurized airliner, the Boeing 307 Stratoliner, which first flew in 1938, before U.S. involvement in the war; its design was borrowed from that of military aircraft under development, incorporating the wings, tail, and engines of the B-17C.

Aircraft designers and builders gained more experience with pressurization through aircraft such as the B-29 Superfortress. The B-29’s pressurization system used compressed air tapped from the superchargers on the inboard engines. Piston-driven Wright R-3350 Duplex-Cyclone engines powered the Superfortress. Pressurization systems in modern jet aircraft tap bleed air from the compressor section of turbine engines.

As pressurization helped military aircraft venture into high altitudes during the war, crews encountered an unexpected phenomenon — powerful winds, sometimes exceeding 200 kt, caused problems with navigation and fuel consumption, among other things. As head winds, jet streams could make aircraft run low on fuel. As tail winds, they could produce groundspeeds higher than had been seen before.

This likely came as a surprise to the crews. Two decades earlier, a Japanese meteorologist, Wasaburo Oishi, had identified strong high-altitude winds. But he published his work in Esperanto, an artificially constructed language created in the 1870s to promote international communication. In this case, Esperanto seems to have had the opposite effect, as few people were familiar with Esperanto and most could not understand what he had written.

The belated understanding of jet streams led to improved weather forecasting, with direct benefits to aviation. By watching jet streams, meteorologists could better predict where weather systems were headed.

Airline dispatchers also made use of jet stream information to enable flight crews to avoid clear air turbulence and adverse head winds and to take advantage of good tail winds.

Other improvements in meteorology that began during the war included the expanded use of weather balloons to measure atmospheric pressure, temperature, humidity, wind direction, and speed, and increased cooperation between military and civilian meteorologists.

In the decades since then, the sharing of weather data has expanded significantly. Today, the U.N. World Meteorological Organization promotes international cooperation on atmospheric science.

Radar and Air Traffic Control

After World War II, rapid growth in civilian aviation demanded better air traffic control. Another wartime advance, radar, enabled controllers to monitor the position of aircraft in real time. Development of radar — short for radio detection and ranging — began in the 19th century with experiments by German physicist Heinrich Hertz, who recognized how radio waves reflect off metal objects.

During the 1930s, as the threat of war loomed in Europe, Scottish scientist Robert Watson-Watt began experiments on detecting aircraft by using radio waves, and in 1935, Watson-Watt and his assistant Arnold Wilkins used a British Broadcasting Corporation transmitter in a successful demonstration that detected a Handley Page Heyford bomber.

Eventually, the British government built a series of radar towers, called Chain Home Stations, to detect enemy aircraft. These radar stations played a critical role during the 1940 Battle of Britain.

Meanwhile, other nations, including Germany, the Soviet Union, and the United States, were making their own progress with radar, and soon, radar equipment became compact enough to install in cockpits. Initially, military planes used their radars to find targets. However, this innovation opened the path for radar applications beyond the detection and monitoring of aircraft. Airborne radar eventually led to the precise color weather radar in flight decks today.

International Cooperation

Even before the war ended, visionaries saw how commercial aviation would shorten travel times, expand commerce, and connect nations more closely. This new world, made smaller by fast aircraft, would require international cooperation. Airplanes flying across national borders would need to operate by common rules.

This realization led representatives of 52 countries to meet in 1944 to sign the Convention on International Civil Aviation, more commonly called the “Chicago Convention.” The agreement was drafted to “create and preserve friendship and understanding among the nations and peoples of the world,” and it led to the creation in 1947 of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), which describes its role as helping nations “achieve the highest possible degree of uniformity in civil aviation regulations, standards, procedures, and organization.”

Today, ICAO has 193 member states, all signatories to the Chicago Convention.

ICAO published its Annex 13 to the Convention on International Civil Aviation in 1951. Annex 13 remains the definitive guide to accident investigation, covering topics such as who should conduct investigations, which parties can be involved, what rights those parties have, and how final results should be reported.

These developments set the stage for the modern era of commercial aviation and presented a mandate for the new Flight Safety Foundation. Over the eight decades that followed, the Foundation has initiated projects and developed products to reduce risk and improve aviation safety.

Upcoming articles will discuss other safety improvements during the past 80 years, and Flight Safety Foundation’s role in those advances.

This article is the first in a series on landmark events in aviation since Flight Safety Foundation was founded in 1945.

Looking Back and Moving Forward - Celebrating 80 Years of Aviation Safety Excellence

Through CRM and TEM, communication has been key to safety improvements.

Read the Full Article Here

Wind shear: A potential killer now better understood, detected, and avoided.

Read the Full Article Here

Traffic alert and collision avoidance systems: lifesavers in the skies.

Read the Full Article Here

ICAO | UNITING AVIATION

A Flight Safety Foundation–led effort helped curtail one of aviation’s deadliest killers.

Read the Full Article Here

Flight Safety Foundation began its work at the dawn of a new era in aviation.

Read the Full Article Here