EUROCONTROL’S SKYbrary Hosts Complete Guide
Alexandria, VA, September 24, 2009 — Citing the prevalence of human factors issues in aircraft accidents and incidents, the Flight Safety Foundation’s European Advisory Committee (EAC) has released the Operator’s Guide to Human Factors in Aviation (OGHFA) to bridge the gap between theory and practice to improve the safety and efficiency of commercial aviation.
“The challenge that the EAC faced was to gather this available scientific information and make it understandable and accessible for aviation operators,” commented FSF President and CEO William R. Voss. “The end result is an extraordinary collection of valuable information that we’ve made available to the entire aviation community through the much appreciated assistance of EUROCONTROL and SKYbrary. The mission of the Foundation since its founding has been to develop and widely distribute safety materials for aviation, and this project fits perfectly with this mission.”
The OGHFA consists of over 100 articles and supporting visual aids which present human factors issues in a manner tailored to aviation operators. The articles are divided into four categories:
- Crew Action and Behavior
- Personal Influences, involving the “internal state” of each crewmember, such as knowledge, stress, fatigue, awareness and many other factors.
- Organizational and Environmental Influences, including factors beyond the control of the crew but under the control of the airline.
- Information Influences, including the content and form of information available to a crew, such as checklists, manuals, navigational charts, and other items.
“OGHFA is a hugely important resource for airline operators, and one that can make a real contribution to improving safety. It needs to be widely available to the aviation community from a central location — which makes SKYbrary, the online library resource for aviation safety – such an ideal tool for this purpose,” said Tzvetomir Blajev, the EUROCONTROL Coordinator Safety Improvement Initiatives and FSF Fellow.
A complete copy of the OGHFA can be obtained at www.skybrary.aero. SKYbrary is an initiative of EUROCONTROL, the European Strategic Safety Initiative, the International Civil Aviation Organization, the UK Flight Safety Committee and the Flight Safety Foundation. It was developed to provide a comprehensive online source for aviation safety information.
###
Flight Safety Foundation is an independent, non-profit, international organization engaged in research, auditing, education, advocacy and publishing to improve aviation safety. The Foundation’s mission is to pursue the continuous improvement of global aviation safety and the prevention of accidents. www.flightsafety.org
Contact: Emily McGee, Director of Communications, 1-703-739-6700, ext. 126; mcgee@flightsafety.org