Ime Akpan
The director general of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Capt. Muhtar Usman has said that out of a total of thirty seven (37) safety recommendations which the Accident Investigation Bureau (AIB) issued to the NCAA, the regulatory agency had fully implemented 29.
Usman who disclosed this in his address at AIB’s stakeholders’ forum for the amendment of the bureau’s regulations 2016 held in Lagos recently also stated that two of the recommendations were partially implemented, one was yet to be implemented while NCAA disagreed with remaining five and provided reasons.
He announced that the agency forwarded the status of implementation of the three outstanding safety recommendations to the AIB Safety Recommendation Committee set up by the minister of state for aviation, Senator Hadi Sirika.
Usman, who appreciated the AIB for issuing safety recommendation, pledged to cooperate and continuously improve the existing partnership with the Bureau to ensure safe skies within Nigeria.
He said the safety recommendations that the NCAA had implemented had “assisted in improving our processes, led to the development of new and amendment of existing procedures, amendment of regulatory requirements and overall the strengthening of our safety oversight obligations.
The Authority had also reviewed and analyzed several observations and conclusions in the draft and final reports and had afterwards issued All Operators Letters to address certain safety issues, re-issued documents and heightened its surveillance on certain approved entities. So, the issuance of safety recommendations and their appropriate implementation by the Authority is invaluable to the functions of the Authority.
The NCAA is progressively ensuring the implementation of its responsibility with respect to enforcing compliance by relevant stakeholders with the AIB safety recommendations. The current procedures to assure the above include the distribution of the safety recommendations to the appropriate technical directorates with oversight responsibilities on the concerned certified entities, requiring their accomplishment with supporting evidences and thereafter providing reports to the office of the Director General for documentations and records.
“It is noteworthy to state that the whole process of management of the output from accident and incident investigation reports, with particular emphasis on the Safety Recommendations, form a major input into the NCAA Safety Oversight System that the NCAA uses to make the necessary safety oversight adjustment in order to maintain the safety resilience of the industry under the new State Safety Programme as required by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO).”
Earlier, Usman had said that the Nigerian Civil Aviation Act, 2006 Part VIII, Section 29 (13) states that “On the basis of the findings of an accident investigation, the Authority shall be informed and the director general shall take corrective actions that, in the judgment of the Authority, will prevent similar accidents in the future”.
To enable the NCAA comply with the requirements of the Act and the AIB Regulations, the director general said the Authority had constituted a team of inspectors from the different technical areas and specialties of airworthiness, flight operations, air navigation services, personnel licensing and aerodrome operations.
He explained that on receipt of the draft reports on serious incidents and accidents from the AIB, the team “reviews the report in order to enhance its value, determine the necessity (whether to or not) to implement the safety recommendation and where required, develop safety actions to appropriately address the safety recommendations.
“The NCAA’s response is forwarded to the Director General for amendments and acceptability and thereafter to the Bureau. Several final reports issued by the AIB contain these safety actions by the NCAA.”
