Safety Management System is a very effective and proven management system to identify hazards in a proactive manner and to ensure that hazards do not turn into accidents, incidents, through timely elimination of hazards.
SMS was introduced in India for the first time on 20 Jul 10 by DGCA through the issue of a CAR. Since then DGCA has been making concerted efforts to ensure that the SMS is implemented in letter and spirit. In a recent audit by DGCA, it was observed that the implementation of SMS is lacking on many fronts and it is not being taken seriously by most of the Operators. The lack of proper implementation of SMS was also highlighted by the Honorable Minister of Civil Aviation during his briefing to the lawmakers in Parliament.
The Scope of SMS includes all the personnel of the operator right from the CEO downwards to lowest level including employees from Finance, HR, Admin and marketing etc. Every employee of the Company should be sensitized to the concept of Safety Management System depending on their role and responsibilities. Hence, everyone in an Aviation Company should be trained on SMS.
Most of the Operators have no choice but to train their employees i.e. Pilots, Cabin Crew, Accountable Executives/Managers, Chief, Deputy Chief of Flight Safety and Safety Manager etc. as mandated by DGCA. Other employees of the Company obviously remain ignorant about the SMS in absence of any training.
It is pertinent to mention here that professional and vibrant Operators like Aviation Department of Gujarat and OSS Air Management have trained all their personnel including the class four helpers on SMS.
The Management of the Aviation organisations should appreciate that SMS is a very useful system to promote safety and hence, it would serve the interest of the Company towards maintenance of a safe operating environment. It needs to be remembered that Accidents are bad for business and reputation and can impact very heavily on the finances and survivability of a Company.
Keeping in mind the importance of SMS towards safety and the reluctance of the Operators to get the SMS training done for all their personnel due to financial considerations, ASMSI has decided to conduct Online SMS training of all the personnel of a Company free of cost.
Kindly do not hesitate and feel free to avail this opportunity of getting all your personnel trained on SMS, without incurring any expenditure. Training of all your personnel on SMS will go a long way in enhancing safety of your operations and promoting safety culture in your organisation.
It must be remembered that Absence of Accidents does not mean that an organisation is Safe.
Air Commodore BS Siwach AVSM YSM VM (VETERAN) (9871251590)
Director General,Aviation safety Management Society of India
aviationsafetyindia@gmail.com
www.aviationsafetyindia.com