Friday Fact – Comet
Say the word Comet and a lot of people in aviation will instantly think of the mid-air breakups caused by square windows accelerating metal fatigue. What is far less known is that 2 out of the Comets Mk1’s first 5 accidents were down to the square windows and after the problem was fixed a further […]
Leading Safety, and Leading Safely – Part 6 – Are we getting better at this stuff?
Most of us are so busy fire-fighting the daily challenges that flood our inboxes that we often fail to take the time to have a look and see how we are doing, to improve. Whilst measuring and benchmarking performance using metrics and indicators allows comparison and competition (as long as it is used constructively) and […]
read full story >>Leading Safety, and Leading Safely – Part 5 – Doing the do!
Good ol’ Betty Boo! She got the essence of Safety leadership, it is about doing what you say you are going to do. We talk about execution, bringing to life the direction you have set and actually taking action (as you said you were going to do in your strategy and plan!). It also encompasses […]
read full story >>Leading Safety, Leading Safely Part 4 – Engaging person to person
Engagement, Communication, Promotion, MBWA (Management By Walking Around) surely it’s all the same, isn’t it? One of the most significant safety leadership challenges out there is a lack of real, tangible and meaningful engagement, showing that leaders really are interested in their teams, and how they are being supported in delivering a safe operation. Safety […]
read full story >>Leading Safety, and leading Safely – Part 3 – Being accountable
Everyone is accountable, aren’t they? Safety is everyone’s responsibility. In fact, what we normally tend to hear when people say that is ‘Safety is everyone (else’s) responsibility’! Being accountable for a behaviour, standard or task implies not only the responsibility to make sure it happens but having control of those things that affect it. In […]
read full story >>Leading Safety, and Leading Safely – Part 2 – Providing Direction
You have a safety policy, surely that provides all the direction the organisation needs? Organisations are required by regulation or legislation to develop and display their safety policy, but from our experience it usually doesn’t mean anything to anyone, or support the people and their behaviours. It could be argued it is really a compliance […]
Leading Safety, and leading safely – Part 1
Really, another blog on leadership, isn’t LinkedIn full enough of leadership fluff? It is true that there is a bucket of information out there, some of it digestible, some of it not so. However, after almost four years of working with aviation organisations around the world following a career in naval aviation, and discussing daily […]
Baines Simmons Wins Royal Air Force of Oman (RAFO) Consultancy Contract
Air Partner’s aviation safety consultancy company Baines Simmons has been awarded a contract to provide aviation safety consultancy services to the Royal Air Force of Oman (RAFO). The objective of the programme is to improve and safeguard the airworthiness of all RAFO aircraft for years to come. The contract supports the development of a new […]
read full story >>Flying the Furrow – Friday Fact
Regarding last week’s Friday fact, navigating by following railway lines is a tried and tested practice but what happens when you set up a new route across the desert and there are no railways to follow? When a new route was proposed in 1921 between Palestine and Iraq, the decision was taken to emulate a […]
read full story >>Top safety risks in commercial aviation – Friday Fact
In 1925 Sir Sefton Brancker, Director of Civil Aviation, presented a paper to the to the Royal Aeronautical Society in which he analysed the “various sources of danger“. Sir Sefton stated that the top dangers present in aviation were: Breakage of the aircraft itself in the air Jamming or failure of controls Fire Powerplant failure […]