Civil Aviation
The International Civil Aviation Organization has recommended that all aviation authorities implement SMS regulatory structures. ICAO has provided resources to assist with implementation, including the ICAO Safety Management Manual. Unlike the traditional occupational safety focus of SMS, the ICAO focus is to use SMS for managing aviation safety. Id.
The United States has introduced SMS for airports through an advisory circular and other guidance.
The United States announced at the 2008 EASA/FAA/TC International Safety Conference that they would be developing regulations to implement SMS for repair stations, air carriers, and manufacturers. The FAA formed a rulemaking committee to address the implementation (known as the SMS ARC). The SMS ARC reported its findings to the FAA on March 31, 2010. The Report recognizes that many of the elements of SMS already exist in the U.S. regulations, but that some elements do not yet exist. A draft of what the US SMS rule might look like was proposed by one trade association that participated in the ARC. Currently, the FAA is supporting voluntary pilot projects for SMS.
The Federal Aviation Administration has also required that all FAA services and offices adopt a common Aviation Safety (AVS)Safety Management System (AVSSMS). This is what ICAO calls a State Safety Program (SSP). An overview of the FAA approach to SMS may be found in the following PDF document.
The Federal Aviation Administration published a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) for the establishment of SMS for air carriers. That NPRM explains that it is intended to serve as the foundation for rules that would later be applied to Part 135 operators, Part 145 repair stations and Part 21 manufacturers. Id. Several U.S. trade associations filed comments in response to the air carrier NPRM, including ASA and MARPA. Among these comments were arguments for developing separate SMS regulations for other certificate holders, in order to make sure that SM remains a usable tool for advancing safety (rather than a uniform but useless paperwork exercise). In addition, the Federal Aviation Administration has also filed a NPRM for SMS for airports, which would be separate from the rules for SMS for air carriers (consistent with the arguments of the trade associations).
The European Aviation Safety Administration (EASA) began the process of implementing Safety Management System (SMS) regulations by issuing Terms of Reference (TOR) on July 18, 2011. That was followed by a Notice of Proposed Amendment (NPA) issued on January 21, 2013. The proposed EASA regulation would apply to repair stations, but would have significant ancillary effects on other aviation industry sub-sectors.
Read more about this topic: Safety Management Systems, Implementation, Adoption of SMSs For Industry Sectors
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