WASHINGTON—The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) on Tuesday proposed requiring charter, commuter, air tour operators, and aircraft manufacturers to implement a key safety tool aimed at reducing accidents.
The U.S. regulator wants to extend a mandate to adopt so-called Safety Management Systems (SMS), which are a set of policies and procedures to proactively identify and address potential operational hazards early on. U.S. airlines have been required to have SMS since 2018 and some aerospace companies already voluntarily have SMS programs like Boeing, GE, and Raytheon-subsidiary Pratt & Whitney
Congress in 2020 directed the FAA to mandate SMS for aircraft manufacturers as part of a wide-ranging certification reform bill following two fatal Boeing 737 MAX crashes but the FAA’s proposed rule goes beyond the requirements from lawmakers. SMS systems require four key components—safety policy, safety risk management, safety assurance, and safety promotion….