Tens of thousands of people involved in aviation maintenance are being asked to participate in a survey to determine why safety action programs for maintenance lag behind the proliferation of such programs for flight operations.
“This is the first nationwide, one-shot maintenance safety survey,” declared Dr. Manoj Patankar. He is the survey project director for the Department of Aviation Science at Missouri’s St. Louis University. The project is funded by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
The survey was triggered by the great disparity between Aviation Safety Action Programs (ASAP) for flight operations and for maintenance operations. Since the 1996 inception of ASAP, 28 airlines have adopted it for pilots, but only six carriers have implemented the program for the maintenance side of operations.
The survey is an effort to address the factors behind the disparity, Patankar explained.
ASAP allows persons to anonymously report safety deficiencies to management, thereby allowing hazards, deficiencies and shortcomings to come to light for corrective action that would not necessarily have done so if the reporting individuals feared facing penalties or FAA enforcement action. Individual ASAP reports submitted to companies also are passed along to the Aviation Safety Reporting System (ASRS), which is maintained by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration on behalf of the FAA. By this means, safety problems reported at the company level are incorporated into a national-level database for trend tracking and pattern analysis across the industry. Individuals also can report to ASRS directly, without having to go through ASAP.
Patankar noted that there has been an exponential rise in the number of ASRS reports filed by mechanics since 1996, so it is evident that mechanics are willing to report their errors.
Yet the number of maintenance-related ASAP programs is about one-fifth of the number of such programs for flight operations.
“Why do we have such a difference?” Patankar asked. “Is it because mechanics or companies don’t believe in the program? Or is it because FAA inspectors aren’t pushing it?”
The survey is an attempt to provide insights into such questions. Some 83,000 questionnaires were mailed in February.
“I think this survey differs significantly from previous efforts in terms of size and scope,” Patankar said. Earlier studies of maintenance resource management (MRM) – the maintenance version of crew resource management (CRM) – involved 25-50 participants at a time (although totaling to roughly several thousand responses over a 13-year period). This ASAP survey seeks responses from a randomly selected national sample of mechanics in a one-shot approach.
To date, some 3,200 completed questionnaires have been returned. “Considering that about 50 percent of the recipients may not be the best match for this study, and the typical return rate for mail-in surveys tends to be about 30 percent, I would like to get about 12,000 responses by the end of April,” Patankar said.
The form features 104 items, and all responses are anonymous. In fact, the “Dear Participant” section at the top of the questionnaire assures, “There is no way to identify individuals who participate or don’t participate in this survey.”
The question items came out of previous studies of aviation maintenance and, more directly for this survey, out of focus group meetings held last fall. Six focus groups were conducted, three with persons from companies that have maintenance ASAP programs, and three with employees from airlines that do not have maintenance ASAP programs.
Many questions on the form touch on the sensitive issue of trust. “That item came up in our previous studies and in the focus groups,” Patankar said. Those earlier studies found that up to 30 percent of mechanics believed their managers could not be trusted to act in the interest of safety. In the focus groups, Patankar recalled, “The mechanics said that 30 percent figure seemed low.”
Survey responses will be analyzed over the summer, with a report and recommendations submitted to the FAA in the fall.
The findings on trust will be important. Without trust, reporting will be suppressed. Without reports, data will be lacking. Without data, the FAA’s ethic of “data-driven safety” will be shortchanged.
>> Patankar, e-mail [email protected] <<
The Study Objective
“Because of the potential benefits to safety, a major interest of the FAA is to determine whether the failure of ASAPs to expand to multiple operators as rapidly for aircraft maintenance as it has for pilots is attributable to FAA’s … policy, and/or other factors beyond the control of the FAA.”
Source: First Year Report: August 2003-January 2004, by Manoj Patankar, St. Louis Univ., Feb. 28, 2004, p. 2
On the Minds of the Mechanics
What’s the first word/phrase that comes to mind when you hear “Maintenance ASAP”?
- Safety
- Time commitment involved; labor intensive
- Impressed by airline’s commitment
- Impressed by union’s resources
- ASAP used to be viewed as a “Get out of jail FREE” card but the new MOU has changed it a bit
- Long time in coming
- Did not know, until several months ago, what ASAP was. Neither do our supervisors or mechanics. I questioned about 50-60 people about it.
- Exposure [as in potential personal risk of reporting problems]
Source: First Year Report: August 2003-January 2004, by Manoj Patankar, St. Louis Univ., Feb. 28, 2004, p. 6
Maintenance Aviation Safety Action Program (ASAP) Questionnaire
SELECTED ITEMS
Rating Scores
0 – Not Applicable
1 – Strongly Disagree
2 – Slightly Disagree
3 – Neutral
4 – Slightly Agree
5 – Strongly Agree
Sample Questions: Using the scale above, please circle the number that best describes your opinion
For employees of all organizations, including the FAA (emphasis in original):
Question (Numbers list the questions in the full 104 item survey) [ASW remarks in brackets]
1. A mechanic who knowingly uses a substitute non-approved part or lubricant at the direction of his/her immediate supervisor in order not to delay completion of a job order is exhibiting intentional disregard for safety.
5. Mechanics sign off on job cards in a hurry, not realizing that one or more items on the card may not have been accomplished. [ASW: emphasis in original.]
6. Supervisors sign off on job cards in a hurry, not realizing that one or more items on the card may not have been accomplished.
7. It is my responsibility to report my errors to my supervisor, regardless of the consequences. [ASW: There are consequences, and sometimes they can be severe.]
9. My supervisor can be trusted.
12. Procedural violations occur regularly in maintenance tasks. [ASW: Yes!]
For FAA employees only:
30. My supervisor fully supports an ASAP program.
32. In an ASAP program, the company as well as the labor union is likely to discuss issues that would never be considered in a conventional rule violation case.
36. Some FAA inspectors do not believe in an ASAP program.
Employees of all organizations with maintenance ASAP (not FAA employees):
47. A problem with Maintenance ASAP programs is that it is a secret. Very few people know about the success of these programs. [ASW: What success?]
64. In our company, we are able to connect Maintenance ASAP cases with those found on the flight side of the company.
Employees of organizations without Maintenance ASAP (not FAA employees):
75. The Aviation Safety Reporting System operated by NASA (the NASA Form) provides adequate regulatory protection to the mechanics. [ASW: a reference to ASRS; few mechanics use it.]
80. Our mechanics don’t trust the company management. [ASW: a hot issue.]
85. Our mechanics don’t trust the local FAA.
86. Our management doesn’t trust our mechanics. [ASW: a hot issue.]
93. Our management is concerned that the FAA may find out about a systemic problem and force the company to ground a large fleet of airplanes for a relatively minor problem.
94. I work for a Part 145 Repair Station. We perform maintenance for a Part 121 operator that has an ASAP program. I wish our maintenance errors were covered by their ASAP agreement.
95. Our mechanics feel comfortable reporting safety problems to the management. [ASW: Do they?]
96. Our management is responsive to safety concerns raised by the mechanics. [ASW: Are they?]
100. Our mechanics believe that they don’t have much control over the company’s negative practices. Consequently, they don’t have much faith in the ASAP or similar processes. [ASW: Probably true.]
Source: St. Louis University