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Flight Safety Consultancy
Alongside our flight data service, we offer a consultancy service. All the FDS consultants are highly experienced specialists in safety management. We can assist your airline from carrying out a simple gap audit to setting up a complete safety department.
Statistics You Can Use
How often have you seen bar charts that leave you cold? With FDS we discuss your needs and tailor the diagrams to suit your operational needs. Often these are aimed at the airline's periodic publications, so the diagram can be copied straight into the newsletter or circular.
Responsive 24/7
Our team of analysts are available every working day, but you may need support for an incident outside those hours. For this reason FDS provide an Out-of-Hours number that you can call any hour of the day or night. In practice, this is rarely used but when engineering need support for decision making it's invaluable.
Engineering Alerts
An engineering alert, such as for a hard landing or flap overspeed, is usually associated with an engineering inspection. The sooner engineering are told about this the more time they have to arrange the necessary work. For this reason, FDS engineering alerts are output within one hour of receiving the data. No other system offers this speed of response.
Visualisation
Presenting flight data in the form of a set of flight instruments allows a pilot to relive a flight, and see exactly what happened. A powerful debriefing and training tool, optional visualisation is available via website download for every takeoff or landing.
Engine Monitoring
FDS extract recorded engine data for the takeoff and cruise power settings, then format this for use by engine monitoring programs such as SAGE, COMPASS or P&W EHM. This is sent to the airline or to the engine monitoring specialist where the data is automatically processed for engine trending.
Sharing Data for Safety Comparison
All airlines involved in flight data monitoring see the value in sharing data. By comparing your event rate with other similar operators you can get an idea about your relative safety performance. This is especially useful for airline management who need independent measurements to base decisions about expenditure.
FDS provide comparative event rates between our customers in a de-identified manner. This is a unique service and, as every event has been validated, we know the basis of comparison is fair.
Working for the Future
We believe that there is more information available in the data than we currently extract, so we set up a project to examine how to get more from the statistical data available. This project is being supported by the UK Government and the European Union. For more information see www.fdsktp.co.uk.
Faulty Events
Flight data analysis software can include errors in coding and some very unusual events are included but they can may not have been tested using real flight data. At FDS we have a "backstop" quality procedure that finds events that are never triggered and, where necessary, these are reprogrammed to correct the coding errors.
If you purchased your FDM software, how do you know if all your events are working?
All Analysts Qualified
In FDS we believe that flight data analysis is a skilled task. Declaring an event valid can lead to examination of the pilot's actions, so the analyst must be prepared to justify his decisions. For this reason FDS analysts hold either a degree or higher qualification from a university, or held ATPL qualifications at the level of Captain.
Every Event Checked
FDS analysts check every event before it is sent to the flight safety officer. Only by doing this can we be certain that the events are valid and exactly comply with the event definitions set out by the airline.
The secondary advantage of this approach is that our statistics are exact. No allowance need be made for software errors, instrumentation defects or variations between aircraft.
Service Model
What is our aim at FDS? To be better than the flight data department you would have set up if you had an in-house department.
Imagine an office manned every day and never closed for analyst's holidays or sickness. The best software with backups and maintenance carried out by certified experts. Friendly analysts ready with quick answers to your questions combined with world-class expertise. All accessible via the Internet so ready to work whenever you are. What more could you ask for?
Sharing Events
When FDS or one of our customers develops a new event, this is made available to all other customers. In this way the FDS community improves the standard of monitoring more quickly than would be possible for a single airline working in isolation.
For example, one operator found that crews were landing with insufficient engine power to perform a satisfactory go-around. The Low Power on Approach event was developed and is now standard feature of the FDS event set.
Sharing Experiences
FDS Users asked us to arrange a Users' Group where they could share safety information. This is held every six months and is a unique forum because the airines involved meet without being under scrutiny from the Aviation Authorities.
Over the years the flight safety officers have developed friendships, so that now they share information in an atmosphere of confidence and mutual respect. An added bonus is that after the meetings, FDS customers can discuss confidential safety issues with Users' Group colleagues, where they may not be able to discuss such matters inside their airline.
Tailored Event Set
FDS tailor flight safety events to suit each operator. Every operator is special and a "one size fits all" approach will not allow for these differences.
Furthermore as the safety specialists in the airline learn about how their crews are behaving, so they will need to refine the event set. These changes are included within the FDS service as we strongly believe that the events should evolve to meet your changing needs.
Monitoring Old Aircraft
FDS now monitor aircraft with only five recorded parameters. If you have Pitch, Heading, Airspeed, Altitude and Vertical g then we can provide an FDM service monitoring an event set like this:
- Heading deviation during take-off
- Pitch high at take off
- Pitch rate low during take off
- Pitch high between 35 and 400 feet
- Pitch rate high during take-off (below 50 feet)
- Speed high at lift off
- Speed low at lift off
- Pitch rate high during initial climb (above 50 feet)
- Roll exceedance below 500 feet for 2 seconds
- Roll exceedance between 500 and 1500 feet for 2 seconds
- Height lost during initial climb, between 50 and 1000 feet
- Height lost during initial climb, between 1000 and 2000 feet
- Speed low during climb, between 35 and 400 feet
- Speed low during climb, between 400 and 1500 feet
- Speed high climb below 500ft
- Roll exceedance above 1500 feet agl.
- Speed exceedance VMO
- Maximum operating altitude
- Speed high at low altitude (Birdstrike limit)
- High rate of descent during approach, between 2000 and 1000 feet
- High rate of descent during approach, between 1000 and 50 feet
- Pitch high during final approach, between 1000 and 100 feet
- Pitch low during final approach, between 1000 and 100 feet
- Speed high during approach at 1000 feet
- Speed high during approach at 500 feet
- Speed high descent below 500ft
- Heading deviation during landing, above 50 kts
- Speed high at landing
- Go around
- Level Bust
- Bounced landing
- High vertical g at touchdown
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