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Study
Shows High Accident Rate For 'Ad Hoc' Cargo Operations
Researchers in the Netherlands have released a landmark study
showing a disproportionately high accident rate (6.85 accidents per million
flights) among "ad hoc" cargo operators, which are characterized
as conducting a high percentage of unscheduled flights, typically on routes not
served by major air-cargo operators, and as having few aircraft, often older
aircraft, in their fleets.
By comparison, scheduled passenger flights of
major operators had a rate of 1.08 accidents per million flights, said a report
presented during the Flight Safety Foundation (FSF) 12th annual European
Aviation Safety Seminar (EASS), March 6-8, in Amsterdam, Netherlands.
The seminar was co-presented by the European Regions Airline
Association and was attended by more than 260 aviation-safety professionals from
more than 40 countries.
Alfred Roelen and Mijntje Pikaar, research scientists at National Aerospace
Laboratory (NLR)-Netherlands, and Wim Ovaa, national coordinator of the Safety
Assessment of Foreign Aircraft program in the Netherlands Directorate General of
Civil Aviation (RLD), wrote the report, "The Need to Improve Safety of Ad
Hoc Cargo Operations."
Using data from 1970 through June 1999 for fatal accidents and hull-loss
accidents among Western-built jets and turboprop aircraft, the study is the
first to measure the accident rate for ad hoc cargo operators, Roelen said.
The accident rate for ad hoc operators compares with 3.51
accidents per million flights for major air-cargo operators, 1.02 accidents per
million flights for integrators (large parcel-delivery operators that stress
on-time performance) and 1.85 accidents per million flights for supplemental
operators (commuter airlines and their cargo counterparts).
During the study period, 46 accidents occurred among major operators, six
accidents occurred among integrators, nine accidents occurred among supplemental
operators and 46 accidents occurred among ad hoc operators.
"While the ad hoc operators represent only a small portion of the global
aviation industry, the impact on the safety record of the cargo sector is
believed to be significant," Roelen said. "Asia, South America and
especially Africa are the problem areas."
The accident rates per million flights conducted by ad hoc cargo operators in
these regions were: 7.55 in Asia, 10.82 in South America and 16.45 in Africa.
The report said that the main reason for these levels of cargo-operator safety
in developing countries is a lack of financial resources, and the researchers
recommended strengthening the oversight capability of national aviation
authorities as the best long-term method of preventing accidents.
The accident rate among ad hoc cargo operators in North America was 5.41
accidents per million flights. Roelen said that this is two times higher than
the accident rate among major cargo operators in North America.
Roelen said that the accident rate among ad hoc cargo operators in Europe was
0.69 accidents per million flights, in Australasia the rate was zero and in the
region of the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the total number of
flights in Western-built aircraft was too low to calculate rates that would be
statistically robust.
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