Australia’s aviation system has been judged one of the world’s safest after an International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) audit ranked it sixth among member states for safety oversight.
The UN-Backed organization audited Australia in 2017 on a range of issues including operations, airworthiness, accident investigations and air navigation services. It gave the nation a safety oversight score of 95 percent, according to the Civil Aviation Safety Authority.
Australia achieved above average scores in all areas of ICAO’s Universal Safety Oversight Audit Programme with percentage scores for five of seven measures above 90 percent.
The weakest score was in terms of aviation legislation, which has been a contentious issue among smaller Australian aviation organizations. But even here the score of just under 81 percent was higher than the global average of 71.77 percent.
READ: the top 20 safest airlines for 2018.
The nation achieved full marks for its civil aviation organizational structures and 99.42 percent for air navigation services.
ICAO also rated its accident investigation capabilities highly at 97.06 percent. This was more than 40 percentage points ahead of the global average of 55.61 percent and marked the widest gap between the two scores across the seven safety measures.
The aviation licensing system pulled a score of 97.5 percent, while aerodrome safety was rated at 95.71 percent and airworthiness at 93.16 percent.
Operations narrowly missed out on being in the top 10 percent with a score of 89.08 percent.
CASA director of aviation safety Shane Carmody said everyone in the aviation industry could be proud of the top six ranking.
“The audit delivered a 95 percent safety oversight score, which we must now work to maintain,’’ he said in a briefing note. “This means Australia currently ranks sixth out of International Civil Aviation Organization member states for effective safety oversight.”
Carmody said the ranking demonstrated Australia had a robust aviation safety system “supported by public sector agencies with a deep commitment to achieving the best possible safety outcomes”.
“Credit for the ranking also goes to the commitment to safety by the people and organizations who make up Australia’s aviation community,’’ he said. “It is your day-to-day work, delivering safety during every flight and every aviation activity, that makes Australian skies amongst the safest in the world.”
