The Line Operations Safety Audit Program: Transitioning From Flight Operations to Maintenance and Ramp Operations

Managing risk has become increasingly important in modern organizations, including medicine, aviation, and finance. Accident investigation concentrates on failures, which are important for discovering major breakdowns, but failures are rare events. Proactive approaches offer the flexibility of observing normal operations. A Line Operations Safety Audit (LOSA) is a voluntary safety program that collects safety data during normal airline operations and was originally designed for flight deck operations. The goal of this FAA-sponsored project is to capitalize on the 10-plus years of successful audits on the flight deck. The hazards that threaten the safety of flight deck operations are not unique to that environment. Similar problems are present during maintenance and ramp operations. This report provides a review of the use of LOSA, discusses LOSA’s essential operating characteristics, lessons learned on the flight deck, and describes the extension of LOSA to maintenance and ramp operations. The research team developed tools for airlines and maintenance organizations to use as they initiate their maintenance (M-LOSA) and ramp (R-LOSA) programs.