Causal Risk Models of Air Transport : Comparison of User Needs and Model Capabilities

Aviation safety is so well-developed that individual organizations cannot rely on the number of accidents as useful indicators of the safety level of their operation. Adequate control of risks requires the availability of a method to determine the level of safety as a function of the current status and of proposed or expected changes tot the aviation system. Aviation safety policy plans have therefore proposed the development of causal risk models. Unfortunately, these failed to specify or even describe such models other than in the most general of terms. Causal model development was stated as a goal in itself, without consideration of how such a model should be used. The objective of this work is to clarify these issues by comparing user requirements with the performance that can be delivered by various modeling techniques. The publications answers the question what causal risk modeling adds to current safety management approaches and what the criteria are for ensuring it makes a successful contribution to safety.