Aviation Safety and Security
Research on aviation safety, accident investigation and risk management.
The Aviation Safety and Security Research Group (AvSSRG) is a research team at the Department of Air Transport, Faculty of Transportation Sciences, Czech Technical University in Prague. The group focuses on safety and security in aviation and other complex socio-technical systems, with a strong emphasis on systemic approaches to safety, particularly the System-Theoretic Accident Model and Processes (STAMP) and Safety-II. The group addresses topics related to the design of safe, secure, and resilient systems, the safe operation of existing aviation systems, safety management, risk assessment, and accident and incident investigation. Its work is based on the understanding that modern aviation systems cannot be effectively managed only through component-based or purely compliance-oriented approaches, but require systemic analysis of interactions among technical, human, organizational, regulatory, and cyber-related factors. The research group focuses on the collection, processing, and analysis of aviation safety and security data, the modelling of complex socio-technical systems and their interactions, and the development of dedicated methodological and software tools supporting Safety Management Systems (SMS) in aviation organizations. The current research focus of the group includes applied research on System-Theoretic Accident Model and Processes (STAMP) and its implementation in real aviation operations, as well as other systemic safety approaches. The group also addresses questions related to the implementation of EASA Part-IS, which introduces requirements for the management of information security risks with a potential impact on aviation safety. Further research topics include aircraft reliability, Model-Based Safety Assessment (MBSA), Model-Based Systems Engineering (MBSE), and the development and use of ontologies based on the Unified Foundational Ontology (UFO) for safety taxonomies and related aviation data. The activities of the group include the development of tailored methodologies, models, and solutions for specific operational contexts, as well as consultancy and support in the area of aviation safety and security management. The group also applies its expertise to other transport domains and high-risk industries where systemic safety and security approaches are needed. The group cooperates with major Czech aviation stakeholders, including Prague Airport, AERO Vodochody Aerospace, Czech Airlines Technics, OK Aviation, the Civil Aviation Authority of the Czech Republic, and others. International cooperation includes partners such as Sapienza University of Rome and members of the international STAMP community. This cooperation was further strengthened by the organization of the 12th European STAMP Workshop and Conference, organized by members of the Aviation Safety and Security Research Group. The group also collaborates with the Department of Computer Science at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Czech Technical University in Prague.
Team Members
Selected Projects
The goal of the project is to increase safety intelligence of complex aviation organizations by proposing a way of measurement and visualization of organizations’ safety performance based on systemic approach to safety. The project is focused on development of technical solution aligned with International Civil Aviation Organization’s plans. Objectives of the project are (1) to develop knowledge base for storing knowledge about achieved safety performance (2) to propose a procedure of safety performance evaluation based on systemic approach to safety and (3) to develop software tool to support systemic measurement and visualization of safety performance based on the proposed procedure and by utilizing data from the knowledge base.
Modern tools and methods to increase the security of air transport at international airports in the Czech Republic
The project aimed to increase the quality of air transport security through development of new procedures and directly implementable technological solutions that will improve the efficiency, training, performance monitoring and job satisfaction of security personnel at international airports in Czechia. Improving personnel satisfaction lowers fluctuation and thus strengthens the security confidentiality. Optimizing work productivity, new procedures was also make possible to opt for processes ensuring protection against the spread of infectious diseases. Identification and implementation of these processes made possible to dispatch more travellers with improved level of security using the existing technology and workforce even when the protection against infections must be ensured.
Research and development of progressive methods for measuring aviation organizations safety performance
The aim of the project was to develop methodological and software tools using safety indicators for safety management and safety performance management in aviation organizations. The safety indicators were designed to support the assessment and management of safety-related processes within aviation organizations, as well as to provide sufficient support for oversight by the industry regulator, the Civil Aviation Authority of the Czech Republic, with regard to the sensitivity of information and data provided by aviation organizations. A complex structure of indicators, including reactive, proactive, and strategic indicators, was developed to measure the operational safety of aviation organizations. Different types of indicators and their mutual interactions provided a comprehensive model of safety risks within organizations. This made it possible to formulate more precise safety recommendations than when considering each indicator separately. The indicators were defined in a way that enabled the monitoring not only of the causes of accidents and incidents, but also of changes in safety management and safety culture in the organizations concerned.
The goal of the project was to expedite, simplify and make more accurate the process of risk analysis and control as well as achieving more accurate safety performance monitoring for aviation organisations. To achieve the goal, intelligent components for existing solutions was be established as a software based on STAMP systemic safety model, which will be conceptualised into machine-readable form with subsequent domain specification for aviation.
The goal of the project was to increase the objectivity of risk evaluation within aviation safety studies, with a particular focus on the airport domain, in order to ensure the adequacy of mitigation measures related to risk control. For this purpose, a methodology for process risk analysis and evaluation using quantitative methods was developed. This methodology was intended to replace selected qualitative procedures currently used in safety studies.
Ontology engineering utilization in reliability and quality knowledge management systems in the aviation
The project was focused on development of a knowledge management system in air transport with utilization of ontology engineering in the domain. The goal of the project was application of quality and reliability conceptual modeling to represent knowledge and correlations in quality and reliability data. The emphasis in the project was put on the extraction of key information from non-structured data and on the research of possibilities for transformation of non-structured data to structured data. The project was lead to establishment of a knowledge management system of aviation quality and reliability, for the purpose of domain knowledge management, its extraction and further utilization in the industry. Project results was validated by means of case studies in real conditions, as a support for decision making about quality and reliability assurance in the aviation.
The project goal is digitalization, modernization, integration and improving the effectiveness of civil aviation authority processes with decrease in administrative burden of the overseen aviation organizations. The goal will be achieved by application of STAMP model (new safety prediction model developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in cooperation with NASA agency) in selected processes, which are carried as part of the state safety oversight in aviation. Partial goal is development of a tool allowing innovative overview of oversight processes, improvement of their effectiveness and setup of functional communication between the civil aviation authority and overseen aviation organizations, which will help state safety inspectors with carrying the state safety oversight.
The main goal of the project was improvement of effectiveness of aircraft maintenance planning and execution with consequent improvement of air transport competitiveness and availability. Particular goals were identification of factors and dependencies, which determine the course of aircraft maintenance, and improvement of accuracy of the aircraft maintenance and repair process estimation. The scope of the project was research of relations among factors and creation of knowledge model, which considered relevant factors and their relations during estimation of individual task schedule and so increase the accuracy of the overall maintenance calculation. The project was focused on utilization of contemporary solutions from knowledge management systems and mathematical predictive analysis.
The goal of the project was to increase of international competitiveness, market extension abroad and a shift in global value chains of the main applicant (Czech enterprise), which specializes in advanced information technologies in the domain of safety engineering for aviation. The goal was achieved by developing a tool for partly automated hazard analysis by means of System Theoretic Process Analysis (STPA), which was currently being introduced into operational processes of global enterprises in aviation and other high-risk industries.