Our mission 

Increase runway safety in a cost effective way, by balancing the safety and financial risks.

How

Estimate the accident and incidents costs resulting from runway safety events.

Provide objective data, analysis, priorities and consultation of runway events

Help finding adequate / preferred / cost-effective mitigations.

Provide (tailor-made) trainings

Runway Safety NextGen

Safe runway operations takes the associated risk into account. That risk shall be As Low As Reasonably Practicable (ALARP).  Showing that the safety risk is ALARP means that any further risk reduction is either impracticable or grossly outweighed by the cost.  That means that the cost of possible mitigations shall be compared with the costs associated with runway safety risks. That requires insight in the costs associated with runway incidents and accidents. 

Our model enables generic and specific estimates of runway accidents (whatever the cause). Yearly results are shown here.  

The issue

The runway is in essence the reason of existence of an aerodrome, "no runway-no business". High value assets use it. Having to close a runway due to an accident results in delays, diversions, loss of revenues, compensation fees, cost of injuries and fatalities, costs of loss or damage of equipment, cost to organisation and/or possible civil and criminal proceedings. These costs are estimated at $ 500 Million per month.  

(NLR-ATSI) estimates one runway excursion per week; our figures indicate one per day (All types of aircraft, globally).  Although the probability of a catastrophic event is slim (0,0004%), lost 815 (runway excursions) and 1 (runway incursions) people their lives (2005-2014) in runway related occurrences (Boeing).    

Therefore keeping runway operations safe is essentially good business.

100% Safety does not exits, absolutely none runway excursions is not possible now neither in the future; nor is it necessary. It is all about managing the risks to an acceptable level; thus ALARP. 

Risk mitigation

Risk is a function of likelihood and severity. Risk reduction is possible by addressing the likelihood and / or the severity aspect of a runway occurrence. Reducing the likelihood is the first priority, but might become increasingly more challenging with the already very low occurrence rates. The associated safety costs might rise accordingly and reach the "As low As Reasonably Practicable" (ALARP) safety level. 

Expressing the runway safety risk in financial risks provides a solid indication of the achievable ALARP. When insight in the financial risk becomes available, it will become possible to calculate the return of investment (ROI) of the various mitigating measure options in order to achieve ALARP.

cost-effective

When a runway safety risk is identified and when the various mitigating options and their ROI are reviewed, the accountable manager has the instruments to decide on the most cost-effective option. Cost-effective in this context means that the mitigation works and that the associated investment outweighs the financial risk.

What we do

We analyse, in close cooperation with the client and related stakeholders, the runway safety risk. We'll provide a financial risk calculation. We identify and evaluate possible mitigating options. That provides the possibility of finding the most cost-effective mitigating measures based on the ALARP principle. 

If the mitigating measures would grossly outweigh the safety gain, than our findings can be used for the appropriate authority to motivate that the runway safety risk is at an acceptable level. 

What We've Achieved