SAFETY

Air accidents always a risk...

Air accidents can never be completely prevented despite the huge strides made in aviation technology because the industry is still run by humans, a top US aviation official said Tuesday.

But the industry must draw lessons from its tragedies and improve on existing safety measures, said Mark Rosenker, chairman of the US National Transportation Safety Board.

"We must be realistic," Rosenker said in a keynote address to a global seminar on air safety, held in Singapore.

"Aviation with all its technological improvements and advances is still a human endeavour and unfortunately air accidents and serious incidents will continue to occur," he said.

While accidents cannot be eradicated, air travel is by far the safest of any form of transportation, Rosenker said.

"For the most part, it is an extremely safe industry."

The aviation sector saw more than two billion passengers travelling with commercial airlines in 2006.

"At every level of government and industry, we must be prepared for a major aviation accident... and related safety recommendations originating from those unfortunate events will be necessary," Rosenker said.

"We can get out, we can search for the parts... but when in fact you make the determination, you really have begun the first step of preventing the next accident."

The International Society of Air Safety Investigators (ISASI) agreed that preventing future accidents comes from learning from past mishaps.

"What we learn in accident investigations will continue to be the first step in accident prevention and mitigation," said ISASI president Frank Del Gandio.

"Investigators often confirm well-understood issues, but they also produce new knowledge and new recommendations for corrective action," he said, calling for a sharing of that knowledge within the aviation community.

"The task now is to drive risk even lower. The only way we can do that is by sharing information in a manner that makes it useful to everyone in our community," he said.

In the most recent global aviation mishap, all 165 passengers and crew fled a Taiwan-based China Airways Boeing 737-800 jet moments before it erupted in flames after landing in Tokyo last week.

In July 2007, a TAM airline Airbus A320 overran the runway while landing at Sao Paulo's Congonhas airport, crossed a road and slammed into an airport building, exploding into a fireball.

All 187 people aboard the plane were killed, along with at least 12 on the ground.