Andy Cook
Associate Director-General,
Civil Aviation,
Transport Canada
As the Team Lead of the approach ban safety initiative, I have the privilege of working with a team of dedicated aviation professionals who are striving to advance aviation safety in Canada. In this issue, you’ll have an opportunity to hear directly from the members of our team about the compelling safety issues that have been identified by the Transportation Safety Board (TSB)—and what we are doing to address them.
Safety must always be our priority!
Transport Canada strives to ensure a safe and secure transportation system in Canada through laws, regulations, policies and oversight activities. To that end, we are currently developing new regulations and guidance material that is intended to enhance safety during instrument approaches. The safety rationale for these new regulations is explained in Why We Need to Act Now: The Compelling Safety Case and Being Led Down the Garden Path: Understanding the Human Factors Contributing to Low Visibility Approach Accidents.
All Canadians have an important role to play in this regulatory development process. Your feedback is very important to us and will help us develop regulations that will address the critical safety imperatives; these provisions will also need to be easy to understand and apply by pilots in the dynamic operational environment. The right of stakeholders to provide their input, and the system that has been developed to facilitate this, is explained in Canadian Stakeholders Have a Voice: Understanding the Consultation Process.
Another important goal of the approach ban safety initiative is to increase safety awareness and help folks to understand the operational changes that will accompany the implementation of the new regulations. You can learn about this through the articles which discuss the steps being taken to simplify runway level of service visibility requirements, new instrument procedure design criteria and the introduction of enhanced flight vision systems (EFVS) and other new technologies that will improve both flight safety and operational capability.
Our consultation process is well underway and will continue. We have received a large volume of strong support for this initiative, and there are also those who have expressed their concerns and proposed other ideas. All your feedback is important!
This special issue of the Aviation Safety Letter is intended to further our ongoing two-way discussion with our stakeholders. We hope that it will help Canadian stakeholders understand the critical safety issues that need to be addressed. We also hope that it will encourage everyone to share their comments and suggestions.
We are moving forward to improve safety—and we are listening!
Andy Cook is the Associate Director-General, Civil Aviation at Transport Canada. As a military pilot, Andy flew the CT114 Tutor as an instructor and as a Team Coordinator for the RCAF Snowbirds (431 Sqn). He flew the C130 Hercules in the air refuelling and tactical air transport roles and the A310 as Commanding Officer of 437 Squadron, RCAF. Andy’s experience in civil aviation includes management and flying with a subpart 703/704/705 air operator, as well as several years in general aviation. He is type rated on the A310, ATR42 and L100 (C130).