On this page
- Background
- Inspection Cycle
- Inspection activities, results and statistics for 2019-2020
- Most common observations/finding (trends)
- Conclusion
- Organizational contact information
Background
Transport Canada’s Civil Aviation Branch does both planned and reactive surveillance inspections to assess whether companies are following Canadian regulations. This includes inspecting foreign air carriers that fly to and from Canada.
The branch uses a risk-based approach, and incorporates both quantitative and qualitative data to plan inspections.
Inspection Cycle
The branch is in the middle of a transformation initiative changing the way that they conduct surveillance. In 2019-2020 an updated risk-based planning method was used.
Surveillance includes all activities related to preparing, conducting, and reporting an inspection. It also includes any action taken to deal with issues found during an inspection, like reviews and follow-ups on corrective action plans, enforcement actions, or certificate actions.
The branch uses surveillance to inspect:
- air operators
- aerodromes
- flight training units
- approved maintenance organizations
- manufacturers
- multi-certificate holders
- approved training organizations
- air traffic services
- design approval holders
- design approval organizations
- Ministerial delegates, and
- aeronautical design products
Inspection activities, results and statistics for 2019-2020
Surveillance in the regions
This data was taken from the National Aviation Company Information System database (NACIS). It includes data from all regions except the National Operations, National Aircraft Certification and Medicine branch as their data is not available in NACIS. Not all aerodromes inspected are reflected in this data as the database does not have all data for this metric.
- Total number of inspections: 608
- Total number of companies inspected: 567
- Total number of issues found: 1,041
- Average number of issues found, per inspection: 1.7
- Number of inspections that found issues: 343
- Number of inspections that found no issues: 265
Surveillance for National Operations and National Aircraft Certification
| Description of data | National Operations | National Aircraft Certification |
|---|---|---|
|
Total number of inspections |
104 |
5 |
|
Total number of companies inspected |
7 |
5 |
|
Total number of issues found |
87 |
23 |
|
Average number of issues found per inspection |
1.2 |
5 |
|
Number of inspections that found issues |
32 |
5 |
|
Number of inspections that found no issues |
72 |
0 |
Surveillance broken down into days
This data was taken from the National Aviation Company Information System database (NACIS). It includes data from all regions except National Operations and National Aircraft Certification. Not all aerodromes inspected are reflected in this data as the database didn’t have all data for this metric.
- Average number of days from receipt of Corrective Action Plan (CAP) until CAP Acceptance Letter sent: 28 days
- Maximum number of Days from Exit Meeting to Closing Letter sent: 586 days
- Minimum number of Days from Exit Meeting to Closing Letter sent: 1 day
- Average number of Days from Exit Meeting to Closing Letter sent: 217 days
- Number of Surveillance events that have no record of closing letter date entered: 113 events
- Number of findings that are from events that have not closing letter date: 311 findings
- Percentage of Surveillance events that have no record of closing letter date entered: 19%
| Days to close a Surveillance Event | Qty of Events |
|---|---|
|
0 to 60 Days |
233 |
|
61 to 120 Days |
93 |
|
121 to 180 Days |
44 |
|
181 to 240 Days |
44 |
|
241 to 300 Days |
28 |
|
301 to 360 Days |
19 |
|
361 to 420 Days |
14 |
|
421 to 480 Days |
12 |
|
481 to 540 Days |
6 |
|
541 to 600 Days |
2 |
|
No Closure Letter |
113 |
This data was taken from the National Aviation Company Information System database (NACIS). It includes data from all regions except National Operations and National Aircraft Certification.
Closing an inspection within one year is the Civil Aviation Branch’s policy. Exceeding this isn’t necessarily a negative outcome if the company is actively working with Transport Canada to solve the issue(s) found during the inspection.
Most common observations/finding (trends)
This table only includes issues that relate to a specific Canadian Aviation Regulation.
| Canadian Aviation Regulation (CAR) reference number | Number of issues found |
|---|---|
|
605 |
180 |
|
573 |
177 |
|
706 |
127 |
|
571 |
108 |
|
703 |
80 |
|
406 |
302 |
|
702 |
36 |
|
700 |
27 |
|
561 |
27 |
|
305 |
21 |
|
704 |
21 |
|
705 |
19 |
|
602 |
18 |
|
604 |
15 |
|
403 |
7 |
|
303 |
7 |
|
202 |
4 |
|
405 |
3 |
|
107 |
2 |
|
501 |
1 |
|
203 |
1 |
|
301 |
1 |
The data taken from the National Aviation Company Information System database (NACIS). It includes data from all regions except National Operations and National Aircraft Certification.
Conclusion
The Civil Aviation Branch uses inspection data to determine the risk profiles of companies. This affects the frequency and scope of future inspections. While this is an important use of the data, there are still more ways that we could use this data.
Currently, surveillance data is stored in number of different, unconnected systems. This limits our ability to analyse and use this data to the fullest extent.
To improve this, the branch is migrating all surveillance inspection data into a single database. Having a more holistic view of inspection results will help us better analyze the data and keep the civil aviation sector safe.
Organizational contact information
Transport Canada welcomes your comments on this report.
Email: Questions@tc.gc.ca.