The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) recently expanded the use of Technical Advisory Boards (TAB) during aircraft certification processes.
TAB consists of independent groups of internal and external safety experts. They help the agency maintain a consistent and thorough approach for all aircraft certification projects.
Technical specialists are independent of the certification projects they are reviewing.
During a TAB review, they familiarize themselves with proposed design or design changes and how changes meet certification regulations.
TAB members have a variety of responsibilities depending on the level of review, including identifying new technologies, designs, or design features that could be catastrophic if they failed; determining whether FAA project specialists reviewed all major issues; determining whether similar systems have caused problems on other aircraft; determining whether the proper FAA offices were involved in the certification process; and conducting secondary design reviews and procedure and training evaluations.
The aircraft certification process recently was reformed. Changes include hiring additional personnel to research how over-reliance on automation potentially affects basic piloting skills; expanding the agency’s evaluation of manufacturers’ assumptions regarding human factors that equipment manufacturers make when performing system safety assessments; and delegating fewer responsibilities to manufacturers and demanding more transparency from them.
The changes exceeded those required by the Aircraft Certification, Safety, and Accountability Act.