Aircraft airworthiness authority

Aircraft Airworthiness Authority is a term used to describe the organization responsible for determining the safety suitability and effectiveness of parts that go into aviation (aircraft) systems. This organization determines if the aircraft, and/or it parts, are suitable for safe flight (i.e., are they airworthy). System safety is usually involved in evaluating airworthiness for systems and equipment from a safety perspective and in ensuring that the Aircraft Airworthiness Authority s safety standards are satisfied. The Airworthiness Authority for commercial aircraft in the United States is the FAA. The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) is the Airworthiness Authority for commercial aircraft in Europe. TTie Air Force, Army, and Navy have their own internal airworthiness authorities. 

Military Handbook (MIL-HDBK)-516B, Airworthiness Certification, DoD Handbook, delineates the U.S. military aircraft airworthiness certification process. It also contains a list of the typical certification data required for airworthiness certification, which leads to a flight clearance. It includes a section on system safety, a system safety program (SSP), and a software safety program (SwSP). System safety generally provides the safety evaluation of hardware and software for airworthiness flight clearance recommendations. System safety is involved in ensuring that the Aircraft Airworthiness Authority s standards are satisfied for the airworthiness authority involved. 

Minimum Equipment required for dispatch of the aircraft. The regulatory authorities require that aU equipment installed on an aeroplane in compliance with the Type Certification Basis must be operative. Experience has proven that, due to the various levels of redundancy designed into an aeroplane, operation of every system or installed component may not be necessary when the remaining operative equipment satisfies the airworthiness authorities (ARPS 150, para 3.4.2). Therefore, certain conditional deviations from the original requirement are authorised to permit aeroplane dispatch. These Dispatch Deviations identity ... 

For example the airworthiness authorities such as the CAA are responsible for the certification of civil aircraft for use in the UK (in conjunction with other authorities). 

The systematic process, during the design of an aircraft or airborne system, of demonstrating conformance to a set of specific and predetermined airworthiness regulations (e.g. FAR25) for a specific type and category of aircraft (as determined by the relevant airworthiness authority). 

Most civilian airworthiness authorities have thus determined that an acceptable aircraft accident rate attributable to technical cause factors for large commercial transport aircraft is of the order of 1 per 10 million hours, provided the probability of occurrence does not vary from flight to flight. ... 

This leads to an accident probability of 0.0000001 (10 ) per hour for technical cause factors. Therefore, for transport category aircraft, most civil airworthiness authorities require that aircraft systems and associated components (considered separately and in relation to other systems) be designed in a manner such that the occurrence of any failure condition which would prevent the continued safe flight and landing of the aircraft should virtually never occur in the life of an aircraft type. 

Military airworthiness authorities have generally not established acceptable levels of safety for technical failures. However, a higher risk level is generally considered acceptable for military aviation and a factor of 10 is often used when comparing acceptable accident rates for equivalent military and civilian aircraft types. Therefore, a probability of occurrence in the order of 10 per hour for a catastrophic severity effect for individual systems on a military transport category aircraft type (equivalent to a civil aircraft type) is often considered reasonable and achievable. See Appendix B for more information. 

Technical airworthiness A concept, the application of which defines the condition of an aircraft, and supplies the basis for judgement of the suitability for flight of that aircraft in that it has been designed, constructed, operated and maintained to approved standards by competent individuals, who are acting as members of an authorised organisation and whose work is both certified as correct and accepted on behalf of the regulatory authority. 

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