Airport Safety Policy Principles
- To ensure the efficiency, effectiveness and highest safety and service quality standards of flight infrastructures, systems and equipment;
- To provide for ongoing review of operational processes and procedures for maximum compliance with national and international regulations on operational safety, quality and efficiency/effectiveness;
- To implement systematic, regular and appropriate training for all personnel.
Actions and underlying rationale
The actions undertaken are aimed at:
- Empower all management and employees regarding safety in every business activity.
- Prioritize operational safety in every situation.
- Minimize risks, especially those related to aircraft.
- Maintain safety standards for operators, contractors, and external parties in the airport area.
- Ensure continuous safety improvement through risk analysis, auditing, and the definition of specific objectives in periodic Safety Board and Safety Committee meetings.
- Promote a safety culture through the reporting and analysis of every relevant event.
As Airport Operator, SEA believes that personnel training plays a major role in the achievement and maintenance of suitable professional skills, which in turn are essential to achieve and maintain the highest safety levels.
The Safety Management System
The Regulations for the Construction and Operations of the Airports provides for the adoption of a Safety Management System by the airport management company.
The System must be capable of guaranteeing that the airport operations are being carried out under pre-defined security conditions, and evaluating, at the same time, the efficacy of the system itself in order to adopt the necessary measures to correct any type of deviation.
The "safety management" represents an integral part of the organisational management and it defines the methods for identifying processes, procedures and resources needed for the implementation of the management's safety policies, as well as the tasks, powers and responsibilities of the personnel involved.
From an operational perspective, SMS finds its application in the activities carried out by the Safety Board and the Safety Committees of Linate and Malpensa, corporate bodies responsible for the periodical monitoring of the activities carried out at the airports.
The information sources of the Reporting System include:
- reporting risks present during operations
- safety studies
- audit/observations
- internal investigations.
Ground Safety Report
The reporting deriving from safety operations is performed through the Ground Safety Report; a key element of the SMS system whose implementation entails the performance of monitoring activities to ensure that safety standards are met.
The Ground Safety report is an indispensable tool that provides the Safety Manager with information on safety issues occurring at the airport.
From the processing and analysis of the received data, the Safety Manager may infer airport safety-related performance and an adequate feedback on the performance of the system.
In order to have a simple and efficient reporting system that guarantees that all reports are received on an on-going basis, the following reporting channels have been set up:
e-mail box: sms@seamilano.eu
- https://airportsafety.seamilano.eu/safety-sea/ap/liml/gsr.html
- https://airportsafety.seamilano.eu/safety-sea/ap/limc/gsr.html
Ground Safety Recommendations
The“Ground Safety Recommendations” are tools used by Airport Management and provided within the scope of the Safety Management System as an official clarification of the objectives in place within safety policies.
The "Recommendations" are provided based on the indications emerging from the processing of the reports, from targeted statistics and from the investigation of accidents and incidents occurring within the "Airport Safety" activities. They are intended for all players operating within the "Airport System" including: handling companies, fuel providers, catering companies, etc, with the purpose of preventing accidents and inconveniences that may occur during the support operations for the aircraft.
Through the "Recommendations", the Manager aims to contribute to the improvement of the safety levels of airport operations
Ground Safety Recommendations, an SMS
The“Ground Safety Recommendations” are a tool used by the Airport Management and issued within the scope of the Safety Management System as an official clarification of the objectives of implementing the safety policies.
The "Recommendations" are provided based on the indications emerging from the processing of the reports, from targeted statistics and from the investigation of accidents and incidents occurring within the "Airport Safety" activities. They are intended for all players operating within the "Airport System" including: handling companies, fuel providers, catering companies, etc, with the purpose of preventing accidents and inconveniences that may occur during the support operations for the aircraft.
Through the "Recommendations", the Manager aims at contributing to the improvement of the safety levels of airport operations.
The safety of airport operations is ensured by complying with the set of regulatory requirements applicable both to infrastructures and to operations, as dictated by the Regulations in effect.
Notwithstanding all of the above, SMS can assess the safety achieved by applying regulatory requirements, and improve its level where deficiencies or critical issues are identified.
In light of the above, the management company formulates safety-related policies and objectives that it will pursue in the course of airport management. SMS refers to an "airport system" as a whole.
The main components of an SMS can be summarised ad follows:
- determination of safety policies by the management company;
- planning and organisation of the system;
- activation of the Reporting System;
- periodical and systematic auditing plans
- risks evaluation process;
- review and improvement of the system.
The maximum involvement and commitment of all SEA departments must guarantee the achievement of the set forth safety objectives.
For each process, not only the risks and their preventive measures but also the mutual impacts that the implementation of this process may have on safety issues related to other processes, must be identified.
The objective of compliance with the highest international standards in terms of infrastructure, equipment, procedures, safety and service quality is considered a requirement concerning all activities carried out at the airports.
All SEA personnel, during the performance of aeronautical activities, are sensitised and trained in order to observe the principles on which the policy is based and the requirements set forth by the Safety Management System.
The movements of vehicles and people are regulated by the appropriate ENAC ordinance.
For this purpose, the Safety Board (internal body of the Airport Management) and, for both Airports, the Safety Committee meet on a monthly basis. Operators, airlines, institutional entities and all those who work at both airports participate in these meetings.
The Safety Board and the Safety Committee operate in partnership and complementing each other, in order to:
- ensure a complete and exhaustive discussion of safety-related issues concerning airport operations;
- identify, as necessary, appropriate prevention activities and, if appropriate, the correction and mitigation of potential risks.
In compliance with the provisions of ENAC, specific reviews have been conducted on particularly significant issues through special Working Groups.
Within the SMS, the following groups are operating:
- Working Group on Fuel Producers: this group has developed the “Pilot project for the fuelling of airplanes with passengers aboard, without the presence of Fire Brigades”. Within this group, all necessary measures, aimed at minimizing any spillage of fuel, are examined and evaluated.
- Working Group on Ramp Safety: it assigns to all the handlers specific operations to carry out regarding safety ramp issues. This Group examines the outcomes and proposes improvement measures, shared with the Post Holder Movement and Terminal, in order to establish a solid base to be submitted to the Safety Committees for the maximum level of involvement of all operators and subjects participating in airport activities.
The Safety Management System at the airport is also tied to the management of animals and plants and focuses on the following issues:
- safety issues
- management of obstacles chart
- mitigation measures
- landscape issues
- attention to biodiversity
SEA has developed, within its own areas, a policy aimed at the reduction/control of the "wildlife strike/green areas management" which includes:
- periodical inventory of animals and internal conditions;
- control of grass height, grass mowing and health of trees;
- wildlife control (rabbits, hares, etc.);
- activities carried out in the surrounding area to make it less attractive.
In order to make the airport less attractive to animals, special naturalist researches have been carried out at the airports of Linate and Malpensa. The studies have provided a number of recommendations for reducing the risk of wildlife strike by working on the environmental aspects of the airport, particularly as regards the management of green areas.
At the Milan airports, SEA has set forth the measures to be adopted for refuelling activities in the event of passengers' boarding/disinbarkment operations without the presence of the Fire Brigade. The responsibilities and the scope of the activities and actions performed by different subjects involved in these operations, have been defined.
SEA has acted very responsibly, in terms of innovations, after experiencing serious setbacks at the national level and overcoming significant negative elements that had characterized the air transport industry in our country.
The level of complexity of the refuelling operations, also due to the simultaneous presence of several parties involved in ground support operations, has required a harmonized approach of all activities to achieve optimal safety conditions.
For this purpose, a safety network - “safety net” - has been developed which, through an effective attribution of tasks and responsibilities, in compliance with the the provisions set forth in the ENAC amendment n. 6 to the Regulation for the Construction and Management of Airports, enables the achievement of the highest safety standards during refuelling operations, while fulfilling at the same time operational requirements.
The refuelling operations, with passengers aboard and without the presence of the Fire Brigade, are active at Terminal 1 and Terminal 2 of the Malpensa airport and are under way at the Linate airport.