The International Air Transport Association (IATA) and the Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore (CAAS) will establish a Global Safety Predictive Analytics Research Centre (SPARC) in Singapore.
The centre will use predictive analytics to identify potential aviation safety hazards and assess related risks. It will analyse the operational flight data and safety information that are available under IATA’s Global Aviation Data Management (GADM) initiative.
IATA and CAAS said the first area of focus for SPARC would be runway safety, such as runway excursions, which IATA says have become the most frequent category of accidents in recent years.
IATA Director General Alexandre de Juniac said data analysis would complement the traditional gathering of safety knowledge through accident analysis. ‘As the number of accidents declines, we need to take a system-based, data-driven, predictive approach to preventing accidents, including analysing the more than 10,000 flights that operate safely every day,’ he said.
IATA expects 7.8 billion people to travel by air in 2036, up from 3.8 billion who flew in 2016.
