De Juniac: African Airlines improve safety performance for 2017

Africa’s aviation industry safety performance improved in 2017 in all sub-Saharan countries, IATA DG Alexandre de Juniac said. Airlines in the sub-Saharan Africa region had zero jet hull losses and zero fatal accidents involving jets or turboprops for the second consecutive year. Both the turboprop hull loss rate and the all-accident rates declined against the average of the previous five years. However, the turboprop hull loss rate increased compared to 2016 (5.70 vs. 1.52). In turn, this largely was responsible for causing an increase in the all-accident rate compared to 2016 (6.87 vs. 2.43). “Meaning, there is still a large gap to cover in the safety performance of the continent’s turboprop fleet,” according to an IATA release. De Juniac said 34 African airlines are now member of IATA’s IOSA Operational Safety Audit program. “We say the safety level for IOSA carriers is much better than without it. But we are also asking governments to adopt IOSA to their own regulations as their standard, as it is now in many countries outside of Africa,” de Juniac said.<br/>