FAA Issues Final Rule On Safety Management Systems

On March 9, 2015, the FAA's Final Rule requiring that all certificate holders under Part 121 of the Code of Federal Regulations (U.S. domestic passenger and cargo operators) implement Safety Management Systems ("SMS") became effective. Under this rule, carriers must implement SMS by 2018. As the FAA itself has stated, "SMS is the formal, top-down, organization-wide approach to managing safety risk and assuring the effectiveness of safety risk controls." According to the FAA, SMS promotes a safety culture to improve the airline's overall performance, using four key components—Safety Policy, Safety Risk Management, Safety Assurance and Safety Promotion. The FAA estimates that the rule will cost airlines $224.3 million over 10 years. In addition to that cost, carriers have rightly voiced concerns as to whether the data collected as part of SMS could be protected from disclosure pursuant to Freedom of Information Act requests or civil discovery. Time will tell if/how SMS,