January 21, 2025
Global High Risk Categories: A Look at Midair Collisions and Near Misses
JumpseatSMS
The 2023-2025 edition of ICAO’s Global Aviation Safety Plan (GASP) has identified five global high-risk categories of occurrence (G-HRCs), as global safety priorities that should be addressed to mitigate the risk of fatalities.
- Mid-air collision (MAC);
- Controlled Flight into Terrain (CFIT);
- Loss of Control in-flight (LOC-I);
- Runway Excursion (RE); and
- Runway Incursion
A review of NTSB’s data set for accidents and serious incidents in the United States shows the below trend for Midair collisions and Near misses (The data includes Part 91, Part 107, Part 121, Part 135, Part 137, Non-Us Commercial, Non-US Non-Commercial, Public Use and Armed Forces aircraft).
- The number of midair collisions over the past decade have been consistent, the same for near misses in the last four years, however, 2024 had an increase in the number of near misses. Should the industry be proactively looking at causal factors for both midair collisions and near misses to mitigate and manage the risk?
- A Safety Management System enables the operators to proactively identify safety trends within their operations, thereby reducing their operational risk.
Analysis of causal factors for Midair collisions in the past decade shows Personnel Issues as the leading cause for the incidents/accidents.
