Aviation leaders on Monday called runway safety one of the high-priority issues in operating airports even though the number of runway accidents has been sharply reduced thanks to advanced technologies and heightened vigilance.

A safety symposium was held on the sidelines of the General Assembly of the Airports Council International, one of the industry’s largest gatherings, which kicked off its three-day program on Monday in Seoul.

The program was launched to discuss safety issues at an executive level and engaging the participants in a partnership on enhancing safety at airports through ACI’s Airport Excellence in Safety Program. 

In his keynote speech, Bognani Maseko, CEO of Airports Company South Africa and ACI World Governing Board Liaison for Safety, urged for a safety culture to be built across a network of airports.

According to him, to discuss despite the surging air traffic at airports, especially in the Asia-Pacific region, the world’s largest airport market, safety issues are not as widely discussed as they should be.

He suggested that each airport share its safety measures on its website along with its mission for growth to build its own safety culture over global networks.

“Safety is the most important factor among all the factors we are responsible for. All the staff, old and young, senior and junior, should share the commitment,” he said.

Benito de Leon, acting associate administrator for airports at the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration, emphasized technical support for safety efforts.

The U.S. agency has invested $200 million to $300 million every year to install the Engineered Materials Arresting System, a bed of engineered materials built at the end of a runway to reduce the chance of runway accidents, since 2000.

Following the installation, airports have been able to reduce the number of accidents that happen due to short taxiing distance, airport complexity and close proximity of multiple runway thresholds.

Regarding the enhanced safety measures, Julieanne Alroe, CEO and managing director of Australia’s Brisbane Airport, stressed the importance of monitoring and measurement based on incident data, employee surveys and performance appraisals.

“You cannot manage what you cannot measure,” she said.

At the end of the safety symposium, the ACI, a nonprofit association of some 1,800 airport operators in 177 countries, also introduced its Airport Excellence in Safety Program’s latest Runway Safety Implementation Kit, to be shared by all the participants and their organizations.

The ACI general meeting and conferences will be held through Wednesday at Coex in Samseong-dong, southern Seoul. Korea’s Incheon International Airport is this year’s host.

By Lee Ji-yoon (jylee@heraldcorp.com)