Over the past decade, the airport fuel and refueling operations industry has seen some major changes.
Large fuel companies have scaled back their operations, retreating from airports that don’t contribute sufficiently to their bottom line. Airports have been forced to find alternative fuel supplies and refueling providers. In most cases, local councils, aero clubs and other organizations have filled the void to maintain fuel supply for their airport customers. Often, the assets have been sold to these new organizations for a minimal cost but what was not well understood is that with the assets went the responsibility for meeting the industry standards, ensuring their staff were properly trained and that the assets were maintained appropriately.
All these have significant costs and risks attached.
Things have been made even worse over time - the standards continue to evolve and change, and training is needed to maintain competencies, to train new staff or to ensure the staff understand the latest Joint Inspection Group (JIG), International Air Transport Association (IATA) and Air Transport Association (ATA) standards.
Staff in the new operation may have been trained by the departing organization but, as we all know, over time, unless the training is maintained and updated to reflect the latest requirements, and as staff change, less and less of the (now outdated) training gets passed down. All issues easily solved with training and monitoring of standards, but it’s not as easy as it sounds.
There has been no training available outside the major players in the aviation fuels industry so, even if the current operators had wanted to maintain their staff’s competence, they had no one to turn to.
To subscribe to the global industry bodies is expensive, and the requirements hard to interpret if you haven’t significant aviation fuels and equipment knowledge.
Operational support in the form of procedures, forms and technical guidance from experts is no longer available unless you have expensive Technical Service Agreements in place. This is something that only the largest companies can afford.
So, where does this leave airports that run their own fuel operations or engage smaller companies to do this? With a whole lot of headaches and risk, and very few options to mitigate these.
The risks for operators of aviation fuel facilities include the liabilities from fuel quality issues, damage to aircraft and assets, and in the worst case, fatalities.
Throughout my career, I have seen many of these liabilities come to fruition. Fungus growths in fuel storage from poor handling blocking aircraft fuel filters. Engine damage and compromised equipment from incorrect refueling process and the associated business costs. Fires, personal injuries and aircraft misfueling. In two cases, I have seen the safety regulator shut down the operation and auditors acting for airlines require expensive rectifications to be enacted.
And insurance companies are not generally a fan of operations ‘muddling through.’
I had identified these issues while I was the regional operations manager for a global aviation fuels organization but was not in a position to do anything to resolve it. Working with a training expert over the last six months, we have bought our combined knowledge and skills together and developed S.T.A.R. (Specialized Training in Aviation fuels & Refueling). This is a comprehensive training solution scalable to suit every organization from a micro operation with a few drums of aviation fuel and a hand pump for aircraft refueling, to complex airport storage and hydrant systems with their associated aircraft refueling operations. The training is constantly updated to reflect the latest JIG, IATA and ATA industry standards, and is available in online and face-to-face version. We have even developed a hybrid model combining the best of the online and face-to-face training.
We have significant operational expertise to be able to provide technical guidance and support to airports removing the frustrations, reducing their risks and liabilities and making training and support cost-effective and accessible.
Talk to us at www.globalsafetypartners.com.
Ian Bell has significant experience in the aviation fuels and training industries. Ian now operates his own consultancy Global Safety Partners, supporting regional aviation fuels and refueling operations with training, engineering, maintenance and operational support services.
