3 Ideas to boost your airport inspections

The world of airport management is complex indeed! The responsibility of keeping the airport running smoothly and safely is a very crucial one as a lot can be at stake. With primary attention to be given to operational items like pavement areas, safety areas, markings and signs, lighting, aircraft rescue, and firefighting, fueling operations, navigational aids, ground vehicles, obstructions, public protection, wildlife hazard management, construction, and snow and ice control, etc., the job can be stressful at times.

It is possible though to undertake certain measures so you can boost your airport operations by making them less time-consuming and more effective. Here are a few tips to make the task a little easier for you.

1.   Look beyond the way you have always done it

Agreed that pen and paper have always been how Airport inspections have been done ever since airports came into existence. It in fact has been the only way of recording daily inspections and generating reports for decades and a very effective one at that. Many of the airports still choose to do their daily inspections the traditional way of employing age-old practices. There is nothing wrong with that since it is a time-tested method and has always helped airport managers and other stakeholders in meeting their goals time and again. Some of the progressive airports have also employed one or the other airport inspection software available in the market, choosing to keep up with the times.

But, does it ever occur to you that these seemingly naive solutions which should be helping you meet your yearly goals, could actually be pulling you back or slowing you down when it comes to progressing as a whole compared to your global counterparts? It is possible that the downsides of your current system are not even evident while very much being there.

The idea is to be on the lookout for some tell-tale signs like

• Is a big chunk of your budget going in maintaining/upgrading your current software
• Is your software so clunky that you have to pay for training every time someone new joins your organization
• Time is of the essence and are you losing it just putting together your reports in complex software or keeping track of huge stacks of paper

If your answer to any of these is ‘yes’, then it's time to make a ‘change’.

2. Avoid over-complicating things

‘Change’ is the most dreadful word for most of us and we would go to any length to just avoid doing that be it in any aspect of our life. As the popular saying goes, A known devil is better than an unknown angel. That’s simple human psychology at play. But, in today’s parlance when change is the order of the day and each new dawn is witness to a ‘new normal’, can we still afford to stick to our old ways of doing business? Luckily, not every change is complicated to make. Some options are out there to actually make your life easier. All you have to do is make the right choice, trust the system, and say ‘yes’ to let it help you.

3. Let technology aid you

It is just unbelievable how technological innovations are disrupting every industry. Aviation has not remained untouched with some very modern systems being embedded with some never-before features like Artificial Intelligence and more. The airports are also responding to change in an adaptive way.

The past decade has seen a humongous change in the way airport inspections are done. There is a plethora of airport operations software available in the market today which makes daily inspections seem like a breeze. But saying that all of them are equally adept would be misleading. All of them need to be carefully scrutinized on all parameters that would matter for an airport. The one with the most ticks should be the one that you should invest your time and money in.

Aerosimple provides an all-in-one airport operations solution for airports to meet their Part 139 compliance requirements mandated by the FAA.