**6.3 Flight safety directorate**

The operational branches of both military and civil aviation are expected to have effective 'flight safety directorates'. The primary responsibility of the flight safety directorate is to estimate the risk threshold under all dynamic condition, take appropriate measures and ensure that operational risk does not exceed this value. The basic aim of the flight safety studies is to ensure that the chances of achieving the mission tasks be optimal, while operational risks are minimal. In military aviation, the flight safety directorate has a very complex duty to perform. On the one hand, the military training must give a high level of exposures to possible war scenario and threats,


**17**

rectified.

**7.3 Military certification**

*Military Aviation Principles*

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.87087*

b.Avoid very high cost of losses and damages

tions and make necessary readjustments

**7. Military aircraft design and certification**

**7.1 Military aircraft design consideration**

**7.2 Certification of aircraft**

while it must ensure that the high level of risks are to be avoided in peace time within the stated training syllabi. This is because the accidents have very deleterious effects on the morale of the flier. During the war time, however, task achievement is paramount, and hence risks are to be taken even at high degrees if the operational requirements dictate. The main purposes of the flight safety studies are therefore to:

a.Identify and minimize those risks which may contribute accidents

c.Identify all risk hazards real or potential at all levels and all phases of flying

d.Risk thresholds are dynamic, and they need to be reassessed under all condi-

All modern military aircraft are designed to perform multiple missions. This is inherent in the design of such aircraft, for example, the A400M military transport aircraft is designated as a tactical airlifter with strategic capabilities and can also be configured to perform long-range cargo and troop transport, medical evacuation, aerial refueling and electronic surveillance missions. *Military aircraft* is capable of operating from semiprepared runways under varied climatic and environmental conditions [1, 13, 28]. *Military aircraft design requirement* is driven by operational capabilities derived from threat perception and defence preparedness strategy of a country, whereas commercial aircraft design and development are driven by the market forces. A comparative study of the design *considerations for civil and military* aircraft is shown in **Table 1**.

Certification is a process of evaluation and documentation of compliance of a product to its specified requirements and declares it 'safe to fly'. It is a third-party assurance to the user that the product has been designed, developed, evaluated and produced in such a manner that its quality, reliability and integrity meet the

requirements. An aircraft can really be considered airworthy when [13]:

a.Its type has been designed and certified meeting design standards.

b.It has been manufactured by an approved organization as per type design.

d.Further, on compliance of (c), no significant defects have been found and not

There is a difference in concept of civil and military aircraft certification. While military certification has a general concern of airworthiness as well as

c.It has been maintained by qualified people as per approved system and inspected in accordance with all applicable airworthiness directives.

**Figure 8.** *Mil-STD-882: design safety decision matrix [14].*
