The FOD Squad -- secret saviours

In the world of aviation, acronyms dominate. LHR, GPU, ILS, ATC, PAX & many hundreds more. Many acronyms are universally known, some are known only to specialists, whilst a few deserve much higher recognition than they receive.

One of those is FOD, which stands for Foreign Object Debris. FOD is defined as any item that shouldn’t be there that has the potential to cause damage to an aircraft. Numerous unwanted items find their way onto live operational areas of airfields or aircraft. Such items include spanners, baggage locks, nuts, bolts, stones and even broken pieces of runway. Additionally, vehicles & aircraft in the wrong place at the wrong time can present a significant hazard to aircraft operations.

FOD sounds unthreatening, but the resulting damage costs the Aviation industry millions of dollars each year. More worryingly, in exceptional cases, FOD can and has lead to the loss of life. In such circumstances, FOD suddenly becomes a far more threatening issue.

Military aviators have always been aware of FOD, and many air forces have a strong focus on FOD prevention as a vital part of their Aviation Safety activities. The US and UK militaries work closely in this field and probably lead the world in the way they tackle FOD prevention and the awareness of it amongst their personnel.

Military combat aircraft have high-performance jet engines that are far less tolerant to FOD damage than civilian turbofan engines. The damage caused to these engines presents a significant financial and operational challenge to military operations. This is more so for aircraft operating in the austere environments where current war-fighting and peacekeeping missions are taking place. If military capability is to be provided whilst giving value for the taxpayers money, every effort must be made to reduce the costs and safety risks of FOD.

In pursuit of this aim, the UK MoD is actively promoting anti-FOD measures. Military airfields differ greatly from their civil counterparts in many ways. Firstly, the number of staff & different organisations on a military airfield is small compared to a major civil hub, which may have tens of thousands of staff & several hundred operators active at any one time. Another is that the nature of the aircraft and the lack of commercial pressures means that time is less critical than operational integrity.

The greatest asset of the world's air forces in airfield safety lies in their ability to embed a positive FOD culture in the day-to-day lives of all personnel who have a role to play in FOD Prevention. Most, but not all, cases of FOD arise from human error and the potential loss of the lives of comrades helps to focus the minds. This leads to staff taking a far greater responsibility for airfield safety than their civil counterparts. Military airfields also benefit from a single chain of command & their ability to rely on highly-developed discipline to further optimise safety. As soon as they make the transition from civilian life, military personnel are trained to think safety, and to take responsibility for their actions. Additionally, visitors to the airfield can be easily controlled & vehicles checked to reduce the risk they might pose to safety.

This means that when key areas are identified as at risk, mandatory avoidance procedures can be introduced. In the MoD, that created an initiative to completely overhaul the approach to FOD Prevention. Part of that programme included a specific focus on FOD Prevention on the Fast Jet fleet, which include the principal attack aircraft such as the Tornado & Harrier. The initiative commenced with a thorough analysis where FOD issues existed so that effort could be focused where it would achieve the maximum effect. The FODFATHER was introduced as a figurehead for the FOD campaign and the strapline “Pick Up the FOD or the Pilot Gets It” was invented to focus personnel to the risk of FOD.

Flight Lieutenant John Franklin has fulfilled the role as the FODFATHER to the UK MoD for several years and was awarded an MBE in the 2006 New Year’s Honours List for his achievements. He preaches, teaches & enthuses FOD avoidance. He does that within the Royal Navy, Army and the RAF, and also to international audiences at major conferences dedicated to FOD and airfield safety through a global organisation called National Aerospace FOD Prevention Inc (NAFPI) that is dedicated to raising awareness of FOD Prevention across the world-wide aerospace community.

His programme contains a set of measures designed to fulfil 3 main requirements.

1. Stopping FOD getting on the airfield through the education of personnel and the introduction of pro-active control methods.

2. If FOD gets on, get it off through airfield monitoring and inspections coupled with airfield sweeping regimes and a culture that ensures personnel remove debris when they see it.

3. When FOD Damage does occur, understanding through analysis the causes of the damage in order to prevent re-occurrence including the consideration of aircraft and engine technology employed on future aircraft designs.

Traditonally, the armed forces were close to self-sufficiency for their aircraft and airfield maintenance. However, in the modern military, partnership in these areas are being forged with civilian contractors, such as BAe Systems, Rolls-Royce, Westland Helicopters and others. All contractor personnel are also trained in the necessary safety standards, and the MoD forges strong links with all contractor organisations to ensure a joined up approach exists to improve all aspects of safety.

As part of the MoD FOD initiatives, ClickAirport & the FODFATHER worked together at RAF Leuchars and RAF Lossiemouth in order to help identify areas of key benefit to the programme, and worked to tune the capabilities of Activity Manager to suit the particular needs of RAF operational safety. Activity Manager is now in use at the forefront of military operations with the newly introduced Typhoon fleet based at RAF Coningsby, and has played a valuable role in ensuring a structured approach to bird control activity, airfield inspections and management, fault data collection, incident reporting and case analysis.

Flt Lt Franklin has seen real benefit from the MoD’s partnership with ClickAirport. ""The Fast Jet fleet is the most susceptible to FOD within the RAF. Tornado FOD incidents have reduced significantly through the ability of Activity Manager in providing us with accurate data concerning the nature and locations of incidents, allowing us to identify the root causes of problems. We can share that data quickly with the many organisations involved in the support of the aircraft and the airfield so that we can make informed decisions to maximise airfield and aircraft availability and reduce our operational costs of ownership.""

Going forward, the RAF will replace the Tornado F3 and Harrier with the Typhoon & the JSF (Joint Strike Fighter). These new aircraft have design criteria, which includes a higher ratio of flying hours to maintenance hours but, as so often, there are swings & roundabouts. The engine design of these future aircraft involve Bladed Disk technology, which mean individual engine stages are made up of a single piece of material rather than the individual blades fitted to a hub that are fitted to the likes of Tornado and Harrier. Whilst such technology provides a significant performance improvement, they are more expensive to repair, especially when FOD Damage occurs. For this reason, the continued success of the MoD’s FOD initiatives are vital to the long term support of these future aircraft.

Above all else the goal of FOD Prevention is to prevent the loss of life. The FODFATHER instils in all military personnel the fact that every crew member and every passenger on every flight is somebody’s loved one and is it everyone’s responsibility to help keep them safe when they take to the sky. ClickAirport is proud to be a part of this ethos and we wish the MoD every success in their noble efforts."