Safety or AAI Courses

[B200Drvr]

Does anybody know of a good Safety Management System (SMS) or Aircraft accident investigation course(AAI) or the likes of in the UK?

[OzExpat]

I don't know about the UK, but all those courses - and many more - are available from the Singapore Aviation Academy.

[Oh that's super!]

Cranfield Uni for AAI, if you have approx £12,000 and 6 weeks to spare (inc accom & food). Course isn't held again till next year though. Assuming you aren't going to go into AAI full time or almost full time though, it's probably an overkill.

SCSI for AAI if you have less money (still expensive, but also a good course - I think it might come to about USD 10,000 or so in total?) but it's held mostly in the US and the total course length is about 6 weeks from memory (2 weeks x 1 + 1 week + 4?? Don't quote me). Again, this might be an overkill if you aren't going to specialise full-on in AAI.

If you are on a tighter budget, SAA as mentioned by OzExpat is probably quite fine, although I haven't personally heard any feedback on it. I think it's under SGD 3,000. The next course is in 2007. Reasonably priced 2-week course that appears to have some good presenters.

SMS - you could do it with SCSI by distance learning, I think. Also Cranfield might have some short courses.

If you just want to know the basics of SMS, jump on www.casa.gov.au (http://www.casa.gov.au) and do a search. They have some downloadable material on it. You can also order an educational/information pack for very small fee (can't remember exactly how much, but it'd be about £10 equivalent).

[B200Drvr]

Thanks guys,
I am going to do the SCSI courses in Oct, was looking to see if there was also a JAR based one.
Will look at the other info as well.
Thanks alot

[Oh that's super!]

Saskatoon, sorry to be a barer of a bad news, but as a mere mortal, even after doing the Cranfield AAI course, one would have a very, very, very low chance of being taken on by AAIB.

Without a lot of experience as a pilot (not just a CPL, but extensive operational experience) or a lot of experinece as an engineer, or an extensive specialist knowledge in a relevant field (metallurgy etc), your chances are basically nil.

If you have a lot of experience as a pilot or an engineer, one would have a very, very small chance, instead of "basically zero".

[Groovy]

Cranfield offers a number of different accident investigation courses from the full 6-week course (the one AAIB Inspectors do) to a 3-week 'fundamentals of investigation' course and also a 2-week 'Accident investigation for aviation management course.
It is even possible to take the course through to an MSc in Safety and Accident Investigation.
Competition to get into the AAIB is very high, but there are plenty of other people who need investigators including manufacturers, operators, regulators and insurers. Just as an indication, Cranfield trained about 120 accident investigators last year from all over the world.

:)