EASA Expresses Readiness to Work with BAGAIA

Chinedu Eze

The European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) has expressed the readiness to share the tenets of the European Co-ordination Centre for Accident and Incident Reporting Systems (ECCAIRS) with the Banjul Accord Group Accident Investigation Agency (BAGAIA).

The agency agreed to the partnership through the European Network of Civil Aviation Safety Investigation Authorities (ENCASIA) and has assured that it would kick-start once the modalities were  finalised by the International Civil Aviation Organisation ( ICAO)

This was disclosed at the ENCASIA Plenary holding 11-12 Oct 2022 at the Belgian Safety Investigation Authority, Federal Public Service Mobility and Transport, Brussels, Belgium, where a BAGAIA delegation led by the BAGAIA Commissioner, Charles Irikefe Erhueh, in company of AIB-Nigeria Commissioner, Akin Olateru and Commissioner AAIB-Ghana, Mr. Prempeh Akwasi Agyeibi, were all under observer status.

The EASA Senior International Cooperation Officer sub-Sahara Africa Regional Coordinator, Yves Koning, who responded to the special requests by BAGAIA delegation, said consultations with ICAO on the modalities to implement ECCAIRS in other regions outside Europe is ongoing.

Koning, who expressed appreciation for the request said,”Yes, it already being implemented in the Europe, but they are finalising with ICAO on the modalities to implement it outside Europe. Once that is done it will now be extended on train the trainer.”

ECCAIRS is a cooperative network of civil aviation authorities and safety investigation authorities in Europe, a project being managed by the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission (DG JRC) on request of the Directorate General for Mobility and Transport (DG MOVE) and in close co-operation with the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA).

BAGAIA under the EU-ASA project, presented the request for peer reviews of processes in the regions where EU experts will do due diligence and provide reports afterwards.

Also BAGAIA requested for human capacity development and the ECCAIRS training of the new version.