SAFA Skysailor Magazine

39 WINTER 2025 | June-July-August SKY SAILOR Just because you lodge a report, or several reports, does not mean we’re going to stop you from doing what you love. If our safety officers think you could benefit from some advice to help you with what might be a problem, they may have a gentle chat with you, but no, we won’t rescind your authorisation (unless the soon to be mentioned caveat comes into play). Are you too embarrassed to write a report? Don’t be. There are very few pilots out there who genuinely have not made a mistake, or had an accident or incident of some description. It happens. You’re human and what you’re doing is quite a complex task – flying. There’s a lot to it and it takes time, effort and patience to get a good grip on it. We’ve all been there before. Take a look back over past SkySailor issues and you’ll see I’ve written about some of my own doozies. Are your mates or other people telling you not to bother? Ask them, ‘Why not?’ They might also be embarrassed; again, there’s nothing to be ashamed of. They might have privacy concerns; we don’t identify any member or person in any of the informa- tion we make publicly available. I can’t think of a good reason not to submit a report other than one: you might incrim- inate someone doing something they’re not meant to be doing. Which brings me to that caveat men- tioned previously. One of the core principles around which our Safety Management System is built, is that we, SAFA, operate in a ‘Just Culture’. It means we encourage people to report accidents, incidents, or hazards they observe. In fact, in our Operations Manual (V3.0_20250604) you will find it is a pilot’s responsibility to report accidents or incidents (see 4.1.1(12)); the onus on safety officers and instructors is more rigorous (see Section 5 of the Operations Manual and the relevant sections of the Qualifications Manual). As mentioned before, we view these reports as an opportunity to learn from what has occurred and try to make an improvement in safety. We do not whack people around the head for honest mis- takes they make.