Architecture System Framework for a Continuing Airworthiness Management Organization

Abstract

International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) main goal is to increase safety of global aviation. To pursue such goal, a Global Aviation Safety Plan was issued. This document highlights the importance of Safety Management System (SMS) requirements compliance by aviation stakeholders. At regional level, European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) issued the European Plan for Aviation Safety which identifies the strategy and the enablers for the near future. This includes the implementation of SMS on aviation industry, but also identifies the importance of digitalization and technology to improve safety level. In industry, having an enterprise architecture helps Organizations to have a systematic approach to ensure Processes, Information and Technology architectures alignment. Technology shall be used to improve the processes to a higher level of effectiveness and efficiency, producing the information effectively needed by different organizational levels. So, the question that arises is how can Continuing Airworthiness Management Organizations (CAMO) leverage its business, promoting safety and bringing value to stakeholder’s expectations? The goal of this dissertation was to promote the development of a high-level CAMO architecture system framework which complies with applicable SMS and airworthiness regulations. To meet this goal, three data vectors will be analyzed: the organizational architectures, the airworthiness CAMO requirements and the data provided by studies on how technology is leveraging industrial aviation. This will allow the identification of which business processes and compliance information are required and enable the discussion of which applicable architecture model should be more effective. The study led to the Architecture System Framework components proposal within the Continuing Airworthiness Management Organization, namely the Business Process architecture, the Information architecture and the Technological enablers guidance proposals. The Business Process architecture proposal is divided trough 3 processes levels that includes 8 level 1 processes, 31 level 2 processes and a third level where each of the level 2 process was designed using BPMN detail approach. To design Information Architecture was used DFD notation where 11 high level data entities repository were identified, evaluated and proposed. In the end of this work and using the identified technological enablers applied to aviation industry at the moment, it was discussed how these technologies could leverage the identified processes. Then it was developed a technological guidance scheme where was integrated the identified processes with the possible technologies to be used.