ICAO Annex 13 ‘Aircraft Accident and Incident Investigation’ applies to the activities that follow accidents and incidents, regardless of where they occur. Accidents & incidents are defined as occurrences associated with the operation of an aircraft that affect or could affect the safety of its operation. The term “quality” is not mentioned in Annex 13.
Safety is defined in ICAO Annex 19 as the state in which the risks associated with aviation activities, related to, or in direct support of, the operation of aircraft, are reduced and controlled to an acceptable level. The term “quality” is not mentioned in Annex 19 either.
The concept of quality has been replaced by compliance (iaw Annex 19, Ch. 3, Safety Assurance). An internal audit process is one of the key means to monitor compliance with safety regulations, which form the foundation of a SMS, and to assess the effectiveness of safety risk controls and the SMS itself. Guidance on the scope of the internal audit process is provided in the ICAO SMM Doc 9859.
Guidance on conducting these audits is provided in ISO 19011:2018 (or the latest ed. ISO 19011:2026), Guidelines for auditing management systems.
The importance of compliance as the foundation of safety assurance
Many forward-thinking aviation organizations successfully integrate Quality Management principles into their SMS to achieve higher process maturity and drive real continuous improvement.
The good news is that this approach is already embedded in Chapter 3 – Safety Assurance (specifically 3.3 Continuous Improvement of SMS) of the SMS framework.
The Accountable Manager is required to establish and maintain an effective integrated management system that includes CMS, SMS, Part-IS, and Aviation Security, while overseeing their certificates ATO, AOC, CAMO, and Part-145 operations, as applicable into a single MS (often this is the very challenge).
ISO 19011:2026 provides excellent guidelines for auditing management systems (MS), with a strong risk-based approach that was notably missing in traditional QMS standards.
Thank you for reading this post. It’s always a pleasure writing/discussing these important topics with professionals who are genuinely committed to elevating safety standards.