(1)

In accordance with Regulation (EU) No 376/2014 Member States and the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (‘the Agency’) are each required to establish a mechanism to independently collect, evaluate, process, analyse and store details of aviation safety occurrences. The competent authorities of the Member States have to draw up occurrence reports on the basis of details of occurrences and store them in a national database. The same obligation exists for the Agency to draw up occurrence reports on the basis of details of occurrences and store them in a database.

(2)

In accordance with Article 9(1) of Regulation (EU) No 376/2014, Member States and the Agency are to participate in an exchange of information by making all information relating to safety stored in their respective reporting databases available through the European Central Repository (ECR).

(3)

Pursuant to Regulation (EU) No 376/2014, occurrence reports are to contain a safety risk classification that is subject to review by the competent authorities of the Member States or the Agency, and are to be transferred into the ECR.To ensure that the occurrence reports contained in the ECR are all classified in a harmonised manner, the competent authorities of the Member States and the Agency should ensure that the classification in those reports is determined in accordance with the common European risk classification scheme (ERCS) as set out in Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2020/2034 (2).

(4)

It is now necessary to lay down the arrangements for a harmonised and consistent implementation of the ERCS by the Agency and Member States.

(5)

When occurrence reports contain a risk classification determined by using methodologies other than the ERCS, the competent authorities of the Member States or the Agency should classify the risk of the occurrence concerned in accordance with the ERCS as defined in Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2020/2034.

(6)

In cases where the competent authorities of the Member States or the Agency decide to use a conversion procedure to convert the risk classifications referred to in recital 5 into an ERCS classification, and where such methodologies are ARMS-ERC 4x4 or RAT ‘ATM Overall’, the competent authorities of the Member States or the Agency should use the direct conversion procedure provided in this Regulation.

(7)

Where the direct conversion procedure set out in the Annex is not applicable, the competent authorities of the Member States and the Agency should be allowed to use other conversion procedures as long as an equivalent ERCS classification is achieved.

(8)

Continuous monitoring and improvement of the ERCS is necessary to ensure its effective application. It is necessary to lay down detailed rules for such monitoring and improvement and the Agency should assist the Commission in that review and monitoring. For that purpose, Member States should report regularly and within prescribed deadlines to the Agency and the Commission on the use of the ERCS and its assessment.

(9)

The competent authorities of the Member States, and the Agency need to prepare for the application of the ERCS, in particular by adjusting their internal processes and possibly allocating additional resources. However, Article 24(3) of Regulation (EU) No 376/2014 provides that Article 7(2) of that Regulation, which mandates the use of the ERCS by the Member States and the Agency, is to apply once the delegated and implementing acts specifying and developing the ERCS enter into force. Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2020/2034 defining the ERCS already entered into force on 31 December 2020. Therefore, it is not possible to delay the applicability of the obligation to use the ERCS beyond the date of the entry into force of this Regulation. Moreover, for the purposes of the annual safety review published by the Agency in accordance with Article 72(7) of Regulation (EU) 2018/1139 of the European Parliament and of the Council (3), it is essential that occurrence reports uploaded to the ECR within a 1 year period are scored in a harmonised way. The obligation to classify the occurrences in accordance with the ERCS should start to apply as of the date of entry into force of this Regulation. Therefore, this Regulation should enter into force on 1 January 2023.

(10)

The measures provided for in this Regulation are in accordance with the opinion of the Committee established by Article 127 of Regulation (EU) 2018/1139,

(1)

‘ARMS-ERC methodology’ means the methodology developed by the industry working group ‘Airline Risk Management Solutions’ (ARMS) for assessing operational risks;

(2)

‘ATM’ means air traffic management as defined in Article 2(10) of Regulation (EC) No 549/2004 of the European Parliament and of the Council (4);

(3)

‘ATM airborne severity score’ means the part of the RAT methodology that assesses the air operation performance of the occurrence;

(4)

‘ATM ground severity score’ means the part of the RAT methodology that assesses the system performance (procedures, equipment and human) of the ATM system;

(5)

‘ATM overall severity score’ means the ATM ground severity score and ATM airborne severity score combined into one single score;

(6)

‘RAT methodology’ means the Risk Analysis Tool methodology developed by Eurocontrol used to classify safety related occurrences in the ATM domain;

(7)

‘Eurocontrol’ is the European Organisation for the Safety of Air Navigation set up by the International Convention of 13 December 1960 relating to Cooperation for the Safety of Air Navigation (5).