Incident management · Safety reporting · Proof of concept
Helicopter operators investigate every safety report by hand across a spreadsheet, Word files and a legacy system. I designed a single flow where the AI does the first pass and the safety manager makes the decisions.
Screen 12 · ECCAIRS, all decided
Problem
A safety report was rebuilt by hand three times, across a spreadsheet, Word files and a legacy system, so the same facts were typed again at every step.
My role
Sole product designer, with a BA on research. Two months, and twelve safety managers.
What changed
One guided flow: the first pass is done for you, and the safety manager still makes every decision.
Result
Proof of concept, not yet built.
01The problem
A safety report arrives as free text. The safety manager then reads it, rates the risk, keeps a record in Excel and Word, and re-enters it field by field into a legacy system to produce the ECCAIRS record the authority needs.
Nothing connects those steps, so the same facts are typed again at every one.
“A normal report takes about two days.”
Dozens of attributes entered one by one, from a report that already contains most of the answers.
Each manager applies the matrix their own way, so the same hazard gets different ratings.
Nothing shows which reports are overdue, who owns them, or which carry an intolerable risk.
02Research
12
A BA visited twelve operators and interviewed the safety manager at each one.
12
The BA also observed each procedure closely, which shows the steps people skip when they describe their work.
1
I had access to the old system and a recording of a manager using it, which showed exactly where time goes.
The same three pains came up across the operators. They set the brief: remove the re-typing, make risk consistent, and show what is open.
03Key decisions
Decision 1
The inbox puts what needs the safety manager first. Every row shows the risk level, days open, owner and due date.
Counts for overdue reports and intolerable risks sit on top, so the riskiest report is never buried.
Decision 2
Analysis starts when the report opens. It writes a synopsis linked to the source sentences and suggests hazards from the taxonomy.
Nothing is accepted without the manager. Every suggestion can be kept, corrected or removed.
Decision 3
The system matches every ECCAIRS attribute from the report. The manager only sees the values it is unsure of, with its reason.
Keep or correct it, with a one-tap reason for the audit trail. This replaces the re-typing that research named as the biggest pain.
Decision 4
Severity and probability sit side by side with the ICAO 5×5 matrix, so every manager reaches a rating the same way.
Similar risks from the register appear alongside. A recurring hazard is linked instead of assessed again from scratch.
Decision 5
Closing shows what was decided, what is still open and one final action. It stays blocked until an intolerable risk has an accepted mitigation.
A closed report locks, with every change and correction in its audit trail.
19 states across six steps, including the ones that usually get left to engineering.
AI analysis running
Analysis partly failed
Re-run would overwrite decisions
Irreversible close, confirmed
04Response
I presented the concept to leadership, then to the safety managers it was designed for.
The reaction was immediate, from safety managers and leadership alike.
05Next
This is a proof of concept. Nothing is built or measured yet, so the next step is to test it on real reports with the same operators.
Screens use invented data. Names, registrations and reference numbers are not real.
Send me the screen, or the idea. I’ll reply with what I’d do first.
