From risk to resilience

A-SAFE’s James Smith explains why he believes being proactive on airport safety is key to efficient operations.

The image of airport operations is one of constant, co-ordinated motion. But that smooth choreography masks a fragile balance. One damaged piece of equipment, one mistimed delay, or a minor safety incident (airside or landside) can trigger a costly chain reaction.

The financial fallout is significant. Ground delays cost airports €166 per minute, according to the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), while the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) puts the figure at $100.80 per minute for US passenger airlines.

Indeed, in 2022 alone, delays and cancellations cost the industry $17-20 billion in the US and €19–22 billion in Europe.

To protect efficiency, airport operators need to act early by spotting risks and removing friction before it spirals into cost, disruption, or danger. For this level of operational resilience to happen, proactive risk reduction needs to become a priority.

Operational fragility in critical zones

Airports are pressure vessels. Aprons, baggage-handling areas and terminals each play host to a range of fast-paced, high-consequence processes that have little tolerance for disruption.

These environments rely on infrastructure doing its job quietly and consistently without interruption. Airside, ground vehicles move in tight choreography between aircraft stands. A tug out of line or a belt-loader a minute late can block a gate, delay the next arrival, and trigger a chain of missed departures.

The pressure also plays out in the movement of baggage between terminal and aircraft. Tugs and trailers transport thousands of bags across service roads, racing the clock between arrivals and departures.

One misjudged turn, clipped corner or incident deriving from using unsafe desire lines can halt an entire belt of departures, triggering offloads, missed flights, and urgent repairs. This is especially critical at gates and aprons, where 80% of airport accidents occur, and nearly a quarter damage aircraft.

In these high-risk zones, traditional steel-and-concrete barriers become failure points. Their rigidity magnifies minor collisions into major disruptions, requiring immediate downtime and reactive maintenance from already stretched operations teams.

These systems were not built to absorb impact or protect continuity. To reduce risk, airports need infrastructure that works with pressure, not against it.

The reactive model is running out of runway

These recurring challenges have two things in common. Firstly, they are not isolated, they happen daily across airports all around the world. Second, they are accepted as part of doing business.

The approach has remained largely reactive. Something breaks, someone fixes it. Someone is late, someone reroutes. But this model is now proving unsustainable.

Delay-related costs are harder to absorb and getting costlier by the day, with turnarounds growing tighter and traffic surging.

Meanwhile, many airport operators are being asked to do more with less. The aviation industry lost 2.3 million jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic, with ground-handling and security roles the ones impacted the most.

That number has not yet recovered, yet passenger numbers have soared since then, leaving airports severely understaffed.

Thin workforces work under more stress, which directly causes more oversights and mistakes. In other words: incidents (and subsequent delays) are more likely. For this reason, it is important to support them in any way possible to enhance their efficiency and reduce the risk of human error by removing the friction points they are forced to deal with.

That means eliminating safety hazards, redesigning inefficient layouts, and replacing outdated infrastructure that makes their jobs harder.

This process starts by addressing the root cause: a safety infrastructure that creates more problems than it prevents.

Build to bend, not break

Airports operate under tight schedules and tighter margins. With collisions a certainty in high-traffic zones like baggage-handling areas, materials need proven resilience as well as flexibility. That is why more facilities now are deploying polymer-based barrier systems built to dissipate the energy of repeated impacts from ground-handling vehicles.

Unlike traditional materials that fatigue or fail after one strike, high-specification polymers return to shape without structural compromise. This durability translates into quicker ROI and longer-term savings by cutting out emergency repairs, replacements, and the operational downtime they trigger.

But not every polymer barrier performs the same. Only those with proven impact testing and lifecycle data can meet the demands of 24/7 ground operations. Performance matters, as does having the independent certifications that prove it.

The right barrier solution does much more than just protect from the impact: it maintains its structural integrity so that operations can keep going, a characteristic that clearly outperforms cheaper, short-lived alternatives.

Why smarter risk reduction means better operation flow

The impact of this shift is tangible. Having polymer-based barriers instead of steel ones considerably reduces the number of replacements required thanks to their resilience after repeated superficial impacts over time.

By reducing maintenance, airports keep operations flowing, and engineering teams can focus on preventive upkeep rather than scrambling to fix cracked concrete under a floodlight tower minutes before a night arrival.

But physical resilience is only part of the picture. Airports investing in smart safety infrastructure are now gaining access to real-time data through Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT)-enabled systems. These technologies are integrated into the barriers and track impacts, identify high-risk areas, and reveal patterns in near misses.

created by dji camera.

They feed all this data into a software that notifies operators of any incident instantly and gives them insights that make it possible to redirect incoming flights to an alternative stand, eliminating potential delays in turnaround times, adjust layouts, retrain teams, or reinforce specific zones before more serious incidents occur – not after.

This way, risk stops being a statistic and becomes a set of clear, actionable signals.

In baggage areas, for example, fewer disruptions mean that the flow of luggage remains consistent, even when tug trucks and forklifts collide with protective systems. Fewer bottlenecks, fewer cascading delays and a measurable drop in avoidable equipment repairs.

These gains also make performance more predictable, helping airports to operate at pace without pushing systems past breaking point. By removing common failure points and reducing risk before it escalates, airports are building a baseline of operational reliability that holds under pressure.

An infrastructure that never grounds you

Often success is measured by what hasn’t gone wrong. Every delay avoided, every transfer completed, every bag delivered on time are the quiet wins that define performance.

But they do not happen by chance. They rely on infrastructure that absorbs pressure, resists failure, and delivers insight before problems escalate.

Proactive safety is the basis of that infrastructure. It reduces downtime, smooths operations, and gives teams the insights they need to stay ahead of risk instead of reacting to it. The smarter the infrastructure, the sharper the operational edge.

Start where the cracks keep appearing. Replace fragility with systems that hold up under real-world conditions.

It is time to move away from traditional safety and transition to a risk-reduction infrastructure that absorbs impact, recovers instantly, and keeps operations flowing, not one that shatters under pressure.

About the author

James Smith is co-CEO at A-SAFE and specialises in industrial safety innovation, with a rigorous focus on quality testing standards