Oct 13, 2026 · 32 min · 10 segments
In this special episode, we celebrate 50 years of Mandatory Occurrence Reporting (MOR) and reflect on the vital role it has played in improving aviation safety. Jon Round, Head of Airspace, ATM and…
I think one thing we should sort of talk about is the genesis of the mandatory occurrence reporting process.
And what really started this off was a tragic accident in 1972, where a Trident aircraft shortly after takeoff from Heathrow stalled and then crashed shortly after the takeoff.
One, which is the mandating of copy voice recorders in aircraft, as we know now.
But one of the things it did also highlight was there had been a couple of previous events that had occurred prior to this accident, which had very similar circumstances to them in the way that the aircraft was being handled out of those departures.
And although in one case a report was raised internally within the airline, it never really found its way into the right places where it would be looked into.
in some respects, and again, didn't find its way into where it could be looked at and engaged.
So there were several recommendations that were raised as a result of that public inquiry into that tragic accident.
and one of which was to actually look at how there is a way of learning from these events and then putting those changes in and that was sort of really the genesis towards having this joined up system where events like that would have to be reported they would come into a central location which is as we know now is the caa in order to review those and then learn from them but importantly in a way of just culture as we will come on to again around trying to prevent recurrence or trying to prevent an occurrence to the extent of in that respect and to you know hopefully save lives at the end of the day i
think i'd go back to the fact that that was the genesis that was 50 years ago it is the crown jewels of what this building exists in order to achieve which is to try to make aviation safer for everybody it's our job not to take that for granted as much as perhaps the traveling public quite rightly do But we need all of the reporting across all of aviation in order to make that happen.
And the aviation professionals creating those reports, describing what's happened, I think is at the heart of that.
There's no one in aviation goes to work in order to make or have an event, have what they might view as something going wrong.
And that, on a human level, can make people resistant to wanting to file a report.
But the truth is you're doing the right thing by doing it because you're helping everybody else.
So I think it's come from a very tragic event, but aviation keeps learning to try and avoid any such event in the future.
I think one thing we should sort of talk about is the genesis of the mandatory occurrence reporting process.
And what really started this off was a tragic accident in 1972, where a Trident aircraft shortly after takeoff from Heathrow stalled and then crashed shortly after the takeoff.
One, which is the mandating of copy voice recorders in aircraft, as we know now.
But one of the things it did also highlight was there had been a couple of previous events that had occurred prior to this accident, which had very similar circumstances to them in the way that the aircraft was being handled out of those departures.
And although in one case a report was raised internally within the airline, it never really found its way into the right places where it would be looked into.
in some respects, and again, didn't find its way into where it could be looked at and engaged.
So there were several recommendations that were raised as a result of that public inquiry into that tragic accident.
and one of which was to actually look at how there is a way of learning from these events and then putting those changes in and that was sort of really the genesis towards having this joined up system where events like that would have to be reported they would come into a central location which is as we know now is the caa in order to review those and then learn from them but importantly in a way of just culture as we will come on to again around trying to prevent recurrence or trying to prevent an occurrence to the extent of in that respect and to you know hopefully save lives at the end of the day i
think i'd go back to the fact that that was the genesis that was 50 years ago it is the crown jewels of what this building exists in order to achieve which is to try to make aviation safer for everybody it's our job not to take that for granted as much as perhaps the traveling public quite rightly do But we need all of the reporting across all of aviation in order to make that happen.
And the aviation professionals creating those reports, describing what's happened, I think is at the heart of that.
There's no one in aviation goes to work in order to make or have an event, have what they might view as something going wrong.
And that, on a human level, can make people resistant to wanting to file a report.
But the truth is you're doing the right thing by doing it because you're helping everybody else.
So I think it's come from a very tragic event, but aviation keeps learning to try and avoid any such event in the future.
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