Technical Directive Compliance

Words: 818
Pages: 4

Technical Directive Compliance
The Navy and Marine Corps spend 81,025 man-hours incorporating 22,614 Technical Directive based maintenance actions in CY-16. With such an enormous effort associated with maintaining every asset in the inventory, why is there not a fully functional, accurate maintenance tracking system in place? Senior Leaders must ensure the proper incorporation and documentation of Aviation Technical Directives, as it assures fleet readiness, operational capability, and safety of personnel and material. This essay will discuss the problem with the current maintenance tracking system to document all applicable TD status codes, a discussion on mission readiness, and the recommended updates to system capability.
Problem
The
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Introduced to the fleet in 2007 by the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command (SPAWARSYSCOM), it provided significant capability improvements such as the creation of the Auto Log-Sets, thus allowing the Naval Aviation Enterprise to track the repair history, Technical Directives, etc... for individual repairable components throughout its life. The developers failed to restrict the system from creating duplicate log sets or prohibiting users from deleting the data forever. This design flaw has created a serious issue for activities trying to meet their mission and carry out an assigned flight schedule, in that the auto log-sets for recently repaired assets do not always accompany the component. When receiving components without the required auto log-set, activities engage in a multi-step process to either locate or recreate the lost information, this includes verifying Technical Directives for applicability and compliance. The verification and incorporation process can take anywhere from thirty minutes to several days and has a direct impact on aircraft availability and mission readiness. The Commander Naval Air Forces Aviation Maintenance Management Team has identified improper or missing documentation of Technical Directives on auto log-sets as the leading cause for the TD Compliance program failure. Besides losing data, activities often document Not Applicable TDs as incorporated just to clean up their reports or to match the paper logbooks. The Technical Directive compliance program is one of the consistently the least effective and efficiently managed programs found during their Aviation Maintenance Inspections of Navy and Marine Corps aviation activities. After a discussion on the resulting impact on aviation readiness, a