An airman inspects a C-17 Globemaster III engine at Dover Air Force Base, Del., on Oct. 15, 2024. (Roland Balik/U.S. Air Force)
Air Force aircraft maintainers who do not sign nondisclosure agreements cannot hear quarterly, confidential briefs on aircraft mishaps, but they are not required to sign those agreements, according to an Air Force Safety Center spokeswoman.
However, airmen who do not sign the agreements will not be privy to information that could help prevent further mishaps, Capt. Paige Mehringer said in an email Thursday to Stars and Stripes.
An Oct. 17 post on an unofficial Facebook site for Air Force news and rumors, Air Force amn/nco/snco, cited a service memo that states all maintainers will attend the quarterly privileged information safety brief, which requires signing a nondisclosure agreement. The memo was posted along with unattributed comment.
Reviewing mishap data is one way to stem a rising tide of aircraft incidents that have injured airmen and cost the Air Force $79 million over the past two years, according to the memo.
Those briefs hold confidential, or privileged, information about mishaps on the types of aircraft the maintainers are working on.
“In short, they screwed up and didn’t consult [Department of the Air Force] legal to understand that maintainers, in fact, did not have to sign the NDAs,” the unattributed comment states.
Mehringer said airmen are not required to sign the agreements, but they are encouraged to do so.
Firefighters work to extinguish a blaze on a mock aircraft while training at Royal Air Force Mildenhall, England, on May 16, 2024. (Katie Mullikin/U.S. Air Force)
The annual safety brief reviews mishap factors and recommendations gleaned from safety investigations of aircraft accidents, Mehringer said. Without that brief, maintainers are less informed, she said.
“We are eager to get our maintenance Airmen trained and into the same trusted fold with our aircrew to prevent mishaps and protect [Air Force] combat power,” she said.
Maintainers who decline to sign the nondisclosure agreement can still do their jobs, Mehringer added.
“In the past, maintainers have been given access to privileged safety information on an ad hoc basis, as well as other career fields when warranted, but it has not been normalized across a career field, other than aircrew, until now,” she said.
The safety mishap investigation, unlike the accident investigation, is exempt from public disclosure. It includes detailed information sometimes obtained from sources on the condition of anonymity to encourage frank discussion, according to a Sept. 24 article on the Air Force Safety Center website.
Not all accident information is privileged. An accident investigation board, which may operate concurrently with a safety board, makes its findings public.
“Mishap prevention is the focus area of Air Force Safety: the inability to share mishap lessons learned with the right people degrades our ability to protect and preserve our Airmen and equipment,” Mehringer said.
