Survey of Electrical Failures in Aircraft Mishaps

Abigail Cooley
Materials Directorate
Air Force Research Laboratory
Wright-Patterson AFB, OH
Mathematics and Management, BS – Indiana University
abigail.cooley@afrl.af.mil

Abstract

Topic: Aging Airframes, Subsystems, Avionics

Ten years ago, a study was commissioned by the US Air Force to compile and analyze
data on the various electrical and electronic components contributing to aircraft mishaps
from 1986 to the date of request in 1989. Mishaps are classified by severity of injury
and material damage. Class A mishaps have $1,000,000 in damage or a fatality; class
B - $200,000 to $1,000,000 or a disabling injury; class C - $10,000 to $200,000; class
HAP - High Accident Potential. The report recorded the basic electric system of the
failed individual component and each component. Results indicated that connectors
and wiring were the largest contributors to electrical failures. As aircraft age, it becomes
necessary to determine what effect time has on the integrity of the systems and which
systems demand the most attention.

Electronic failure was identified as the primary cause in approximately 2% of Air Force
mishaps. There are a much higher percentage of situations where electric failures are a
contributor to a mishap. We have recently initiated a study to update the earlier
analysis and incorporate other factors such as aircraft age and how the electronic failure
contributed to the mishap. The analysis of primary and secondary electrical failures,
and the aircraft systems they affect, will come closer to the true impact of electric
systems on an aging aircraft fleet.

Mishap data will be collected from the Air Force mishap database, which is maintained
by the Air Force Safety Center, Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico. Information will
be categorized by aircraft type and age, impact of the failure, failed component, function
of this component and the system first affected by this failure.

Introduction

In 1989, a report was released in an effort to analyze the contribution of electrical and
electronic components to aircraft mishaps. The survey included all mishaps for US Air
Force aircraft from 1986 to the date of request. Approximately 650 reports were
reviewed and organized by type of aircraft. A sample of reports was selected and a
total of 326 reports were evaluated in detail. Findings included aircraft type and failed
components. The paper covered those reports where some type of electrical failure
was included in the findings. An effort was made in this new survey to include only

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those mishaps where electrical/electronic failures were cited as the primary or
secondary cause of the mishap. This partition provides more confidence that the
electrical failure initiated or was a major contributor in the mishap, instead of being the
result of some other failure. We also selected ten years of data to determine if aging
trends may exist in the collected data. The information was collected in a database
format that can be readily updated for future studies. This preliminary effort will serve
as a model for a more thorough research process.

Mishap Report format

Each mishap report included a brief summary of the event from the pilot for any
conditions that affect the safety of the aircraft. Following this summary is a list of
findings – one to several of these findings are identified as causes. Each report is
submitted to the Air Force Safety Center, Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico.
Reports are cataloged in a database and categorized by the primary and secondary
causes contributing to the mishap. The identifying category may be a single word or
short phrase. Collecting these reports requires a list of any words that might be in the
list of possible categories and related to some function of subject system.
In this case, a list of descriptors for electrical systems and components was submitted
for a search. This selection narrowed the number of mishap reports to 271 for mishaps
occurring between 1989 and March 1999 where the primary or secondary failure was an
electrical system and/or component.

Each summary and list of findings was reviewed for significant artifacts to be included in
the final analysis. These details were recorded in a simple database via a form with
pull-down menus to make it easier to record additional details. Those details are listed
and defined below.

Collected details

• Age of Aircraft
• Mishap Class – A US Air Force mishap is defines as an unplanned event, or series
of events, resulting in:
• Injury to Air Force military personnel.
• Injury to on-duty DAF civilian personnel.
• Injury to non-Air Force personnel resulting from Air Force operations.
• Occupational illness of Air Force military or DAF civilian personnel. The
medical staff reports occupational illnesses through its reporting system.
• Illness of non-Air Force personnel caused by Air Force operations.
• Damage to Air Force property.
• Damage to non-Air Force property resulting from Air Force operations.
• Degradation of nuclear or radiological safety.
• Mishaps included here are flight mishaps involving Air Force aircraft when intent for
flight is established and there is reportable damage to the aircraft.
A – more than $1,000,000;fatality or permanent disability

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 B - $200,000 to $1,000,000; permanent partial disability; inpatient hospitalization
of 3 or more personnel
C - $10,000 to $200,000; Injury resulting in a lost workday involving 8 hours or
more away from work beyond the day or shift on which it occurred
H – High Accident Potential (HAP), observed during maintenance or pre-flight
checks
• Aircraft Type – Describes the mission of the involved aircraft. For concise recording,
some categories have been consolidated. In particular, Electronic Counter Measure
aircraft have been included with Avionics/Reconnaissance. Other categories include
Bomber/Attack, Cargo, Fighter, Helicopter, and Trainer.
• Components – The primary cause of a mishap is usually attributed to one
component. In some cases, two components (or no components) were listed in the
report. Those components that could not be determined or did not fit within the
range of the surveyed components were included in the avionics group. Other
components include batteries, capacitors, circuit breakers, conductors (wiring),
connectors, electric panels (contains switches, lights and in some cases printed
wiring boards), fuel probes, generators, lights, motors, relays (or contactors),
resistors, switches, and transformers.
• Function – These categories describe the function of the components.
• Electronic components operate without moving parts – capacitors, circuit,
breakers, conductors, connectors, electric panels, fuel probes, lights, resistors.
• Failed components with moving parts are included in the electromechanical
category – generators, batteries, switches, relays, and motors. A failure in one of
these components can involve smaller electronic parts or interconnections.
Generators in particular were often cited as failed components but for an
undetermined reason – could be internal wiring, moving parts or connections
from another system to the generator.
• Interconnections include wiring, connectors, and in some cases printed wiring
boards
• Systems – The system affected by the component was recorded when the
information was available. Some components can be a part of several systems
(connectors, conductors, capacitors, and relays). Where a system was not
specifically mentioned or discussed the failure was added to the avionics category.
This category also included areas that supported other systems indirectly (general
avionics commonly referred to as a “black box”) Other categories included flight
control, fuel systems, instrument (indicators, panel lights, radios, landing gear, etc.),
power systems, and total electrical failure – system unknown

Findings

Most mishap incidents resulted in minor damage to an aircraft or were actually

situations that could have potentially caused the loss or serious damage to an aircraft.
The distribution of mishap class as defined in the above paragraph is given below in
figure 1. There are a much higher percentage of situations where electronic failures are
a contributor to a mishap. Most mishap investigations we have conducted are the result
of several independent events. The combination of these events can result in the loss

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of one or more critical systems that can ultimately lead to the loss or serious damage to
an aircraft.

Mishap class

I P A B
0% 4% 3% 1%

H
33%

C
59%

Figure 1.

As can be seen from figure 1 relatively few mishaps result in the loss or major injuries.
Most mishaps fall into the class C category or below. Next to class C mishaps, High
Accident Potential mishaps were reported far more than mishaps in the remaining
classes. These are mishaps that were discovered in routine maintenance or pre-flight
checks. Had these failures not been repaired they could have caused a more serious
mishap in flight. These findings indicate that some failures can be avoided by
preventive maintenance, others may be unavoidable. Improvements in this area can
avert mishaps that are more serious and maintain or reduce the number of class C
mishaps.

Recently, there has been considerable interest in the aging of electronics and its impact
on overall aircraft reliability and safety. The data that was provided in the mishap
summaries included the age of the mishap aircraft. A distribution of the aircraft age is
given below in figure 2.

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 Age Groups of Mishap Aircraft

70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
2 to 5 6 to 10 11 to 15 16 to 20 21 to 25 26 to 30 31 to 35 36 to 53

Figure 2.

While this summary implies aircraft in the 11 to 15 year experience more mishaps
caution must be used in forming any conclusions. There are several factors that must
be considered before reaching any conclusions. This would include factors such as
quantity of aircraft, aircraft type, and number of flight hours. Additional analysis will be
required and correlation of several factors will be needed to normalize the data in figure
2. Once the data is normalized for several factors, an aging trend may be apparent.

Aircraft were categorized into several types to look at the kinds of failures that might be
specific to one type. In most cases, the component failures were independent of the
type of aircraft. That is to say that components failed in the same way regardless of the
aircraft in which they failed. The percentage of mishaps with respect to aircraft type is
shown in figure 3.

Aircraft Type

Training Avionics/Recon
Refueler 12% 11% Bomber/Attack
6% 10%
Helicopter
5%
Cargo
20%
Fighter
36%

Figure 3.

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Insulation degradation is a significant, if not primary, contributor to the aging problems
attacking the entire aircraft fleet. The experience in this laboratory indicates that
fighters may be more susceptible to aging damage, with 42% of fighter mishaps
resulting from wiring and connector failures. Fighter aircraft typically have more
complex avionics in a relatively small space compared to cargo and bomber aircraft.
Wiring must be fitted into tight spaces, making it difficult to repair and increasing the
chances for chafing. Fighter avionics are also typically subjected to higher operating
temperatures. For comparison, nearly half of the mishaps in the Cargo and
Bomber/Attack groups were the result of electronic failures. Again, additional analysis
needs to be done to normalize this data with respect to aircraft population, flight hours,
and stresses of the mission. The systems affected by these failures are analyzed in
figure 4 below.

System
total electrical
failure avionics flight control
1% 9% 11%

power systems
45% fuel systems
8%

instruments
26%

Figure 4.

Electronic and electrical systems perform many types of functions. This can range from
supplying electrical power to controlling flight surfaces to analyzing and displaying
aircraft performance characteristics. The graph in figure 4 shows mishap distribution by
system function. By this illustration, electrical power and instrumentation are the largest
categories. Electrical power has become a flight critical system since for many
systems, electric power is required to maintain stabilized flight. Many aircraft are now
completely dependent on electronics and no longer have mechanical back-up systems.
Aircraft also rely on electronics to manage and control entire systems. These critical
systems are typically controlled in the cockpit and can not be easily overridden in the
event of a catastrophic failure.

Each failed component was part of a system. Many components can be included in
several systems, for example relays, connectors or electric panels. Mishaps where a
system could not be determined were included with avionics systems; this was usually
in cases where one of these common components was cited without a system or
location. The system reported with the most failures was the power system, making up

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nearly half of all system failures. Power systems endure the most stress - they also
have components of every function. In comparison, fuel systems and instruments had
most failures in the electronics and interconnection components. Within these systems
each component performed one of three functions – electronic, electromechanical, or
interconnecting. The graph below in figure 5 illustrates the breakup across all of the
recorded mishaps.

Function

electromechanical
interconnections 34%
43%

electronics
23%

Figure 5.

Laboratory investigation experience in AFRL/MLSA failure analysis and the previous

study on electronic mishaps suggested most mishaps are related interconnections or
electromechanical functions. These types of functions can typically experience
mechanical movement, wear, or direct exposure to the surrounding aircraft
environment. The result can be mechancial or physical degradation, with both being
time dependent. This functions are excellent candidates for further aging studies.

Components functioning as interconnections make up the largest part of failures. This

category generally consists of wiring and connectors. The other categories cover a
much larger range of components – an indication that interconnective components
deserve a higher priority in understanding the affects of aging and developing
preventive maintenance procedures. A closer look at the distribution of functional
failures in a sample of the aircraft popullation is illustrated below in figure 6.

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Cooley, Survey of Electrical Failures in Aircraft Mishaps
 Function of Failed Component by Aircraft Type

45
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
interconnections
5
electronic
0
electromechanical
Bomber/Attack

Cargo

Fighter
Figure 6.

As mentioned earlier drawing conclusions from one factor can be misleading. Data
analysis also needs to be correlated with actual field experience and system knowledge.
To illustrate, figure 6 shows the three functions plotted against the number of fighter,
cargo, and bomber mishaps. Bomber and cargo aircraft typically have many more miles
of wiring (an interconnection) compared to a fighter aircraft. Yet interconnections
appear to only dominant other function categories with respect to fighters. Based on
AFRL/MLSA laboratory experience one explanation is that fighter aircraft have a higher
density of wiring, and therefore, more opportunities for chafing. A detailed breakdown
of mishap failures by component function is given below in figure 7

Components
transformers
switch 6% avionics capacitors
resistors
3% 7% 1%
1%
batteries
relays
1% circuit breakers
7%
2%
motors
2%

light
0% conductors
generator 29%
18%

connectors
fuel probe 14%
1% electric panel
8%

Figure 7.

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Wiring and connector failures make up just over 40% of failed components. This agrees
with our experience in conducting mishap investigations. An electrical arc that may be
due to a chafed wire or an internal short in a connector often initiates aircraft fires. In
some cases the wire or connector failure causes the loss of a flight critical system or
compromises another system causing it to malfunction. Conductors and connectors are
often nexus points and can become single point failure sites. A single site failure can
quickly cascade into other systems, comprising the aircraft integrity. Generators make
up the second largest segment of failed components. These components have rotating
parts that experience wear and can de damaged by other electrical components that are
drawing power from the generator. The remaining components listed are also of
interest. In many cases, these failures are related to an interconnection issue. As
noted in the 1989 study, there were very few, if any mishaps, that could be attributed to
an active electronic component such as an integrated circuit or other type of solid state
device. This may be due to cataloging of failures and will be further investigated.

Conclusions

The objective of this survey was to characterize these trends in aircraft mishaps and
identify the types of components contributing to mishaps. This survey has initiated an
effort to record more precise detail both in past records and in future mishaps as they
occur.. The objective of this study was met in that it revealed areas that need further
investigation and helped refine our data collection and analysis tools. Mishap
databases appear to be an excellent resource for identifying the systems
mostvulnerable to the effects of aging – a tool that will directly impact the reliability and
safety of U S Air Force aircraft.

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 Acknowledgements

Air Force Safety Center, Kirtland AFB, NM

References

a. Safety and Investigations Reports, Air Force Instruction 91-204, 20 February 1998

b. Mishap reports, Air Force Safety Center, Oct 89 to Nov 98.

c. Causes of Aircraft Electrical Failures, National Aerospace and Electronics

Convention, George Slenski and Don Galler, 21 May 1990

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