Air Malta has, for the third time, passed the global airline industry’s benchmark operational safety audit, the company said on Friday.

IATA has renewed the company’s IOSA registration for a further two years until the next audit scheduled for 2012. The IOSA Program is the global flight safety and quality benchmark recognised by member airlines of IATA – the International Air Transport Association.

Air Malta continues to be listed as one of the IATA IOSA registered airlines, which it joined in 2006 when the national carrier was first listed among IOSA-compliant airline, after an audit was completed with similarly outstanding results.

The audit examined the airline’s regulatory compliance of operation in eight main areas: flight operations, operational control and flight despatch, aircraft engineering and maintenance, cabin procedures, ground handling, cargo operations and operational safety. Activities in these eight areas were conducted on the basis of more than 900 requirements examined in the course of an IOSA airline audit, and which the airline has to be able to fulfil in order to gain registration with this international body.

The audit this year was conducted by IATA on the basis of more rigorous and updated standards that took into consideration the ever-evolving industry standards. Every operational area of the airline was involved in a weeklong audit conducted by a team of six certified auditors.

Commenting during the presentation of the IOSA certificate, Air Malta’s Chief Executive Joe Cappello said, “The successful IOSA audit further strengthens the professional reputation of Air Malta since IOSA registration is highly valued and mutually accepted at International levels, thus representing a more than acceptable guarantee of quality for our customers. This certification will help Air Malta in its commercial dealings such as code sharing and aircraft leasing.”

Mr Cappello also thanked all the staff from the various operational departments in the company for their co-operation and efforts during the process.

The IATA Operational Safety Audit (IOSA) Programme is an international recognised and accepted evaluation system designed to assess the operational management and control systems of an airline. IOSA uses internationally recognised quality audit principles and is designed so that audits are conducted in a standardised and consistent manner. It was developed with a view to best industry practices and continues to be further developed to go beyond the strict official requirements. This has made it a highly respected air industry certification generally accepted as a benchmark around the world.

The aim of the programme is maximisation of quality and improving the security and cost-efficiency of the industry. The standards incorporate many requirements from ICAO, FAA, JAA and EASA, as well as best practices from airline audit programmes in existence already. The standards were developed by more than 100 industry specialists from all over the world.