O-147 A Discussion on International Harmonisation of the Safety and Suitability for Service Assesment

This paper presents some of the current issues inhibiting the accepting of other nations, or services, qualification data as part of the Safety and Suitability for Service (S3) assessment process. The elusive goal of ‘qualify once’ has been on the agendas of various national safety authorities for some time and is a clear objective for AC/326 dealing with standardisation of munitions S3 assessment and yet nations still duplicate the qualification on common weapons systems to fulfil own national requirements. The paper discusses the challenges and opportunities for achieving agreement on a core set of test/data that could be acceptable at the international level to help alleviate this issue. The role of MSIAC in helping facilitate this process is discussed with the intention of gaining comment and support for this effort from MSIAC member nations.

Keywords: Munitions, Safety, Qualification, International, MSIAC, NATO