Flight Safety Foundation to Recognize International Teams for Safety Leadership and Innovation

The government/industry-led Aviation Safety InfoShare and a team comprising Zipline and the governments of Rwanda and Ghana will be honored next month by Flight Safety Foundation for safety leadership and innovation. The two groups will be recognized during a special awards dinner held in conjunction with the Foundation’s 75th annual International Air Safety Summit (IASS) in Atlanta.

The Aviation Safety InfoShare, which is a joint effort of the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and industry, was selected to receive the Jerome Lederer Safety Leadership Medal for its significant contributions to the advancement of civil aviation safety. InfoShare, which was started in the mid-1990s, is a biannual, industry-sponsored and FAA-facilitated forum for participants from numerous segments of aviation to voluntarily share — in a protected environment — current and emerging safety issues, lessons learned, best practices for data analysis, and successful mitigation strategies.

The Jerome Lederer Safety Leadership Medal is named for Jerry Lederer, one of the founders of the Foundation, who, in the 1940s, was first to facilitate the exchange of safety information through sharing of critical information among airlines, government and industry, saving countless lives.

Zipline, which designs, manufactures and operates the world’s largest instant logistics and delivery system, and the governments of Rwanda and Ghana, were selected to receive the Foundation’s David Morrison Innovation Award for the development and implementation of their instant drone-based logistics systems to safely and reliably deliver vaccines, medicines, blood and other critical medical supplies over vast geographic areas in Rwanda and Ghana. The operations have had a demonstrable impact on healthcare. Globally, Zipline operates on three continents and completes a delivery every two minutes.

The David Morrison Innovation Award is named for another FSF founder. Morrison was an inventor and cockpit designer who played a critical leadership role in the early days of the Foundation.

The awards dinner will be held Monday, Nov. 7, 2022, at the Omni Atlanta Hotel at CNN Center and is an important part of the IASS 2022 agenda. For more information and to register for IASS, please visit the IASS 2022 page on the Foundation’s website.