Shift work, fatigue, burnout and maintenance errors : a study into the Maltese aviation maintenance industry

Abstract

Arguably, aircraft maintenance facilities are being detached from the airlines and becoming more commercialised business units. This, together with the emerging market of low cost airlines has undisputedly created a considerable amount of pressure to turnaround maintenance on the shortest and cheapest lead time. Therefore maintenance organisations have had to enforce measures in becoming lean and optimising shift work within the regulatory framework. Research shows that this may lead to a fatigued environment and one country that lacks pragmatic research on shift work, fatigue, burnout and maintenance errors is Malta. The main objective of this study was to quantitatively explore whether shift work conditions may cause mental and physical fatigue, prolonged fatigue results to burnout, and if those personnel suffering from fatigue are producing small cognitive errors and ultimately large maintenance errors. In order to further validate results obtained a qualitative element has been added. 140 individuals from the aircraft maintenance industry population participated in this study. Results of this study show that fatigue within aircraft maintenance is an issue in Malta, when outlining the symptoms it resulted that the majority were suffering from fatigue. More interestingly is that those suffering from fatigue are also suffering from burnout and prone to making small cognitive errors. These findings provide tangible evidence that fatigue and burnout is an important issue and despite the industry is heavily regulated, steps must be taken to reduce commercial pressure and fatigue within the Maltese maintenance aviation industry. Recommendations on how to mitigate these hindrances also emerged.