Airworthiness Requirements and Fatigue of Helicopters: Some Unconventional and Controversial Reflexions on the True Significance of Failures and How to Avoid Them

Abstract

PROFESSOR PUGSLEY was the first to have popularized the term ‘philosophy’ in connexion with airworthiness. Generally, unless structures are completely safe they are regarded as unsafe. A flying machine, however, can at best be only approximately safe. Hence the need for an a priori definition of safety. Not only is it necessary to make a statistically definable sacrifice of safety to obtain a machine which will fly at all, let alone lift an economical payload, but this sacrifice must be spread in a certain manner to give acceptable returns.

Citation

Shapiro, J. (1951), "Airworthiness Requirements and Fatigue of Helicopters: Some Unconventional and Controversial Reflexions on the True Significance of Failures and How to Avoid Them", Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, Vol. 23 No. 2, pp. 32-54. https://doi.org/10.1108/eb031995