Led by Professor Graham Braithwaite, the Safety and Accident Investigation Centre delivers award-winning teaching, research and consultancy in safety management, human factors, airworthiness and accident/incident investigation.

The Centre is home to one of the largest academic groups of safety and human factors in the world. We offer four MSc courses in:

We offer a comprehensive programme of Continuing Professional Development short courses, ranging from one day to six weeks in length, and many of which can be credited towards our postgraduate qualifications. In addition, many of these short courses can be delivered in-house and tailored to specific customer needs. Recent clients have included airlines, airports, regulators and investigation agencies as well as construction companies and healthcare bodies.

Our intensely practical focus is supported by the people delivering our teaching and research. We work with both academics and industrialists and our team has first-hand experience in managing civil and military operations, safety regulation, accident investigation, design and certification. This means our students get the benefit of their extensive real-world knowledge.

We offer a full- and part-time PhD programme and work with industrial research partners on projects ranging from flight deck design to safety assurance and from safety leadership to safety data analysis. We are able to draw on unique facilities such as the Accident Investigation Laboratory, Digital Aviation Research and Technology Centre and the National Flying Laboratory Centre to support our research.

Our work in aviation safety has been recognised at the highest level. We were awarded a Queen’s Anniversary Prize in 2011 – the highest award a UK academic institution can receive – for research and training in aircraft accident investigation. In 2013 we received the Richard Teller Crane Founders Award from the Flight Safety Foundation for sustained corporate leadership in aviation safety.