SMS records that live wherethe operation does.
Hazard reporting, risk workflows, safety communications, and the audit trail Part 5 requires — inside the platform that already runs your trips, crews, and aircraft.
The Part 5 clock is already running.
The FAA extended SMS to Part 135. By the deadline, the program has to exist, function, and leave records — hazard reports filed and reviewed, risks assessed, communications acknowledged. A binder written the month before won’t show a year of function.
A program your inspector can follow.
Starting from zero? We also build SMS programs as a consulting engagement — gap analysis, the manual, the processes, the rollout — with Contrails carrying the records.
SMS program developmentWhen does SMS become mandatory for Part 135?
The FAA's Part 5 rule extends Safety Management System requirements to Part 135 certificate holders, with compliance enforced at the end of May 2027 for existing operators. The program — and its records — need to exist before that date.
What records does 14 CFR Part 5 actually require?
Evidence that the four components exist and function: safety policy communicated and acknowledged, safety risk management performed on hazards, safety assurance through reporting and review, and safety promotion. In practice: hazard reports, risk assessments, follow-up records, and communications people verifiably received.
How does Contrails keep SMS records?
Hazard and occurrence reporting through configurable forms with photos and signatures; approval workflows with status tracking; safety communications distributed by role and acknowledged per person with timestamps; and an append-only audit trail showing what was reported, reviewed, and closed.
Why keep SMS inside the operations platform instead of a separate SMS tool?
Because hazards come from operations. When the reporting lives where the trips, crews, and aircraft already are, a squawk, a duty conflict, or a ramp event becomes a safety record in one step — and the audit trail spans the whole story, not a disconnected system.
We have no SMS program at all. Where do we start?
Nightingale Skies also builds SMS programs as a consulting engagement: gap analysis, the manual, the processes, and the rollout — with Contrails carrying the records. One conversation covers both.