AOG : Aircraft On Ground
Aircraft ground handling involves the servicing subcontracted by an airline to an airport or handling agent or another airline for the needs of passenger aircraft while on the ground.
This provides AOG ramp services and maintenance and engineering services. It is often cheaper for an airline and more particularly for a smaller airline to subcontract maintenance and other operations to a larger carrier.
IATA Engineering and Maintenance Group assists and supports the Operations Committee in all matters relating to optimising engineering and maintenance to reduce maintenance costs of AOG.
Ground crews are responsible for AOG and all operations at airports. They include among others airframe and power plant technicians and avionics technicians and engineers.
Most airlines follow a corporate structure where areas of operation such as AOG are supervised by a vice president.
While a plane is in AOG situation it is very important for flight safety that cockpit glass and avionics are cleaned with effective and approved cleaners.
ALGLAS™ AOG aerospace products
Some of the most highly approved aerospace products are produced by ALGLAS™.
- ALG/RCBA Biocidal Display Screen Cleaner wipes hygienically clean smears from IFE’s and headsets.
- AGC/Aircraft Glass cleaner was formulated to specifically clean jet efflux, fly, bug and moth debris from cockpit and cabin glass.
- Visial™ VDU 150ml. spray cleaner is designed to clean air traffic control systems, radars and electronic touch panels.
Avionics overhall supplies
Visial™ antistatic wet/dry wipes clean all civil and military integrated or stand-alone instrumenation and is acceptable for use on magnesium-fluoride coated anti-reflective instrument displays.
AOG operations often involve using ground equipment at the airport, and a plane may be damaged when this equipment operates in close proximity to the fuselage and wings. Even apparently trivial dents inflicted on a plane while AOG may be serious enough to ground the plane.
In the airline industry AOG can mean loss of revenue and annoyed customers. AOG services must have real-time tracking capabilities to access their around-the-clock customer service staff.
Vast organisational networks are required to service all an aircraft’s needs when in an AOG situation, operating in some cases 24 hours a day. It is a time-critical market and companies exist to take care of important AOG operations or sensitive aircraft parts shipments.
Sometimes AOG occurs due to damage or technical problems. UK AOG holders and owner/operators of foreign-registered aircraft may find themselves in this situation and FODCOM 28/2005 was published to explain technical and operational procedures that need to be followed before application can be made to the CAA for a Permit to Fly to recover the aircraft.
Out of hours assistance however is not usually provided for AOG’s relating to privately owned/non-AOG aircraft, or AOG aircraft when and aircraft system or supply chain failure takes them outside the scope of MMEL/MEL.
