TAM Airlines' maintenance unit completes 10 years

Sao Paulo: TAM Airlines has celebrated the 10th anniversary of its maintenance, repair and overhaul centre located in Sao Carlos in the State of Sao Paulo. Since 2001 TAM’s MRO unit has serviced and maintained more than 1,400 aircraft of its own fleet and for third parties (both Brazilian and international carriers), and the number of customers has been growing each year.

In December 2010, TAM’s Technological Centre for the first time performed simultaneous maintenance on five third-party aircraft. Last year the MRO increased its servicing of aircraft by 7% and performed 131 checks over a total of 436,016 hours of work, which represents 16% more than in 2009. Also in 2010, 97,763 repairs to components were carried out in twenty different workshops.

“This is an essential business unit, which is expanding its profitability more and more. The efficiency of the TAM fleet and the growing number of aircraft from other customers attest to the quality of this operation which has been transformed into a centre of excellence in such a short period of time”, says Líbano Barroso, TAM Airlines’ CEO.

Currently the MRO has 1,140 employees, both direct and indirect, in addition to around 325 other employees from auxiliary service companies. Installed in an area of 4.6 million square meters in the municipality of São Carlos, the MRO is certified by the world’s most important aeronautical authorities such as the Agência Nacional de Aviação Civil (Brazil’s National Agency of Civil Aviation); Federal Aviation Administration (United States); European Aviation Safety Agency (Europe); Transport Canada Civil Aviation (Canada), and the aviation authorities for several South American countries.

The Technological Centre is authorized to perform maintenance on aircraft such as the Airbus (A318 / A319 / A320 / A321 / A330), Boeing (767), Fokker (Fokker 100) and ATR (ATR-42). It is also certified by various aeronautical authorities to perform special services, such as non-destructive testing, galvanoplasty, repairs to composite materials, painting, and weighing of aircraft, among others. It also has DIRMAB certification to perform checks on the Brazilian Presidential Airplane, an Airbus ACJ (Airbus Corporate Jetliner). In addition, it can perform the overhauling and maintenance of more than 5,000 aeronautical components.

Since January 2007, the company has the IOSA (IATA Operational Safety Audit) certification, the most complete and accepted international certificate in operational safety. The IOSA audit comprises more than 950 requirements in various operational areas of an airline.

“Safety is the priority for TAM, and the MRO has an essential role in this aspect. All the certifications we have received were the consequence of a lot of work and are chapters of a story of success which is just starting”, explains Ruy Amparo, TAM’s vice-president of Operations and Maintenance.

In addition to the maintenance hangars, the TAM Technological Centre houses workshops for the overhaul and maintenance of aeronautical components, from navigational computers to landing gears.

The technical abilities and the certifications obtained by the TAM Technological Centre enable much of the repair and maintenance of aircraft from the TAM fleet to be done in Brazil, rather than abroad, contributing to a reduction in the carrier’s costs. In addition, offering services to third parties optimizes the framework, diluting the fixed costs of the MRO, while bringing revenue to the company.

Source: TAM Airlines