Vice President, Latin America / Aviation Safety Officer | Sergio A. Sales

Sergio A. Sales has been in the aviation safety business since 1976. During this time he was with the Brazilian Air Force, Brazilian Civil Aviation Authority, American Airlines (AA), Brazilian Helicopter Services (BHS), Globo TV Network (RIANA), and Vale do Rio Doce Corp serving as Aviation Safety Officer covering the areas of safety, security, emergency response and quality assurance. Sergio Sales was the Investigator-in-Charge in about 120 helicopter and 30 fixed wings accidents.

With the Air Force, he was a flight instructor at the Air Force Academy, certified functional test pilot for helicopters and fixed wings, and helicopter accident investigation instructor with the Brazilian Aviation Safety Center.

As aviation safety officer with the Air Force Aeronautical Material Depot Unit, he developed and implemented the maintenance go-team to respond to military helicopters accidents, and was the supervisor of all maintenance investigation reports related to Air Force helicopter accidents.

During the eight-year period with American Airlines, he was involved in numerous tasks in the Latin America and Europe regions related to:

• Identify and reduce the exposure to risk of accidents for AA activities.
• Stimulate a positive attitude towards aviation safety for AA and local airports employees.
• Enhance aviation safety standards.
• Elevate corporate aviation safety awareness and emergence response capacity.
• Liaison with Civil Aviation Authorities.

At the AA Headquarters, he developed and implemented the Airport Operations Safety Program for all destinations and alternates, and was responsible for the Corporate Accident Preparedness Plan.

With the AA Emergency Response Team, he attended to the B757 accident occurred in Cali-Colombia, and worked with the AA Emergency Response Center, at the AA HDQ, during the 911 terrorist events and the A300 accident in New York.

His offshore experience comes from working in Macaé, Brazil, with BHS Air Taxi, where he was director of Health, Safety, and Environmental Department for two years. During this period, BHS was awarded with the Platinum Safety Award (February-2005) by the Helicopter Association International. Before joining BHS, he was a safety consultant with BHS for five years and, in the 1990's was BK117 check-airman with Helijet Air, in Macaé.

Captain Joe Oyler (RET)

Joe Oyler retired as a Captain for American Airlines. Recently he was a team member in developing SMS for a major airport, is Certified by DOT in both SMS/Aviation Safety Program Management and as a Risk Management Trainer, and has participated in major ARP SMS/Safety Audits/Assessments. Concurrent with his airline flying, he was a Manager Flight Safety for the airline, Chaired Accident Investigation Committee for major pilot union with experience with 9 NTSB major Go-Team investigations, conceptualized, co-developed and implemented industry's first ASAP Program. He was also member of union National Safety and Training Committees and conceptualized, developed and implemented a National Peer Support Program for pilots mitigating PTSD, being trained in advanced CISM. He started his flying career with the US Navy as a SAR Helicopter Pilot.