Contact Dr Simon Place

Areas of expertise

  • Air Transport Safety & Investigation
  • Airworthiness
  • Aviation Management & Operations

Background

After graduating from Loughborough University in Engineering Science & Technology, Simon served as an RAF Engineer Officer in the Communications/ Electronics field. He studied for a Master's degree in Flight Dynamics at Cranfield in 1994-95, and carried out his thesis at Delft University (Netherlands) under the ERASMUS exchange scheme. There followed a period as a software engineer at Goodrich Aerospace, after which he returned to Cranfield. The 3-year research project to develop methods for the safety assessment & reliability prediction of helicopter transmission systems formed the basis of Simon's PhD thesis. He then worked for an engineering consultancy, where he spent 4 years in safety & reliability assessment on the West Coast Route Modernisation project for Network Rail and Virgin Trains.

In 2004 he returned as a Lecturer in Air Transport Engineering, keen to teach and do research in the fields of aircraft systems, safety and risk assessment and maintenance management. He is a Chartered Engineer and Member of the Institute of Mechanical Engineers.

Current activities

Senior Lecturer in the Safety & Accident Investigation Centre and Programme Director for MSc courses (Airworthiness; Safety & Human Factors in Aviation; Safety & Accident Investigation)

Responsible for modules in Airworthiness Fundamentals, Safety Assessment of Aircraft Systems and Practical Reliability. 

Research interests cover safety & risk assessment, and reliability analysis in the transport sector, including maintenance human factors.

Clients

  • DSTL
  • Hong Kong Civil Aviation Department
  • Hong Kong Institution of Engineers
  • QinetiQ
  • Raytheon Systems Ltd
  • Royal Netherlands Air Force
  • Singapore International Airlines Engineering Company
  • STM Aerospace (Turkey)
  • UK Ministry of Defence

Publications

Articles In Journals

Conference Papers