The Naval Safety Command (NAVSAFECOM) marked another milestone with recent updates to its mission, functions and tasks, which outline its increased authority and responsibilities aimed at identifying hazards and reducing risk to our warfighters.

Coming on the heels of NAVSAFECOM’s establishment as a command earlier this year, OPNAVINST 5450.180G identifies significant new functions that reaffirm the command’s oversight of the Navy and Marine Corps Safety Management System (SMS) and strengthens its fleet-facing focus.

NAVSAFECOM serves as the naval enterprise lead for non-nuclear safety standards and expertise. The command’s mission is to preserve warfighting capability, combat lethality, and readiness by working with stakeholders to identify, mitigate or eliminate hazards to reduce unnecessary risk to people and resources.

The functions align with the four SMS pillars of safety policy, safety risk management, safety assurance and safety promotion.

Notably, NAVSAFECOM now has the authority to direct commands to take corrective action against identified unsafe practices and, when necessary, suspend specific activities until corrective actions are completed and risks are mitigated.

Additionally, the command will now conduct no-notice unit safety inspections and assessments to evaluate risk controls and self-improvement efforts. NAVSAFECOM will also review Echelon II and III certification processes of subordinate commands.

To help conduct the additional level of assessments, the command recently formed the Assurance Directorate, comprised of senior military and civilian employees tasked with assessing the overall effectiveness of risk and safety management practices across the naval enterprise.

“This instruction is our “North Star,” and the new directorate is hitting the ground running to establish Assurance Assessment protocols and processes,” said Mr. David Bussel, Director of the Assurance Directorate. The updated instruction “is a significant departure from our previous charge and indicates the Navy’s emphasis on strengthening our risk behaviors and aligns with the CNO’s ‘Get Real, Get Better’ initiative.”

Data collection, analysis and dissemination, remain a crucial part of the mission, along with continuing to collaborate extensively with the other services in safety, as we know that safety is not one person’s job, but the responsibility of every service member.

“Ultimately, this instruction formalizes what the command is striving toward,” said Bussel, “assisting commands in their ability to inculcate behaviors of self-awareness, self-assessment, self-correction, and continual learning in order to enable a defense-in-depth that ensures your Command is Safe to Operate and Operates Safely through proper Risk Identification, Communication, and Accountability at the appropriate level.”