As an operator, you continually focus on ensuring the highest level of safety. In addition, you strive to meet regulatory and audit standards (e.g., FAA, IS-BAO, BASC) by adopting various safety programs. But did you know that your insurer could be a valuable resource in helping you start, enhance, and accelerate your safety journey?

Improving a safety program reduces risk for everyone, including the insurance industry. As a result, many insurance companies offer assistance in acquiring safety products and services. Since many insurers differ in what they can offer, it’s important to ask about available safety benefits when renewing your insurance policy. These safety benefits can be applied to your current safety program or in obtaining new safety products and services.

Polaris Aero is a participant in several safety assistance programs with many insurers. If you’re not yet a VOCUS customer, insurers may provide financial assistance to help you get started with one of the VOCUS Safety Intelligence applications (VOCUS SMS, FlightRisk, GroundRisk).

These benefits don’t just apply to new customers; they also apply to existing customers. You can use insurance benefits to add an additional VOCUS application, VOCUS add-on (e.g., ASAP, FOQA, Fatigue), or Safety Services (e.g., safety culture surveys, safety program optimization).

If financial hurdles have been holding you back from enhancing your safety program, check with your insurer about the benefits available. Polaris Aero is a participant in several insurance safety assistance programs.

• Global Aerospace SM4
• USAIG Performance Vector
• STARR Safety Alliance

If your insurance provider is not listed or to find out more about available benefits, email us.

Polaris Aero is proud to be one of five early adopters of the FAA’s new NOTAM Management Service (NMS). The initial rollout was completed at the end of 2025.

The NMS represents a major modernization effort by the FAA to migrate from legacy NOTAM systems (United States NOTAM System and Federal NOTAM System) to a single, cloud-based platform designed to enhance the management, exchange, and delivery of aeronautical information. The system’s modern architecture enables near–real-time data exchange, greater scalability, and improved collaboration across aviation stakeholders.

As an early adopter, Polaris Aero is helping the FAA validate and provide feedback on the new system to optimize a successful transition by the FAA and NMS users/integrators. The data made accessible through NMS will replace the previously upheld FAA Federal NOTAM System (FNS) integration in FlightRisk, proving a seamless and modern integration experience for VOCUS users.

By participating in this initiative, Polaris Aero is supporting the FAA’s mission to improve safety, efficiency, and data accessibility across the National Airspace System.

In data analysis, numbers can be used to ‘measure’ things in different ways. These measurement systems – Nominal, Ordinal, Interval, and Ratio – tell us how precisely variables are recorded, and more importantly, they determine what level of insights can be derived.

When analyzing data, it is critically important to understand how – and when – to use each type of measurement system. Choosing the wrong one could have profound consequences, especially when assessing risk.

Nominal scales are used to describe (or identify) things. They are not really numbers in the mathematical sense; they are more like labels. Objects are “measured” by determining the categories to which they belong. Eye color, blood type, and nationality are common examples.

Ordinal scales are used to rank-order objects. These systems tell us that one item may be more – or less – than another, but we cannot state by how much because there are no fundamental units we can use to compare things. The interval between each unit may be different. A common example is the Likert Scale: the difference between “strongly agree” and “agree” is practically impossible to determine.

Interval scales are like ordinal scales; except they have defined units. Therefore, the intervals between each value are equally split. A common example is the Celsius temperature scale. Each temperature unit – degree– is the same.

Ratio scales are interval scales (i.e., they have fundamental units) with a true zero point. This scale allows us to do the math we learned in grade school: we can multiply, divide, add, and subtract. This is the measurement system that allows us to compare objects using ratios. Common examples are distance and money.

What Does This Mean for Hazard Scoring Systems?

Hazard scoring are ordinal measurement systems. They rank order hazards, usually on a scale from ‘1’ (the lowest category of risk) to ‘5’ as the highest category of risk. There may be many hazards in the ‘5’ category, but do they have the same level of risk? Is a flight in severe icing equal to a flight at night? Of course not! In addition, since there are no fundamental units in ordinal scales, we cannot add hazards together. A pop-up trip (level ‘3’ hazard) at twilight (level ‘2’) hazard does not equal severe icing (level ‘5’ hazard).

Treating ordinal data like ratio data can have severe consequences. By understanding the different types of measurement systems – and their inherent limitations – we can make more effective decisions.

Question: Does 2 + 2 = 4?

Answer: Yes, IF you are using Interval or Ratio measurement systems.

SCOTTSDALE, AZ (October 13, 2025) – Polaris Aero, a leader in aviation safety software, has been awarded a Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) contract by the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense (OUSD) to develop Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) capabilities in the VOCUS Safety Intelligence Platform. These capabilities will improve the readiness and safety of military aviation by streamlining workflows, facilitating knowledge sharing, and providing actionable insights to military leaders at various levels.

The SBIR program, which began in 1982, is the nation’s largest innovation program. It offers competitive awards to stimulate technological innovation among small private-sector businesses, while providing government agencies with new solutions that meet their diverse needs.

“We’re very privileged to have won a DoD SBIR award. What’s most exciting is that the new AI capabilities we develop for the military will benefit all our commercial VOCUS customers,” said Christopher Connor, Co-Founder and CEO of Polaris Aero.

About Polaris Aero

Polaris Aero is an aviation software company specializing in risk analysis and safety management systems (SMS). By transforming data into actionable insights, Polaris Aero helps organizations achieve the highest levels of organizational safety, operational effectiveness, and regulatory compliance. Polaris Aero is a Veteran-Owned Small Business (VOSB) headquartered in Scottsdale, Arizona. For more information, or to request a software demonstration, visit polarisaero.com.

About CDAO

The CDAO became operational in June 2022 and is dedicated to integrating and optimizing AI capabilities across the DoD. The office is responsible for accelerating the DoD’s adoption of data, analytics, and AI, enabling the Department’s digital infrastructure and policy adoption to deliver scalable AI-driven solutions for enterprise and joint use cases, safeguarding the nation against current and emerging threats. For more information, visit: ai.mil.