Reactive Hazard Identification: Mandatory Occurrence Reporting

Doing What’s Required

EU Regulation 376/2014 sets out what must be reported through the Mandatory Occurrence Reporting (MOR) system. Most operators comply, and that’s a good thing. It’s the backbone of reactive hazard identification.

When something significant happens, an aircraft system malfunction, a runway incursion, a loss of separation, the MOR process ensures it’s documented, analyzed, and shared across the system. That’s how we learn from what has already happened.

But it’s also important to recognize its limits: MOR is reactive by nature. It only captures what has already gone wrong.

Mandatory Occurrence Reporting — learning from what has already happened.

The Mandatory Occurrence Reporting List Everyone Should Read

I always encourage people to actually read the list of mandatory items in Regulation 376/2014. Not because you’ll memorize every detail, but because reading it once helps you remember the types of occurrences you’re responsible for reporting.

Many people tell me later, “Ah — now I understand what counts as reportable.”

That awareness matters. It keeps the reactive system strong.

But it also raises the next question:

“If this is what I must report, what about the things that aren’t on the list?”

Reactive vs. Proactive Reporting

Mandatory Occurrence Reports tell us what went wrong. They are the reactive side of safety management. They help us learn from events that have already occurred and improve our defenses for next time.

Voluntary Occurrence Reports, on the other hand, are proactive. They capture weak signals, near misses, and early concerns, the things that could go wrong.

When both systems work together, you have a complete picture.

MOR keeps us compliant and informed.

VOR keeps us alert and prepared.

As I wrote in Reporting Culture — Are You Measuring It Right?, a healthy reporting culture should show more voluntary reports than mandatory ones. That 70/30 balance tells you that people aren’t just following rules, they’re helping the system stay one step ahead.

The Risk of Stopping at Compliance

When reporting is limited to what’s required by regulation, it can give a false sense of safety. The numbers might look fine, but the organization is only seeing the after-effects, not the early signs.

A reactive-only system can never prevent what it doesn’t see coming. Voluntary reports close that gap by providing the small observations that reveal emerging risks.

Reactive hazard identification is important, but it’s only one part of the picture. True safety performance comes when we connect what happened yesterday with what might happen tomorrow.

Conclusion

Mandatory Occurrence Reporting is the foundation of reactive hazard identification.

It ensures we investigate, learn, and improve after an event. But relying on it alone means we’re always one step behind.

By pairing MOR with strong voluntary reporting, we shift from reacting to anticipating.

That’s how we move from compliance to culture, and from “what happened” to “what could.”