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News Release
Developing aircraft slides a challenge
Jonathan J. Higuera
The Arizona Republic
Aug. 20, 2006 12:00 AM
Among Mark Robertson's many responsibilities as the technology manager for Goodrich Aircraft Interior Products, one involves obsessing over slides.
Not water slides or playground slides but emergency evacuation slides that go on the world's largest passenger airplane, the Airbus A380.
He is vice president of engineering and quality for the Goodrich Corp. division, which won the contract to supply the evacuation slides to Airbus in 2001. Based out of his Goodrich office in south Phoenix, Robertson has spent the past two years overseeing the company's work on the contract as well as other aerospace products made by his company.
"The fascinating thing about aerospace is that it's still not completely commoditized," he said. "There's still the opportunity to develop and apply new technologies."
Keeping abreast of customer needs and the market and developing plans around that information is a key part of the job.
"We're constantly meeting new business requirements," he said.
Robertson previously worked at Honeywell, where he held several management positions, including director of engineering. It was there his management career took off when he was assigned to work with six company sites to implement new engineering processes and other company initiatives.
"You have to be comfortable providing direction to people and helping them understand why you're going in that direction," Robertson said of that assignment. "You have to define the direction so you can lead in that direction."
In his current post, Robertson has used all those skills to keep projects moving. The engineering phase of the Airbus slides culminated in April when they were successfully tested in Hamburg, Germany, before U.S. and international regulators. More than 870 people were able to evacuate from the A380 during a simulated emergency evacuation. Amazingly, they did it in about 78 seconds, 12 seconds ahead of the 90-second limit.
Robertson's responsibilities ranged from making sure the project stayed on schedule to working with his engineering group to ensure the slides met regulatory approval. And that was no walk in the park. More than 5,000 tests were conducted by the company and regulators, simulating all manner of crash and weather conditions. He typically would arrive in the office at 7 a.m. and work until 6:30 p.m. or later.
"When you first see them they look so simple, like an air mattress," he said of the slides. "But they are highly complex because of all the requirements."
In fact, the 16 slides were the most ever on a passenger airplane.
Now, the engineering phase of the program is winding down, and the production phase will crank up.
He concedes he's not an expert on slide technology. The engineers he manages do the technical aspects of the job. But he's been impressed with the commitment and loyalty the engineers have developed to the slides, which has rubbed off on him.
"I have to rely on their extensive slides knowledge," he says. "My job is to help give them the tools and resources to do the job."
His colleagues describe him as a very detailed person who wants to get to the root of problems and solve them.
Joe LeClear, Goodrich's design engineering manager for the slides program, also worked for Robertson at Honeywell.
"He's a proponent of being inclusive and making sure everyone owns the problem and the solution," LeClear said. "He's a stickler for meeting commitments. And in a pinch, he's very stable and rock solid."
Robertson's day often consists of meetings, one right after another. They are usually about schedules, personnel, and other management issues. He also meets with colleagues, customers and suppliers.
He graduated from New Mexico State University in 1981 with an electrical engineering degree. His first job out of college was with Hughes Missile Systems in Tucson. In 1997, Hughes became Raytheon Missile Systems after a merger.
After 4½ years there, he moved to AlliedSignal's Tucson facility, which in 1999 merged with Honeywell. During his time there, he held several management positions, including one in which he traveled to different company sites as director of engineering.
While in that position, he was approached about taking his current job.
"I'm always looking for a challenge," he said of the move. "It was a completely new product and I knew I would be working directly with customers."
Contact the reporter at jonathan.higuera@arizonarepublic.com or (602) 444-8831.