National foreword

This British Standard is the UK implementation of EN 12312‑4:2024. It supersedes BS EN 12312‑4:2014, which is withdrawn.

The UK participation in its preparation was entrusted to Technical Committee ACE/57, Air cargo and ground support equipment.

A list of organizations represented on this committee can be obtained on request to its committee manager.

Contractual and legal considerations

This publication has been prepared in good faith, however no representation, warranty, assurance or undertaking (express or implied) is or will be made, and no responsibility or liability is or will be accepted by BSI in relation to the adequacy, accuracy, completeness or reasonableness of this publication. All and any such responsibility and liability is expressly disclaimed to the full extent permitted by the law.

This publication is provided as is, and is to be used at the recipient’s own risk.

The recipient is advised to consider seeking professional guidance with respect to its use of this publication.

This publication is not intended to constitute a contract. Users are responsible for its correct application.

This publication has been prepared under a mandate given to the European Standards Organizations by the European Commission and the European Free Trade Association. It is intended to support requirements of the EU legislation detailed in the European Foreword. A European Annex, usually Annex ZA or ZZ, describes how this publication relates to that EU legislation.

For the Great Britain market (England, Scotland and Wales), if UK Government has designated this publication for conformity with UKCA marking (or similar) legislation, it may contain an additional National Annex. Where such a National Annex exists, it shows the correlation between this publication and the relevant UK legislation. If there is no National Annex of this kind, the relevant Annex ZA or ZZ in the body of the European text will indicate the relationship to UK regulation applicable in Great Britain. References to EU legislation may need to be read in accordance with the UK designation and the applicable UK law. Further information on designated standards can be found at www.bsigroup.com/standardsandregulation.

For the Northern Ireland market, UK law will continue to implement relevant EU law subject to periodic confirmation. Therefore Annex ZA/ZZ in the European text, and references to EU legislation, are still valid for this market.

UK Government is responsible for legislation. For information on legislation and policies relating to that legislation, consult the relevant pages of www.gov.uk.

Compliance with a British Standard cannot confer immunity from legal obligations.

This British Standard was published under the authority of the Standards Policy and Strategy Committee on 31 October 2024.

This European Standard was approved by CEN on 5 August 2024.

CEN members are bound to comply with the CEN/CENELEC Internal Regulations which stipulate the conditions for giving this European Standard the status of a national standard without any alteration. Up-to-date lists and bibliographical references concerning such national standards may be obtained on application to the CEN-CENELEC Management Centre or to any CEN member.

This European Standard exists in three official versions (English, French, German). A version in any other language made by translation under the responsibility of a CEN member into its own language and notified to the CEN-CENELEC Management Centre has the same status as the official versions.

CEN members are the national standards bodies of Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Republic of North Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Türkiye and United Kingdom.

European foreword

This document (EN 12312‑4:2024) has been prepared by Technical Committee CEN/TC 274 “Aircraft ground support equipment”, the secretariat of which is held by DIN.

This European Standard shall be given the status of a national standard, either by publication of an identical text or by endorsement, at the latest by April 2025and conflicting national standards shall be withdrawn at the latest by April 2025.

Attention is drawn to the possibility that some of the elements of this document may be the subject of patent rights. CEN shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent rights.

This document supersedes EN 12312‑4:2014.

This document has been prepared under a standardization request addressed to CEN by the European Commission. The Standing Committee of the EFTA States subsequently approves these requests for its Member States.

For the relationship with EU Legislation, see informative Annex ZA, which is an integral part of this document.

The main technical changes compared to the previous version are the following:

Clause 2, Normative references, was updated;
in Clause 3, Terms and definitions, the terms "auto-levelling mode", "autonomous mode", "remote control mode", "pre-positioning", "GPU", "PCA", "mono control panel" and "remote multi control panel" were added;
in Clause 3, Terms and definitions, the definitions for "service access" and "automatic mode" were updated;
in 5.1.4 a) an example was added for clarification;
5.1.6 and 5.1.7 added to improve safety on ground staff;
5.2.1, 5.2.2 and 5.2.10 changed;
5.2.3 and 5.2.13 added to improve safety while operating the PBB;
old subclauses 5.2.3, 5.2.4, 5.2.5, 5.2.6, 5.2.7,5.2.8, 5.2.9, 5.2.11, 5.5.1, 5.5.2, 5.5.4, 5.6.5, 5.10.5, 5.10.6, 6.2 b) and 6.2 c) renumbered;
5.3.1 and 5.3.2 changed;
5.4.1 changed;
5.4.6 added to improve safety in case of synchronization system fails;
5.5.1 added to improve safety while auto-levelling;
previous subclause 5.5.3 renumbered and changed;
5.6.2 changed;
5.6.4, 5.10.4, 5.12.5, 6.2 a) and 6.3 c) deleted;
5.7.3 changed;
5.8.6 and 5.8.8 changed;
5.2.14 added to improve safety of people entering into the PBB while it is moving;
5.9.5, NOTE changed;
5.9.6 and 5.9.7 changed;
5.10.1, 5.10.2 and 5.10.3 changed;
5.11.4 and 5.11.8 changed;
5.11.11 added to improve safety under remote operations;
5.12.6 renumbered and changed;
Clause 6 and Clause 7 were switched;
previous subclauses 6.3 b) and 6.3 d) changed
subclause 7.3 g) added to improve safety of passengers while boarding / disembarking;
previous subclauses 6.4 c) and 6.4 d) changed;
Annex A, Table A.1, items 1,7,8,9 and10 updated.

EN 12312, Aircraft ground support equipment – Specific requirements consists of the following parts:

Part 1: Passenger stairs;
Part 2: Catering vehicles;
Part 3: Conveyor belt vehicles;
Part 4: Passenger boarding bridges; (this document)
Part 5: Aircraft fuelling equipment;
Part 6: Deicers and deicing/antiicing equipment;
Part 7: Aircraft movement equipment;
Part 8: Maintenance or service stairs and platforms;
Part 9: Container/Pallet loaders;
Part 10: Container/Pallet transfer transporters;
Part 11: Container/Pallet dollies and loose load trailers;
Part 12: Potable water service equipment;
Part 13: Lavatory service equipment;
Part 14: Disabled/incapacitated passenger boarding vehicles;
Part 15: Baggage and equipment tractors;
Part 16: Air start equipment;
Part 17: Air conditioning equipment;
Part 18: Nitrogen or Oxygen units;
Part 19: Aircraft jacks, axle jacks and hydraulic tail stanchions;
Part 20: Electrical ground power units.

Any feedback and questions on this document should be directed to the users’ national standards body. A complete listing of these bodies can be found on the CEN website.

According to the CEN-CENELEC Internal Regulations, the national standards organizations of the following countries are bound to implement this European Standard: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Republic of North Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Türkiye and the United Kingdom.

Introduction

This document specifies health and safety requirements, as well as some functional and performance requirements, for passenger boarding bridges (PBB) intended for passenger embarking/disembarking of all aircraft types commonly in service in civil air transport.

The minimum essential criteria are considered to be of primary importance in providing safe, serviceable, economical and practical PBB. Deviations from the recommended criteria should occur only after careful consideration, extensive testing, risk assessment and thorough service evaluation have shown alternative methods or conditions to be satisfactory. Such deviations are outside the Scope of this document and a manufacturer should be able to demonstrate an equivalent level of protection.

The machinery concerned and the extent to which hazards, hazardous situations and events are covered are indicated in the Scope of this document.

This document is a Type C standard as stated in EN ISO 12100:2010.

This document is of relevance, in particular, for the following stakeholder groups representing the market players with regard to machinery safety:

machine manufacturers (small, medium and large enterprises);
health and safety bodies (regulators, accident prevention organizations, market surveillance, etc.).

Others can be affected by the level of machinery safety achieved with the means of the document by the above-mentioned stakeholder groups:

machine users/employers (small, medium and large enterprises);
machine users/employees (e.g. trade unions, organizations for people with special needs);
service providers, e.g. for maintenance (small, medium and large enterprises);
consumers (in case of machinery intended for use by consumers).

The above-mentioned stakeholder groups have been given the possibility to participate at the drafting process of this document.

When requirements of this type-C standard are different from those which are stated in type-A or type-B standards, the requirements of this type-C standard take precedence over the requirements of the other standards for machines that have been designed and built according to the requirements of this type-C standard.

1 Scope

This document specifies the technical requirements to minimize the hazards listed in Clause 4 which can arise during the commissioning, operation and maintenance of passenger boarding bridges (PBBs) when used as intended, including misuse reasonably foreseeable by the manufacturer, when carried out in accordance with the specifications given by the manufacturer or their authorized representative. It also takes into account some requirements recognized as essential by authorities, aircraft and ground support equipment (GSE) manufacturers as well as airlines and handling agencies.

This document applies to:

apron-drive bridges;
fixed-head bridges (also referred to as nose-loaders) or pedestal bridges;
suspended bridges

for embarking/disembarking of passengers. It is applicable from the interface with the terminal building, which can be movable, e.g. on two levels to separate arrival and departure level to the connection with the aircraft including fixed tunnels.

This document does not apply to:

elevating lounges;
passenger stairs;
other form of aircraft access equipment;
autonomous PBB positioning.

No extra requirements on noise are provided other than those in EN 1915‑4:2004+A1:2009.

NOTE EN 1915‑4:2004+A1:2009 provides the general noise requirements.

This part of EN 12312 is not applicable to PBBs which were manufactured before the date of publication of this document by CEN.

This part of EN 12312 when used in conjunction with EN 1915‑1:2023 and EN 1915‑2:2001+A1:2009 provides the requirements for PBBs.

2 Normative references

3 Terms and definitions

4 List of hazards

5 Safety requirements and/or measures

5.1 General requirements

5.2 Controls, monitoring and warning devices

5.3 Vertical drive systems

5.4 Horizontal drive systems

5.5 Bridgehead

5.6 Operating speeds

5.7 Passenger areas

5.8 Operator's workplace in PBBs

5.9 Safeguards against falling

5.10 Service access and landings

5.11 Lighting

5.12 Fire protection

5.13 Electrical equipment

6 Verification of requirements

6.1 General

6.2 Barrier or bridgehead closure device

7 Information for use

7.1 Marking

7.2 Additional marking

7.3 Warnings

7.4 Instructions

Bibliography

BS EN 12312-4:2024

Aircraft ground support equipment. Specific requirements - Passenger boarding bridges

Current

Published:

31 Oct 2024