Issue C of this standard (entitled "System Safety Program Requirements") was released on 19th January 1993, and Issue D (entitled "Standard Practice for System Safety") was released on 10th February 2000.

Issue C describes multiple tasks which can be used to meet the general requirements of the standard; Issue D omitted this detail. This has led to many organisations using Issue C and waiting for Issue E to be released (in other than draft form) which reinstates the tasks.

This military standard addresses a wide range of safety management and safety engineering issues, but does not address as wide a range of engineering issues. In particular MIL-STD-882 provides only a scant version of the concept of a Safety Integrity Level (SIL) to be followed in the development of software, and thus this safety standard is commonly paired with another such as RTCA/DO-178 "Software Considerations in Airborne Systems and Equipment Certification" to fill this gap.

The tasks of MIL-STD-882C are divided into the following four groups, and MIL-STD-882E is expected to expand upon these slightly.

Program Management and Control

• Task 101 System Safety Program
• Task 102 System Safety Program Plan
• Task 103 Integration Management of Associate Contractors, Subcontractors, and Architect and Engineering Firms, addressing safety subcontract management.
• Task 104 System Safety Program Review/Audits
• Task 105 System Safety Working Group/System Safety Group
• Task 106 Hazard Tracking and Risk Resolution, addressing concepts such as the hazard log.
• Task 107 System Safety Progress Summary

Design and Integration

• Task 201 Preliminary Hazard List, mainly addressing hazard identification
• Task 202 Preliminary Hazard Analysis, mainly addressing risk analysis
• Task 203 Safety Requirements/Criteria Analysis, deriving safety requirements
• Task 204 Subsystem Hazard Analysis, performing risk analysis
• Task 205 System Hazard Analysis, performing risk analysis
• Task 206 Operating and Support Hazard Analysis, addressing the safety of operation, maintenance, installation and commissioning, and decommissioning and disposal
• Task 207 Health Hazard Assessment, focussing on personnel safety and materials

Design Evaluation

• Task 301 Safety Assessment
• Task 302 Test and Evaluation Safety, addressing both the testing of safety and the safety of testing
• Task 303 Safety Review of Engineering Change Proposals, Specification Change Notices, Software Problem Reports, and Requests for Deviation/Waiver, addressing change control.

Compliance and Verification

• Task 401 Safety Verification
• Task 402 Safety Compliance Assessment, addressing some aspects of a safety case.
• Task 403 Explosive Hazard Classification and Characteristics Data, addressing ordnance
• Task 404 Explosive Ordnance Disposal Data, also addressing ordnance

Not all of the tasks of MIL-STD-882C are called out for each project; some may be irrelevant due to the nature of the possible hazards, and early hazard identification and risk analysis activities can lead to a lesser number of tasks being required.