walrus

Weekend course for an international certificate of competency and you can charter a yacht in europe. 

That all sounds very familiar OME, and may well happen.

 

However, things are changing; about ten years ago the Victorian Government wanted to dredge Port Phillip Bay to allow deeper draft Post Panamax Ships to operate into the Port of Melbourne.  The Objectors were on a winning argument that this would allow high tides to scour out the beaches, ruining the tourist business, which produced significant income for State Businesses. The State hit back with a $500,000 EES submission which removed any chance of any provate objector being able to meet the short deadline and address and point, and the Channel was deepened.

 

Since then new laws for vital projects have come in, so it's harder for residents to block developments.

 

Melbourne Airport have just carried out modelling which showed that by rotating the main runways 90 degrees a small percentage of days per year will not be subject to delaying weather, so are now going to build two new runways to replace the single runway.

 

So the people who came to Tullamarine and built in the path of the runway will get a Christmas present, and the tens of thousands who did their research and built away from the dominant runway will now cop two runways and 24 hour flights.

 

And

Jet fuel is a very good insulator and that means it is a great source of static electricity- much more than petrol - which is often “dirty” so conducts. Several explosions and fires have been caused by “switch loading” - filling an empty tank that had petrol in it with diesel or jet fuel. Petrol leaves an explosive vapor and the diesel provides the spark. But back on topic, to get an explosion from fuel vapor you need to have the concentration between the upper and lower explosive limits and then supply a spark of a high energy. Fuel proof phones and radios are termed “intrinsically safe” if they can’t produce a spark of sufficient energy. All you are trying to do with bonding and earthing is to get all the gear at the same potential.

Looks to me to be a good setup. The only thing you might like to consider is using an aluminium suction side tube instead of plastic - less chance of spark production. If you are using a recognized fuel hose (ASTM - something) that should have enough conductivity to prevent static build up. Assuming your aircraft battery is earthed to the airframe and the pump frame is also earthed to negative, then you shouldn’t have a spark generating issue - except that poly pipe.

If your switch breaks the positive wire, then everything stays connected after switch is off as long as you remove hose from tank before removing the Anderson plug.

How does your vane pump handle suction?

CASA have published the paper on the MTOW increase proposal. Generally, people are for it. However the devil may be in the detail in regard to maintenance and medical standards. We will have to wait and see.

If I was cynical, I'd be concerned that there is an element of 'divide and rule' in CASA's thinking because the proposal as it stands, disadvantages associations other than RAA. It could perhaps be wondered if the weight increase is a "present' to RAA for swallowing the self management bait.

https://consultation.casa.gov.au/regulatory-program/dp-1912ss/results/socondp1912ss.pdf

They hate private aviation, period.

Going back to the early 1970’s - flying around Australia with three friends in a tri pacer, our leader made a point of having us rotate into the RH front seat and do the flying in cruise so he could navigate. Only problem was that one of us non pilots flew into cloud...

Engine failure followed by an attempted turn back?

Read the first paragraph of your privacy policy.

You are called "customers" not "members".

This has huge strategic implications because the association is now a "business". There are huge implications for members control over RAA implicit in that.

Airsickness will stop after acclimatisation. Ask any DAME, its quite common when you start aerobatics.

If you read the regulations for 149, in my opinion, RAA is jumping out of the frying pan into the fire because CASA actually INCREASES its control of sport aviation under these regulations.

CASA must approve all major staffing positions and there are criminal penalties attached to the administration of all RAA activity. CASA can direct in detail all RAA operations and the members get no say whatsoever.

Of course if you are a CASA approved RAA staff member, you can name your own salary because replacing you can be made virtually impossible by CASA.

RAA effectively becomes a CASA ‘mini me” and can be all the more vicious because it is outside even the lax prudential controls that limit CASA behaviour.

I once read that the road toll could be reduced 90% by using IQ tests on driver candidates. 

 

This idea is so politically incorrect that of course it got demolished as racist.

 

You are completely missing the point.

What must be understood is that safety, like all other decisions, is about costs and benefits. You have forgotten the benefits side of the equation like most people.

So yes, you might possibly be right about reducing accidents but have you considered the economic benefits of car driving? No.

You can easily reduce car accidents to zero by prohibiting driving. The trouble is you are then faced with the massive economic consequences and costs of moving goods and people manually.

Use horses? They had massive costs including safety issues as well. Use public transport? Same same.

The free market generally works and the driving standards and technology we currently use provide something like the lowest cost option. Electric cars and self driving technology may reduce those costs again.

This is why CASA approach to aviation regulation is such a disaster, they refuse to use a risk management cost benefit approach, even though ICAO codified everything I’ve said in manuals, right down to the probability figures to be used as thresholds.

You had better hope that your “basic class 2” medical standard does NOT become law or RAA pilot numbers will collapse and with it your association.

I think it is well understood that a major source of RAA membership is previously CASA licensed pilots migrating to RAA aircraft when it becomes expensive or difficult to hold a class 1 or 2 medical certificate. RAA can research this number if they like.

However while you are told by CASA that their new basic class 2 is the same as the Australian truck driving standard, that’s not quite correct. It’s “based” on that standard but CASA has the same nasty twists as before which makes it far more difficult to obtain than mere self certification. You will not notice this until you read the instructions to certifying doctors and the application paperwork itself - which is not too my knowledge freely available on the web for download. You have o sign up for one of these things to get access to it.

Then you get to read the fine print......The doctor has to sign that she has “no reservations and unreservedly certifies” that you meet  the standard, but the whole list of conditions that make it hard to keep a class2 - diabetes, heart conditions, stents, blood pressure, etc., etc. have to be disclosed and are by definition reasons to make reservations. Catch 22.

To put that another way “joe blow meets the requirements but for (insert condition)” and you don’t get your certificate.

Furthermore doctors realise they are carrying the full legal liability for certifying you. Instead of today, where you carry the liability of certifying you.

Sure, there are let outs for hearing and visual standards, but that is all.

And the truck driving standard is harder to meet then the current car driving standard

What’s the criteria for listing?

Thank you again for your continued abuse of private pilots.

I am sorry for your loss. I stand by what I say. Tragedy is all around us every day but we ignore it. Your tragedy, respectfully, is no different from thousands of others although I understand it’s personal impact. Your reaction is also perfectly normal. However your claim that your personal tragedy is somehow so strikingly different from the norm that, because of it, Angel Flight is somehow to blame and needs to be destroyed or changed beyond recognition is not justified by it.

I am not some armchair idiot with no empathy. I have suffered divorce, the slow death of a later partner by cancer, and various vicious attacks in my life. I am a volunteer firefighter and have unfortunately seen tragedies just as bad as yours. My son is a policeman who has seen much worse death and suffering than I have and is now paying the mental price for that. I am now fighting two other personal battles, through no fault of my own, just like you,  that have the capacity to destroy what’s left of my life.

I wish to suggest to you that the  best response, outside religion and suicide, is to try to rise above these tragedies and do good. For example, why are regional health services so rotten that AF is even needed? How can you assist AF in its mission in memory of your family?

If you allow it, as it seems you might have, bitterness, rage and anger will consume you, making you another victim of the accident. 

Walrus.

Families are decimated by road accidents every day of the week. So a few die in air crashes.....who cares? 

If if we let CASA and it’s ATSB lapdog regulate road transport, we’d all be driving at 30 kph daylight hours only, wearing crash helmets, 4 point harnesses and roll bars. We would also have to stop when it was wet.

Everything in life carries risk. Get used to it.

A quick back of the envelope calculation indicates there is nothing wrong with Angel Flight at all.

BITRE data from 2015 shows total VH relevant private flying time (not training, parachuting, mustering etc.) is about 289,000 hrs pa.

ATSB data quotes “2006-2010 72 vfr into imc incidents - 7 fatal” I’m assuming here that we aren’t talking professional pilots having these accidents.

So if we said about 1 fatal private vfr  into imc per 150,000 hrs is that far wrong?

Now look at Angel Flight - 46,000 flights over ten years, 2 fatal. Assuming 5 hours per AF mission that’s 230,000 hrs - for 2 fatals. That is not significantly different from the general private community in statistical poisson  distribution terms.

Definitely no weight increase? If the USA goes ahead, that will mean progressively more and more designs will be useless in Australia.

P&M Quickr. Relatively Undamaged apart from nose and wing. I think Danny will be grateful to receive any sentence a court might decide to impose as it will be nothing compared to the sentence imposed by family and conscience. Pray for the family, all of them.

Albanese hates small aircraft. He will let CASA run free.

Some peopl here have never been exposed to the practical logistics of accessing treatment in a big city from a rural location. Angel Flight is a golden much valued service on a par with the CFA.

if you live more than 3-4 hours drive from a city, without Angel Flight, your doctors appointment schedule almost always dooms you to two days lost time for you and your driver as well as a nights accommodation plus meals. I speak as the dutiful driver for my wife who has been through 2 years of breast cancer treatment. We live 3 hours from the city.

We made at least 30 trips per year by car, hired an apartment at times and spent upwards of $20,000 per year in the logistics of getting my wife to and from hospital. Then there was the 90 plus days of my lost time in chauffeuring my patient.

Angel Flight is like gold. I fail to see how it is possible to arrange a course of treatment if you live 3+ hours from a capital without totally dislocating your existence.

Think scans(ultrasound, x-ray, mri), blood tests, biopsies, consultations, surgery and it’s follow up, chemo, oncology, radiation, dietitians and reconstructive surgery - all involving. busy specialists with punishing appointment schedules that simply cannot be rearranged to suit country train and bus schedules let alone RPY air transport. 

Angel Flight makes this process partially bearable. Without it country folk might as well give up and die.

I wrote and posted this elsewhere. A private flight is a private flight, period.

Scene: A country road in outback New South Wales, three police cars are conducting random breathalyser checks. An SUV has just been flagged down for a breath test....

 

Officer: “Good morning, blow into the machine till I tell you to stop”.

 

Driver: (Blows into machine). “Morning Officer, is the reading OK?”

 

Officer: “You’re fine, by the way, your kid in the back seat is not looking very well”.

 

Driver: “Oh that’s not my kid, that’s a neighbours kid, Timmy, I’m taking him to Sydney for his chemo treatment, poor little fella.”

 

8

 

Officer: “What? Say that again.”

 

Driver: “Timmy has cancer, I’m taking him to hospital for his regular chemotherapy session, happens every month. His mother doesn’t have a car and can’t get anymore time off work either.”

 

Officer: Don’t you understand you’re breaking the law by doing this? You can’t take a patient to hospital except in an ambulance. I don’t see any flashing lights on your car, this doesn’t look like an ambulance.”

 

Driver: “It isn’t an ambulance , it’s just my Toyota. Timmy is strapped into his safety seat, what more do I need? We have water and some snacks and his painkiller medication, this is going to be a five hour drive.”

 

Officer: “You obviously don’t understand, the law says that only an ambulance can take a patient to hospital for treatment. It’s for safety! You don’t have emergency lights, siren, a flouro vest and a uniform, your not an accredited paramedic either”.

 

Driver: “But Timmy’s mother isn’t a parawhatsit either, if she had a car, couldn’t she drive him to hospital? Why not me? She doesn’t have the time and she’s not a very good driver as well.

 

Officer: “The law is quite clear. She can take him but you can’t. Don’t you understand? What you are doing is highly dangerous without being specially trained, in an ambulance, with a safety manual to follow and a procedures manual, operations manual and a log book and a mission statement. I should warn you, the penalties for this are severe. Your car tires look a bit scuffed as well.”

 

Driver: “ You mean I can take Timmy and a whole car load of screaming kids to McDonalds, Dreamworld or wherever and that’s OK, but if I want to take him to hospital I can’t?”

 

Officer: “Precisely(smiling). I see you understand. It would be far too dangerous to make that hospital trip.”

 

Driver: “Well this is crazy. I can do anything I like except help people. Not only that, me and my friends have been driving poor kids to doctors and hospitals for years without any trouble, but you now tell me it’s forbidden because it’s too dangerous? What is Timmy supposed to do if I’m not here - take non existent public transport? Hitchike?

 

Officer: “It sounds to me like you and your friends are engaged in a criminal conspiracy! Wait till my boss hears this! I should get a promotion for shutting you down. As for Timmy, the law doesn’t care what happens to him. All we care about is safety above everything else. If Timmy can’t travel to hospital then he can’t have an accident during the trip. The logic of the law is simple and unchallengeable. Now turn around and take the kid back home!”

The Board has basically two functions: to safeguard the assets of the members and to hire and fire the CEO.The CEO runs the business and the Board either approves or disproves his strategic plan.

If the board disapproves of the strategic plan then the CEO either resigns or is fired.

In my opinion, if what is alleged to have occurred has occurred, The Board should direct the CEO to assign the trademark to AOPA.

I am not happy about the state of cooperation between associations and I fear that RAA has embarked on a growth strategy at the expense of everyone else.