APenNameAndThatA

The email from RA-Aus yesterday whinged that RA-Aus put in the 760 kg application eight months ago and it still has not been approved. 

The big danger with the 160 kg weight increase is that half of CASA will be fine with it, and half will be resentful and believe that RA-Aus should be put under the pump for the privilege of muscling in on CASA’s turf. Saying “it really shouldn’t be this hard” is rude, counter productive and shows that RA-Aus understands none of the psychology of what is happening here. 

🤦‍♂️

4 hours ago, Garfly said:

You have to cut RAAus a bit of slack here since much of the horse-trading would, necessarily, be happening behind the scenes.  What matters is not winning the argument but winning the day.  And RAAus has made it clear that a good outcome for them would be the government deciding to properly fund the ATSB to do its job; the whole of it, and that includes us.  After all, most of the lessons learned from RA accidents are perfectly applicable to the GA scene.  In NZ and other jurisdictions, the arbitrary distinction would seem absurd.  I wouldn't be surprised if the ATSB quite agrees with RAAus.  They may welcome just such an extended role if only they had the financial wherewithal.  No other outfit has the expertise, arms-length-status nor the legal protections that they do.  But who knows? It's hard to say what goes on in bureaucratic backrooms, but equally, it's hardly fair to judge RAAus' strategy without knowing.

 

Be that as it may, the organisation has put its position publicly and clearly, most recently in this ABC report on the Nullarbor tragedy:

 

" ... Esperance Detectives took on the case after the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) declined to investigate, saying it typically did not investigate recreational aircraft accidents.

Recreational Aviation Australia (RAA) criticised the move, saying it wrote to the Minister for Transport Catherine King in November raising concerns about the ATSB's inability to conduct investigations due to limited funding.

"We have seen at least five fatal accidents in the past 12 months and many in the years prior where the ATSB has chosen to not investigate," RAA chief executive Matt Bouttell wrote in the letter.

"This equates to a significant cost to the Australian people through awaiting State Coroners to arrive at findings that often result in diminished safety outcomes due to a lack of subject matter expertise during the investigation and evidence-gathering phase.

Mr Boutell told the ABC that RAA has provided police with technical support in the past, but it has no legislative powers to conduct fatal accident investigations.

"We have previously provided police with on-site support at accidents, including performing analysis around the circumstances of the accident however, in recent times it's become clear that due to the lack of legislative protections, we cannot keep 'propping up' the ATSB by doing so," he said."

"We have therefore said enough is enough, and that the Government should fund the ATSB for the purpose it is established for." 

 

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-12-20/pilot-in-nullarbor-crash-identified-as-43-year-old-perth-father/101793432

 

 

 

 

 

Fair point. 

On 19/12/2022 at 2:46 PM, facthunter said:

They really CAN'T investigate for the same reason CASA doesn't and even moreso. It's not at arms length with either CASA  to whom they owe their very existence or any donors/sponsors to RAAus and some of the decision makers in RAAus may be selling aviation stuff..  Conflict of Interests it's Called.  Nev

I agree with you. And if RA-Aus was more sophisticated, that’s the reason RA-Aus would have stated. Just to restate: the logical reason you gave is not RA-Aus’s reason, otherwise they would have said so. 🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️. If only they had spoken to you first. 

Others might have covered this before. RA-Aus said today that they were not investigating the accident "for a myriad of reasons". As was clear from both the first and the second communications I saw from RA-Aus about this, the only reason they are not investigating is that they won't be paid. I'm not saying that that's the wrong stance. I am less happy with the stalking horses they use. Maybe to get things done you need to mislead, maybe you don't. They their attempt to mislead would have failed, because if their true motivation is obvious to me, it will be obvious to others too. If there are any really sophisticated operators at RA-Aus, they don't get them to do their communications. 🙄

Thanks for the feedback. 

If anybody thinks that my main criticism of the video was wrong or overblown, I would really like to hear from them. Please. 

Well, here's a turn up for the books. I contacted a presenter, they looked at the video, and this is what they told me. 

Hi Andrew,

I have reviewed the video and your comments, as well as discussed the content of the video with other industry professionals. 

I can see no issues with the content, and my colleagues agree. 

Best Regards,
 

I don't know what to think. Maybe I'm too obsessional to expect/insist that material in videos should be actually be true, instead of merely just conveying a good vibe? The presenter obviously knows how to fly and aircraft. 

11 hours ago, old man emu said:

I'm concerned about a little bit of semantics here.

 

Are you using "acceleration" in the sense it means in physics - rate of change of velocity - and saying that a change in the direction or magnitude of the velocity vector is acceleration?

 

OR

Are you using "acceleration" in layman's tems of simply an increase in "speed"?

 

I have been thinking of that word in layman's terms as aircraft don't usually accelerate ( speed up or slow down) rapidly enough to greatly affect the received velocity data. That's why I say that determining acceleration would add extra steps in the computations that might not provide any better results than if it was left out.

By the time you posted this, you were perfectly well aware that RF was using the term correctly. 

On 11/11/2022 at 9:04 PM, BrendAn said:

I have thought about that but getting my fat arse out of a Jabiru in a hurry would be a mission. Then I thought the jab is never going to break unless something hits it. I don't think a ballistic chute would be much fun with the plane on fire either.

With the sky echo anyone see you on Oz runways is that right.  Like if I had one and put ozrunways on my wife's phone could she see where I am 

Cockpit fires are a *really* rare cause of accidents/fatalities. (bursting into flame on impact, really common). 

Tempted as I am, since FR Guy actually did the the maths on a kalman filter, I will not attempt to explain to him how they work. 😆

Also, since aircraft turn it probably is a good idea to take acceleration into account. 😆

Maybe proximity detectors use this maths, maybe they don’t, maybe the manufacturers  would refuse to tell you.

The great thing about this system is that it would work around airports: there are plenty of aircraft very close that do not pose a collision risk, and they would not trigger an alert. 

Tempted as I am, since FR Guy actually did the the maths on a kalman filter, I will not attempt to explain to him how they work. 😆

Also, since aircraft turn it probably is a good idea to take acceleration into account. 😆

Maybe proximity detectors use this maths, maybe they don’t, maybe the manufacturers  would refuse to tell you.

The great thing about this system is that it would work around airports: there are plenty of aircraft very close that do not pose a collision risk, and they would not trigger an alert. 

Tempted as I am, since FR Guy actually did the the maths on a kalman filter, I will not attempt to explain to him how they work. 😆

Also, since aircraft turn it probably is a good idea to take acceleration into account. 😆

Maybe proximity detectors use this maths, maybe they don’t, maybe the manufacturers  would refuse to tell you.

The great thing about this system is that it would work around airports: there are plenty of aircraft very close that do not pose a collision risk. 

Tempted as I am, since FR Guy actually did the the maths on a kalman filter, I will not attempt to explain to him how they work. 😆

Flattering that someone asks me what I think. Overall, I hold youtube chats to a different standard than RA-Aus videos that had “countless hours” of editing and are among the “best in the world”. 

I do worry about myself. Now Im hearing myself say that telling people that if they neutralise the controls and leave the power in you they recover from a spin is dangerous. Im pretty sure PARE is more reliable. 

Fascinating that stick forward is a pro spin input. But PARE is power to idle, THEN stop the rotation, THEN stick  forward, which is not pro spin.

His bit about hypothesis testing was subtly wrong to. You need to test hypotheses to see if they bit the facts, but you ALSO need to check hypotheses that contradict the first hypothesis that also fit the facts.

One such hypothesis is the he was practicing power off stalls, stalled and tried to recover by adding power before he had lowered the nose. I once had a flying instructor tell me that if you are recovering from a stall you can add power and down elevator at the same time! (You can’t because if you are in a powerful aircraft adding lots of power can drop the left wing and put you in a spin.

Also, of course the FAA was right in saying there was insufficient speed. Unless there is insufficient speed, you can’t stall and spin - but I know what he means.

This is a good example of why everyone should practice spins! The reason is that a) everyone should practice stalls and b) if you mess up stall recovery you can spin. If the accident pilot had done spin training, he would have cut the power and thereby survived. This applies to 300 hp aircraft even more than RA-Aus aircraft.    

Turbo, you make the driver and trucking company sound sensible. Which is quite an achievement. 🙂

46 minutes ago, Flying_higher said:

I’ve got to say that this is an interesting thread. 
First of all Raa made clear this was not a training video. Secondly, there are many highly experienced aviators interviewed in the video that have way more than the starter of this thread. And you can bet your bottom dollar they wouldn’t be involved in something that has some many errors or nit picks. Could it just be that they’re right and you’re not? Tbh I’m going to go with that rather than taking advice from someone that clearly set out to try and discredit the video. 
I actually think there is some good guidance in the video. The best advice given is to go flying with an instructor or do a course with people like those in the video (strike or UPRT) who have oodles of experience. 
 

Also, one of the reasons I posted here was to get feedback, and make sure I was not totally wrong. In the past, I have posted here and everyone told me to shut up, broadly speaking, which I have taken to mean I actually was wrong. 

19 minutes ago, facthunter said:

Could be it's an "ADVERT". Using planes that RAAus doesn't cover. I've pushed Unusual Attitude Recovery for as long as I've been on this forum because I know it's important. No  response from RAAus so just what's changed and to where? Nothing specific just a few planes entering spins. RAAus doesn't allow Low level training unless for mustering??? They are "all over the PLACE"  Nev

I hadn’t thought of that. Like seeing fine dining in a McDonalds ad. You can’t get those products actslually at McDonalds, but you can visit a different restaurant later. 🤡 Curse of knowledge again. It never occurred to me that RA-Aus aircraft could do spins, but a new viewer would think that he/she could do Aa-aus and do those things. 

28 minutes ago, Flying_higher said:

I’ve got to say that this is an interesting thread. 
First of all Raa made clear this was not a training video. Secondly, there are many highly experienced aviators interviewed in the video that have way more than the starter of this thread. And you can bet your bottom dollar they wouldn’t be involved in something that has some many errors or nit picks. Could it just be that they’re right and you’re not? Tbh I’m going to go with that rather than taking advice from someone that clearly set out to try and discredit the video. 
I actually think there is some good guidance in the video. The best advice given is to go flying with an instructor or do a course with people like those in the video (strike or UPRT) who have oodles of experience. 
 

I have clearly set out to discredit the video - because its garbage. I invite you to examine each of my claims. Someone has already pointed out (correctly, I assume) that the handover of the controls was correct. If Im wrong, Im wrong. My claims are numbered for your convenience.  

As for saying its not a training video: of course it’s a training video: the disclaimer is to avoid liability.

As for the contributors having more experience than me, 1) I have addressed that issue of the curse of knowlege, 2) appeal to experience is a logical fallacy, 3) I say on here over and over that I have only 200 hours, 4) I have said that if any of the experts wrote a video that it would be much better. 

My understanding is that the contributors did not see the video before it was released! Think about that for a moment. It’s basic quality control.  

As for choosing the video, that’s fine. But if you drop a wing on climb out and think that the only way there is to deal with it is rudder, you might die. And, just to repeat myself, the presenter knows that too!

Look at it this way. The problem is that the video makes the presenters look stupid. I never said that the presenters were stupid. (edited after BA added feedback, to add “might die” and remove “will die” (hyperbole) and add this paragraph.)

Im going to start wearing mine. I emailed them and that’s what they said the penalty was. 

It would seem that RA-Aus made the video merely to raise awareness, so the stuff in the video does not actually have to be true. RA-Aus’s reply to my feedback…

Good afternoon Andrew,

Thank you for your email regarding our Loss of Control Video.

It is extremely disappointing to hear of your concerns in relation to this content. RAAus is extremely proud of what we have produced and believe that this can be an extremely valuable tool for raising awareness of Loss of Control for all pilots.

I have circulated your feedback within our team for review. Whilst I do not discount that this contains some valid general feedback, I do not agree that this content provides anything that is considered dangerous. This content is developed in order to raise awareness of some of the factors that may lead to a loss of control event. It does not replace the need for dual flight training and has been scripted, filmed, and reviewed by industry experts. The overall feedback from the video has been extremely positive.

I will ensure that your feedback is provided to the board for visibility, however, would like to remind you that under CASR Part 149 our key personnel, comprising of the accountable manager (CEO), Head of Safety, Head of Flight Operations and Head of Airworthiness and Maintenance are accountable and responsible for managing aviation safety. The board of directors are responsible for organisational governance and therefore, it is not the role of the board to be directly involved in operational matters under our CASR 149 accountabilities.

Based on the above, I can inform you that we will not be making any changes to the content, nor will we be withdrawing from the promotion of this content.

I would like to thank you again for your feedback and hope that you can view this content, as well as future episodes, based on its entirety for the purpose of raising awareness of the factors that can lead to Loss of Control events. 

Kind regards,

On 2/11/2022 at 6:24 PM, jackc said:

Good idea, have already done POH in A4 and A5, to carry in aircraft. A4 stays at hangar.

Don’t quote me on this, but do you need to have the original to be strictly legal ? 

On 5/11/2022 at 8:54 AM, hkaneshiro said:

So I have spent a bit too much during my RPL and am thinking that I needed to save some dosh going forward.

 

Would it be possible to do the following

 

1. Join RAA and get the RPC conversion from the RPL (5 hours I believe - I wanted to also do it in a taildragger to get a new endorsement)

2. Get X-Country Nav under my RPC

3. Then add the RAA/RPC taildragger+X-country Navs to my RPL

 

i guess the difference here is that I never did an initial RPC-> RPL conversion with that CASA form. Does this change anything or can I add some of the RPC endorsements added to my RPL later? I could not find a special form.

 

 

 

The best way to save dosh is to stick with RA-Aus. 

42 minutes ago, peterg said:

 

I learnt to fly in a Chippie in the '60's (also some Tiger Moth flying) and not only were the phrases standard but they were essential in tandem aircraft

 

Still used by pro instructors - clear and easily understood

 

 

Duly noted. 

1 hour ago, djpacro said:

Good discussion. Great work APenNameAndThatA

It is a fairly common cause, however.

They are. Refer CASA's Flight Instructor Manual.

Point taken about the second point. Stuck controls after they have checked free and full movement though? I take the point that leaving the control lock in kills people. That is defs true. 

13 hours ago, BrendAn said:

Is this the longest post in the history of the forum 😁. You make good points though. 

11000 words my word processor said, but it feels shorter. It destroyed my brain.