Western Australia Ultralight Fatality

[alf jessup]

At the end of the day it is up to you whether you survive to fly, drive, work, walk ect ect ect the next day.

 

People make mistakes some through bad judgment and some through bravado and some don't make a mistake just happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

 

You can train a pilot/driver/pedestrian/worker with the best training in the world, but what he does once out on his own you, me nobody can control his/her next move.

 

Some end up not seeing the next sunrise and some do.

 

It is the defective nut behind the joystick, steering wheel, handlebars & runners that determines what comes next.

 

It all comes down to attitude in the end and how much of a risk your are prepared to take as far as I am concerned.

 

You want to beat up and impress your mates, go right on ahead, I'm sure they won't be impressed standing by your graveside if it goes pear shaped, wait it always happens to someone else though doesn't it, sad fact is anyone's surname can change to someone else in the blink of an eyelid.

 

Until we as individuals change our attitudes the trend will continue.

 

That's my rant on it.

 

Alf

 

 

[Old Koreelah]

...The total road toll had reduced from I think 1194 per year to about 300 per year...

Much the same figures in NSW, Turbs. Our Rescue Squad saw a huge reduction in callouts after the introduction of RBT. Thousands are alive today because the authorities applied science to a problem, then legislated some unpopular changes to people's behaviour. A great Australian success story. Perhaps RAAus can make similar improvements to our safety record without taking away too many of our freedoms.

 

 

[kaz3g]

That is pretty much as I recall it pmcc. It stopped in the early 60's when the big 3 makers didn't produce aerobatic aircraft. Recovery from unusual attitudes under the hood would shake a few up but that was done. You just use a few BASIC rules to work out what is happening to you.. Nev

And we did it with basic instruments, too, Nev!

 

Kaz

 

 

[104chocks]

Hi

 

I can point you to two Coroners Reports - both from 2004 ( almost 10 years ago ) - both relate to fatal gyrocopter accidents in Australia.

 

One deals with a hub bar failure - this accident led to a significant ATSB report into hub bar failures.

 

The second deals with a fatal accident of a brand new gyro being flown home by the customer.

 

Both reports contain some strong comments about CASA and ASRA.

 

Use the link below and scroll down to 2004 to finds links to the two coroner reports.

 

http://gyrocopteraccidentsinaustralia.blogspot.co.uk/

 

If you know of any other published coroner reports relating to gyros then please let me know and I'll add them to the Blog - thanks

 

Steve

 

 

[Head in the clouds]

"I'd say it would be closer to 10."Get real, if you learn to FLY then it is a aircraft. If it has VH on the tail then time is nil. Yes I went from GA to a jab (sorry still both) and the only reason I did a check was to get an RAA licence as I elected to register it that way. If I registered it VH I would have just flown it home.

 

If it takes someone 10 hours between a Piper and a Jabiru then I would suggest the person is still in the student phase. I won't mention the lengthy time I spent gaining a lic to fly RAA registered aircraft.

Regardless of the weight of it, a Jabiru's performance is more like a GA than most GAs (!) so I don't really think your argument holds in this example.

 

When I had flying schools we converted about as many GA pilots to Drifters than we taught from scratch, and without doubt the average GA pilot took longer to come to terms with the low momentum of an ultralight, than those who learnt from scratch. So scratch learners became safer (from stall/spin risk) in Drifters at lower hours than GA convertees did. And on occasion we had some GA folks who just never made the grade, their 'high momentum' training had become too ingrained. You'd pull the power off and they'd instantly raise the nose "to convert speed into height". It was a good lesson for the instructors to begin GA conversion EFATO training at good height ...

 

 

[turboplanner]

Turbs, I can appreciate the job you've done there with your whatever it is, and I congratulate you on your successfully figures. However...we cannot fit out our aircraft with steel roll cage protection, driver 4" wide restraint harnesses with heavy padding, fireproof driver suits , minimum capacity fuel tanks, and whatever else it is keeping your sportsmen/ women alive. As you know if we did that in the average UL it simply wouldn't get off the ground !.....so we are stuck with the fact that most aircraft are not designed or constructed to hit the ground at high rates of speed. So most who take to the air do so knowing the risks, and have accepted them forthwith. We tighten our seatbelts, make sure the fuel is on, hone our skills as best we can, and take to the sky's. Such is the sport of flying UL and other light recreational aircraft, in the year 2013. I've been listening to the masses telling us "your all going to kill yourselves" now for 30 years or so....... Enjoy it as it is ...or not , your choice entirely as I see it................Maj...

We are just chatting on an internet forum, rushing thought, rushing typing.

 

If we were in a serious safety discussion, we would be addressing factual data, and being very specific about the product.

 

Race cars need steel roll cages, Simpson Harnesses which weight nearly as much as the driver because in his environment he and the car are being belted around at multiple g's all the time.

 

Some things, like correct frame triangulation, or correct FRP design, burstproof fuel tanks do translate .....to a degree, but I agree with you there's no point if all the machine can do is taxi. Most aircraft will never be involved in a deformation, it's just not a major part of the environment. Having said that, two things got me interested in Ultralights. One was when flying a Cherokee downwind for a landing at an airport in Las Vegas, and seeing a guy coming towards me sitting on a plastic chair on a piece of 2" pipe, making a slight deviation to the right as I did and missing me by maybe 50 metres. The other was a magazine report on an Ultralight a little bit like a single seat Drifter which had a progressive crumple frame and seat structure which protected the pilot up to double digit g's if he dropped the aircraft on to the ground.

 

What was instilled into me during GA training was that flying is very safe.....provided you don't make a mistake.

 

To give you an example of that from the car world where we have those extra protections our Chief machine Examiner was asked to fly to another State to assist the Coroner relating to a fatal crash of a standard saloon - probably the most docile of all classes.

 

The driver had been involved in a multiple collision, his car had hit the safety fence hard, knocking him unconscious with his foot on the throttle. The car had careered across the infield and hit the opposite safety fence head on in what should have been a survivable incident. The driver had multiple injuries and the floor pan was filled with blood, which was not something which could occur if his harness had been done up. Two peeople had failed that night - the driver, and the pit steward assigned to check every harness.

 

As far as "you're all going to kill yourselves" - In a serious approach, yes you aim for zero injuries and deaths the same as a shooter aims for a perfect score. If you argue that two a year is acceptable, you'll get four human nature being what it is. However if you want to do some good, you'll do research first, then go where that research tells you there are x issues which can be resolved with y action. No one works on a one solution fits all with the exception of road authorities with their "speed kills" theme, which doesn't work.

 

OK referred to the RBT success. This was based on research which showed that when blood was tested from deceased drivers, in 50% of cases the driver was drunk, and in the road toll decrease in Victoria the two massive drops which account for most of the reduction come from seat belts and RBT.

 

As I mentions, a byproduct of discovering RAA's responsibility as spelled out by CASA is the mandatory accident investigation. Once the politics of that are sorted out, then direct action can be fed in year by year to the SMS and result in corrective action. Safe pilots (as against those who think they have it under control) will notice virtually no difference to their operations.

 

 

[turboplanner]

I think that the truth of this statement may just well be a significant part of the problem.It needs to be driven home that from the moment that you open the hangar door (or should that be the moment that you get out of bed),until the moment you close it, that you and only you, can ensure that you are as safe as you can be (and that includes keeping a lookout for others that could harm you), regardless of any regulation/system put in place to protect you.

A lot of agrees, winner etc like on this post.

 

Yes it does, and that's all that used to be done in the prescriptive legislation days of the 20th century.

 

Pay half an hours flying cost and go to a Public Liability lawyer, a specialist, with this question:

 

"I'm an instructor/Flying School Manager/Airfield Owner etc. I convert pedestrians into pilots/manage an airfield where x number of pilots fly/provide facilities for members of the public to enter, and pilots with passengers to fly, and I tell all the pilots THEY are responsible for being a competent pilot and for safety. Am I meeting my Duty of Care in this way?

 

That should be good for an hour or so's discussion about who's likely to own your house down the track.

 

I was involved in a very similar discussion to this with a major company. There was a new regulation which was non-prescriptive as many of the new regulations are, so no authority checked whether it was done; drivers were not responsible, but the people building the vehicle and putting it on the road were.

 

After decades of outsmarting the road authorities with illegal weights and measures they were trapped by duty of care but didn't know it. The dealers and body builder rebelled and the Managing Director sided with them saying they were professionals, had worked in the industry all their lives and knew what they were doing.

 

Someone decided to get a legal opinion, and a few days later the Managing Director sent out a bulletin to all dealers with the regulation attached and along with a form which the dealer was to sign, committing him to sign the form, comply with the new regulation, and keep records of every quote with the regulation calculations attached, with the condition that if this was not done the dealer would be immediately terminated.

 

So ignore me by all means, but get professional advice - you're still living by the standards which existed before the 1980's.

 

 

[frank marriott]

HIC

 

I was referring to

 

"Yes GA to RA I have personal experience of; it's often discussed as 45 minutes to transfer from a Jab to Cherokee, 4<5 hours the other way; I'd say it would be closer to 10."

 

So I think the comment is relevant. I make no comment about the "LP" type endorsements (different story)

 

 

[metalman]

I will seek some professional advice on this ,but not from an insurance company for obvious reasons, at face value though ,and I believe aviation is probably the last place where personal responsibility is the bottom line. A pedestrian who goes through the syllabus and is transformed into an aviator is given a legal title PILOT IN COMMAND ,any litigation has to get past this title ,the lawyers can argue to and fro but if a person is deemed to be competent then all the legal ramifications fall squarely on the shoulders of the PIC whether dead or alive.

 

I'm no lawyer and have only a 'bloke on the street' understanding ,but as a pilot it has been drummed into me that when I strap into a plane I am responsible for that flight,CASA ,RAAus ,air services all make me responsible for what happens in that plane and so does the legal profession going by the lack of success in sueing other people (airfield owners, refuellers, CFI's) this is not counting the sting accident as I think there was some different dynamics there. And further I would be very sad to see some lawyer find a sneaky assed way of getting past the PIC status .

 

 

[turboplanner]

The Sting case was slightly abnormal, but if the RAA and CASA settled, that means that they decided not to go down the full path.

 

The structure is in place now for someone to sue anyone who had a duty of care in the matter they don't have to find a sneaky assed way, that's my point.

 

 

[David Isaac]

I think the sting issue is exactly the 'sneaky ass way' that Matt was referring to

 

 

[Guest Maj Millard]

When seeking insurance from various companies that service our sport, they seem to set the magic figure at 150 hrs experience PIC time. Do they know something we don't ??........do their statistics show that below this is where the majority of accidents occur ?....certainly this was the case recently with the dual fatality resulting from the low-level buzz-job and wire strike right on sunset. In skydiving you we're a worry until you got that 100th jump under your belt.

 

If the 150 hr is the magic number, and we should have the data to show this, then this is something that could be easily managed, with say a requirement that a new pilot be under supervision until that time, or even a 'provisional' license until he logs 150 hrs. Wether this would make a difference I don' t know, but may be worth a try.......................Maj....

 

 

[turboplanner]

That's roughly what I've seen quoted for GA

 

Students are the safest, things are good just after the licence, then shortcuts are taken, then some pilots think they've learnt it all, but come up against wind shear for the first time etc, then recency is ignored.

 

It's handled very well in the book "The Killing Zone (Wow and why pilots die by Paul A. Craig) - available on amazon.com.

 

In my case I'd done all my navex's in calm conditions, stayed on course, arrived at check points to the minute, then screwed up a couple of times in cross winds, then started to show off doing steep turns, tiny circuits and every landing a short-field over the fence, then no time wasted doing circuits for landings at all and a few other tricks, and was lucky enough to survive the trend by learning from others who weren't so lucky.

 

Managing the pilot's behaviour is one of the keys at this stage. In the racing equivalent we have a Chief Steward who does this.

 

 

[Guest Maj Millard]

As a skydiver you could get grounded instantly by the DZSO (drop zone safety officer) . I once got a one week grounding for being a naughty boy and a bright red-pen entry in my log book. I'm sure it was a learning experience at the time.

 

The pilot who flys infrequently only every couple of months, or twice a year (just to keep his hand in !) is a known danger. Fly often, stay safe !...

 

A flight in a new aircraft type not previously flown, even for a high-time pilot is another danger area. You must go in with antennas up.

 

Pilots below the magic 150 hrs could be monitored by his instructor, undergo periodic performance reviews and logbook checks, and could carry a 'provisional' license until out of that stage, then signed off as fully component by his original instructor. Don' t know if any of this would make a difference , but it's certainly is recognising know danger areas, and doing something about it...................Maj...

 

 

[facthunter]

With 150 hours of solo you "should" have enough experience, to handle the plane.( though if you only fly on fine calm days your experience would be limited).

 

After that the major factor is how much cowboy is there. The NUT that holds the control column is the danger. A careful pilot has a better chance of living longer, and remember the saying " proper planning ( and evaluation of the risks My add) prevents Piss Poor performance".

 

If you reach the stage of thinking you know it all, you are ready for a shock, sometime. Safety is more of a culture and attitude than hours flown. I feel that there is also a factor of inadequate training resulting in a poor understanding of some or other fact of flying that can bite you without warning. This can easily be from a source in a bar or "something I read somewhere". Make sure you really understand what is going to happen when you do something to the plane. Any doubts ask your instructor on a BFR. Discuss it before you get airborne. You can't be briefed in the air. Nev

 

 

[Head in the clouds]

In our teaching days we used to refer to the 'hundred hour syndrome' when the new pilot had reached a stage of over-confidence and often stretched things with weather, terrain or handling to a sufficient extent to give themselves an almighty scare and then became a bit more cautious again. Assuming they survived that the next big milestone was the 'five hundred hour syndrome' by which time some new pilots were earnestly demonstrating that they'd become more skillful than anyone else in history. Someone did a statistical analysis of ultralight fatalities around 1989 and it showed that 500hrs in the logbook was a very dangerous zone to be in.

 

 

[Kev]

Firstly, condolences to the family and friends of the gentleman involved.My question is do RA-Aus actually have anyone that is capable of doing a "proper" investigation of incidents, ie has formal recognised training in incident investigation that would be consistent with a coronial inquiry as an "Expert witness"?

Yes

 

Safe flying

 

Kev

 

 

[Jabiru7252]

Another report, video also showing the aircraft and naming the Pilot.

Unfortunately showing an aircraft in a video doesn't mean that was what he was flying. I remember a Jabiru crash that was reported as a Cessna. I also remember a twin Cessna being featured in video where a plane crashed, a Piper Seneca. The media get more wrong than right, another example of dumbing down I guess.

 

 

[alf jessup]

With every accident whether it be aircraft, motor vehicle, work related they all have one thing in common (Human element) the only one we cannot control is sudden incapacitation for medical reasons and that as humans we have no control over, unless we knowingly take to the air the roads in a condition we are not fit for.

 

Sometimes things are out of our own control as an oncoming driver veers into you path or shoots through a red light/stop sign or another aircraft turns final same time, but if we take a defensive attitude when we fly. drive or work we can help minimize other humans mistakes.

 

Make good radio calls keep a good lookout in circuit and fly the correct hemispherical altitudes, maintain impeccable maintenance and don't think we are infallible to death our chances of continuing to live another day increase markedly.

 

Alf

 

 

[DWF]

Someimes a pilot with 150 hours solo may not have 150 hours experience but ONE hour's experience 150 times.

 

DWF

 

 

[M61A1]

A lot of agrees, winner etc like on this post.Yes it does, and that's all that used to be done in the prescriptive legislation days of the 20th century.

 

Pay half an hours flying cost and go to a Public Liability lawyer, a specialist, with this question:

 

"I'm an instructor/Flying School Manager/Airfield Owner etc. I convert pedestrians into pilots/manage an airfield where x number of pilots fly/provide facilities for members of the public to enter, and pilots with passengers to fly, and I tell all the pilots THEY are responsible for being a competent pilot and for safety. Am I meeting my Duty of Care in this way?

 

That should be good for an hour or so's discussion about who's likely to own your house down the track.

 

I was involved in a very similar discussion to this with a major company. There was a new regulation which was non-prescriptive as many of the new regulations are, so no authority checked whether it was done; drivers were not responsible, but the people building the vehicle and putting it on the road were.

 

After decades of outsmarting the road authorities with illegal weights and measures they were trapped by duty of care but didn't know it. The dealers and body builder rebelled and the Managing Director sided with them saying they were professionals, had worked in the industry all their lives and knew what they were doing.

 

Someone decided to get a legal opinion, and a few days later the Managing Director sent out a bulletin to all dealers with the regulation attached and along with a form which the dealer was to sign, committing him to sign the form, comply with the new regulation, and keep records of every quote with the regulation calculations attached, with the condition that if this was not done the dealer would be immediately terminated.

 

So ignore me by all means, but get professional advice - you're still living by the standards which existed before the 1980's.

I think that you misunderstand what I'm saying.... I'm not arguing the legal side by any means, all I'm saying is, that we can make laws until they come out our arse, but the pilots (or drivers, or workers) that survive, will more often than not, be the ones who understand that only they can make themselves safe.

[Phil Perry]

Much the same figures in NSW, Turbs. Our Rescue Squad saw a huge reduction in callouts after the introduction of RBT. Thousands are alive today because the authorities applied science to a problem, then legislated some unpopular changes to people's behaviour. A great Australian success story. Perhaps RAAus can make similar improvements to our safety record without taking away too many of our freedoms.

What is the meaning behind the letters R B T please ? ( Being a resident Pom at the moment, I'm not Au fait with your regs. )

 

Phil

 

 

[David Isaac]

Random Breath Testing, exercised by police on any motorist at any time without need to show reason.

 

 

[metalman]

Or RANDOM BREAST TESTING exercised on pretty young women at any time without need to be in a relationship with the woman,,,,,,,mostly followed by a hard whack in the face or an ugly altercation with an angry boyfriend

 

 

[Old Koreelah]

What is the meaning behind the letters R B T please ? ( Being a resident Pom at the moment, I'm not Au fait with your regs. )Phil

Random Breath Testing. Every cop car in NSW has a breath tester. They pull over motorists at random (that's the stated policy anyway), you count to ten across the unit. If alcohol is detected, they get really interested in you. 0.02% (the smallest level detectable) is mandated for new drivers, bus drivers, etc. The rest of us can get away with 0.05%.

The impact was enormous, changing the way we live. Accident rates dropped, pubs and clubs lost money, taxis were happy...