101 uses for ERSA

[wanabigaplane]

101 uses for ERSA

 

In 2004 I was preparing for a flight around Australia in my Sapphire. Now there is not much room in the cockpit of this aircraft, but with careful preparation I had worked out an arrangement that had a place for everything that I had to have at hand during the flight. Then, aghast! When I went to buy the latest ERSA, I found it was a different size - much bigger, and a different shape. It wouldn’t fit neatly anywhere. For most of the trip, it followed Mr Funnel around the cockpit, looking for a place to hide.

 

Now, ERSA does not cover anywhere as many of the smaller fields that AOPA does. However, it is a CASA requirement that ERSA is carried in the cockpit. So, during some of the longer stretches, my mind fell to wondering what use ERSA was to me at all. Come to think of it - if I removed all the useless pages, the book would be less than half the size. Then you could fit it somewhere !

 

I will never, ever, land at Sydney airport. The same goes for all the other larger airports too. There is no chance I will be flying to Tasmania this year, and how would you get to Weipa, or Thursday Island, and stay within gliding distance of somewhere to land? Who cares which way I will have to fly around Ayers Rock, and what good to me is 200 pages of a Runway Distances Supplement when I could land on the taxi way?

 

Here are some of the uses I have put it to, and some that I have thought about. Lets see what uses posters can think of.

 

1. Lighting a camp fire. There are more than enough pages on Mascot to light a few fires.

 

2. Use as a wheel chock

 

3. Wiping the dipstick

 

4. Emergency funnel.

 

5. Bookmarkers for useful locations in AOPA.

 

6. Use pages to stop the canopy rattling.

 

7. Toilet paper - what pages would I choose for that ?

 

8. Playing “I’ve been every where man†(during inclement weather you drop ERSA on the bar, and he who cannot make outrageous claims as to having landed at one of the airfields shown, buys the next round)

 

9. Use a few pages as a feeler gauge.

 

10. Use the plastic spiral to poke the wasp net out of the pitot tube.

 

11. Place a few pages under the magnetic catch in the security gate so that you can get back onto the field.

 

12……over to you.

 

Grumpy old ERSA owner.

 

 

 

[Guest AusDarren]

ahhh yes.. I sympathise.. I suspect for most RAAus users, an annual ERSA would be sufficient.. 4 per year is unnecessary cost.. so the life of notams becomes a bit longer. is that really a problem?

 

Regards,

 

AusDarren

 

 

[Student Pilot]

Stead of taking the whole jobby along, just photocopy the places you intend to travel and a couple of "Alternates". You can upsize them with the photo copier to A4 size if your old and blind like me.

 

 

[Admin]

Well done Grumpy old ERSA owner

 

Making paper airplanes out of the pages when you are sitting at the airstrip grounded due to weather

 

 

[Ben Longden]

As a booster seat for kids......

 

Ben

 

 

[Guest pecram air]

Get for the ERSA pages free

 

I tend to download all the relevant pages from the Airsevices Website where it is free. I only download the pages relevant to my flight and any altenatives I might need. :)

 

 

[BigPete]

YES guys I agree with all of you BUT - are we legal to only carry the pages we would need for the flight? If CASA say "Take ERSA" then are we in trouble if we get caught with out the full book?

 

regards

 

 

[poteroo]

You're only required to take the maps you'll need for the trip - not for the whole of Australia, so I'd say that you have a good arguement for being selective with your ERSA pages.

 

Depending on the quality of the GPS you have installed, much of the location data might be in the database for the GPS - certainly for all Navaid and RPT locations anyway.

 

happy days,

 

 

[Guest brentc]

I believe it's illegal to fly without a current ERSA and I believe it's not legal to fly with a partial one as for example, you are required to have all information handy for in the event of an emergency. Also, frequencies do change as I found out recently. I was heading into Tyabb and opened my brand new ERSA only to find that it had changed from 126.7 to 128.0. It certainly caught me by surprise and could have been embarrasing.

 

I think that if you had an emergency and needed to land at an alternate field that the ERSA could be a lifesaver.

 

 

[TechMan]

Counteract the imbalance that the fish tank has aquired on one side due to standing on the ops and tech manuals??

 

 

[numptie]

1. Use it on the seat so short people can see over the dash.

 

2. Strap them onto the bottom of your feet so you can reach the pedals.

 

3. As stilts so you can reach the fuel cap without using a ladder.

 

4. Ballast - for correct weight distribution.

 

Bob

 

 

[pylon500]

What's an ERSA? :ah_oh:, but seriously,

 

I tend to download all the relevant pages from the Airsevices Website where it is free.

And I think this is the address;

ERSA link

 

Arthur.