Ultralight Federation mark II anyone?

[Guest ratchet]

And no-one died. And in literally tens of thousands of hours we have never killed a nonparticipant or

 

even better come close to heavy metal.

 

But sometimes sh&t happens.

 

Without a concerted voter base demanding blood no minister will act to clip our freedoms in

 

an election yr.

 

CASA/ATSB may indeed have had enough but in the real world things are murky. For example if they

 

become holier than thou then we only have to point out why it took 4 audits to do this. A great regulator

 

would have verified the reforms after the failed first one.

 

Truth is, they were slack too and using it as an excuse to go draconian on us will raise natural questions of

 

them as well. We're joined at the hip.

 

Like I said, 10,000 voters from marginal electorate want to fly. They have done nothing wrong. We

 

are a safe sport with a long and good record of safety. We have 5000 aircraft i think and they will NOT

 

be returning to days of 300' altitude and not over built up area. We have an industry and a technological

 

base that provides skills and some employment.

 

Sometimes a truck's brakes and nonroad users are killed in their houses or on the footpath. It happens and

 

regulation has nothing to do with it.

 

IF our failings had been causal in the ferris wheel crash then they may have had a case for further restrictions,

 

I'd like to THAT evidence.

 

In reality we were bad at form filling and counting which is fixable and had no causal role in any harm to

 

ourselves and none to the public.

 

There may be elements of ATSB/CASA that hate our guts. Some may long for the day when every aircraft

 

type to fly in our airspace had to be test flown by CASA at our expense- even if it was approved by a dozen

 

other aviation authorities.

 

It will never happen. It all comes down to who pays and where the votes are.

 

If tiny population of people and planes and massive continent can't regulate a light aircraft movement then

 

it's embarrasing. What magic dust do the Americans use?

 

Time has moved on, we;re a successful sports body. We think we're special because we love planes. Truth

 

is the voters aren;t interested any more than rock fishermen getting lost at sea.

 

We haven't harmed the public, but we're bad at admin. Still we love it and if the US can do it well then we;re

 

not going back to bejng a soviet republic.

 

Not when the public don't care and my vote and 10,000 others says over my dead body.

 

CASA can be as peeved as they like. We can fix this and we will.

 

 

[David Isaac]

I actually have a feeling that the one ferris wheel may have been enough. The investigation on that is still ongoing and it's my impression that it was the impetus behind everything that has happened since and the hard-set attitude adopted by CASA in suspending the registration renewals. It seems apparent that ATSB and CASA delved further into the "regulation" of RA-Aus and the further they dig the more rot they've found.

I have to agree Volksy,

The Ferris wheel incident was perceived as horrific in the public eyes and was nothing short of a miracle that no one was injured.

 

Of course the accident itself had nothing to do with airworthiness or not of the aircraft. In my opinion it was the trigger to investigate by CASA and we (RA-Aus) clearly did NOT have our house in order. The consequences are now obvious to all of us and we have seen all the 'fall guys' marched out the door except one who left of his own accord and who in my opinion has a lot to answer for.

 

But WE WILL GET THROUGH THIS and be a better organisation in the long run if we all have the right attitude.

 

 

[Guest ratchet]

I have to agree Volksy,The Ferris wheel incident was perceived as horrific in the public eyes and was nothing short of a miracle that no one was injured.

Of course the accident itself had nothing to do with airworthiness or not of the aircraft. In my opinion it was the trigger to investigate by CASA and we (RA-Aus) clearly did NOT have our house in order. The consequences are now obvious to all of us and we have seen all the 'fall guys' marched out the door except one who left of his own accord and who in my opinion has a lot to answer for.

 

But WE WILL GET THROUGH THIS and be a better organisation in the long run if we all have the right attitude.

Horrific maybe. A near miss yes. The word ultralight was smeared everywhere but what i saw and most

 

people saw was a slick REAL aircraft (as people say) pranged in the air.

 

The public are so dumb about flying that they see it in very simple terms. Anything with tube and wire is an

 

ultralight and is flown by a crazy. Slick, rounded things that look fast are little planes that are sexy but i still

 

wouldn't fly them. The words mean little. The picture is everything.

 

I doubt the population are up in arms about an ULTRALIGHT nearly killing them. I think they saw what

 

they think was another GA accident.

 

I am regularly approached by people who know i love aviation. They say "did you see that amazing plane

 

the other day?"

 

I say "what did it look like"

 

"Hard to say"

 

"Was it a jet or did it have propellors?"

 

"I couldn't tell"

 

"Did it have a T tail?

 

"Don't remember"

 

It was a C-17.

 

And so on.

 

My wife actually saw some cardboard cutouts of planes on the highway and thought they were real.

 

The public are very unsophisticated about aircraft and have as much interest in them as i have with

 

bow hunting. Bow hunters think otherwise and we think that the public care as much about aviation as we

 

do. They don't.

 

Pollies know this and if there was truly a backlash over the ferris wheel then the minister would be on the radio

 

looking for votes right now while it's still fresh. didn't happen.

 

The machinations with CASA on the incident may be a little animated but our failings are also their failings. It took 4 failed audits before they saw something wrong? Did someone change their fax number?

 

This is our time to be apologetic, contrite and play the bureaucratic game while holding up 10,000 votes

 

and a good safety record for inspection. The planes will fly, the people will fly them and they will vote

 

and any unjustified restriction will see me (jokingly) send an SOS to the UN for a team of human rights lawyers

 

to parachute in shouting "discrimination, bias, bureaucrat snout in trough, red tape and waste" etc.

 

It's not a time for panic.

 

 

[David Isaac]

..........It's not a time for panic.

I agree Ratchet ... it is all fixable.

 

 

[DWF]

In aviation it is never the time for PANIC!

 

What is needed is Preparation, Procedures, Practice and Proficiency.

 

DWF

 

 

[Gnarly Gnu]

Ratchet good points although I think you put too much emphasis on the politicians / ministers. The reality is these days the regulations that affect our daily lives are mostly coming from senior public servants and their bottom feeding lawyer buddies, the ministers are largely there to rubber stamp the paperwork & talk to their senator pals to get things through parliament. That is why changing the government doesn't really change the everyday rules that affect our daily lives all that much, the same back rooms boys carry on regardless of which government is in at the time. So in my opinion it's CASA who are going to be calling the shots here & they will do whatever they see as most politically expedient for them.

 

 

[Guest ratchet]

Ratchet good points although I think you put too much emphasis on the politicians / ministers. The reality is these days the regulations that affect our daily lives are mostly coming from senior public servants and their bottom feeding lawyer buddies, the ministers are largely there to rubber stamp the paperwork & talk to their senator pals to get things through parliament. That is why changing the government doesn't really change the everyday rules that affect our daily lives all that much, the same back rooms boys carry on regardless of which government is in at the time. So in my opinion it's CASA who are going to be calling the shots here & they will do whatever they see as most politically expedient for them.

We routinely make the mistake of thinking the public service is designed to serve the public. The first priority of

 

any pubic serpent is solely to protect the minister's butt. One is never rewarded for doing a good job (I mean how do you

 

tell...count committee meeting and memos?) but ALWAYS crucified if the minister is embarrassed or worse if he

 

lies in parliament.

 

We need to understand that ministers are only concerned with votes and while they may rely on the PS to

 

radar issues on the horizon, it is the minister who will make a political and economic decision rather than one based on

 

just the views of the PS. CASA may think that NPRM XYZ is better than sliced bread and needs legislating. The

 

minister will politicise what this will cost, who will win and who will lose- especially him/her.

 

The reason things don't change massively between governments is because the status quo is easy and if

 

you change it then you change the win/lose tradeoffs. And it won't happen if the minister loses anything at all.

 

If there was ever likely to be real fallout from the ferris wheel incident then it would have already happened

 

while the apparent horror was fresh and the voters were outraged. Didn't happen. Old news. History. Twitter

 

on people.

 

Ministers have more things to do than dig up old things the voters don't care about just so the PS can

 

sharpen knives and do some empire building.

 

Far easier to let things ride. Yes, the lawyers will be saying that legislating this and that would protect

 

the minister from the fallout of another serious incident. Possibly. But as a political animal he/she will

 

weigh up probabilities of a possible incident in the next 12 months versus a certain backlash from 10000

 

people or more. Restricting 5000 a/c is a lot of bad mojo for LAMEs, retailers and not just pilots. Some people use those a/c for mustering etc.

 

Politicians never think long term as the Murray Darling attests.

 

This is a hornet's nest that ministers will resolve administratively, positively with the minimum of

 

political fallout.

 

 

[Gnarly Gnu]

You reason in a rational world where ministers read and understand the legislation offered to them by the PS. I'm not sure that is the case currently...

 

 

[turboplanner]

A lot of whistling past the graveyard going on here.

 

I know what some of the politicians know, and it isn't limited to cardboard cutouts of aeroplanes, it involves the names of individuals, the makes and models of aircraft and the satisfactory level of legislation or otherwise.

 

If you fall for the popular image of politicians as portrayed by GG, take a few mintutes to go onto a Parliamentary Website (Federal or State) and look at the running schedule of their workload, and the massive variety of subjects they have to study and absorb.

 

Watching "Yes Minister" may be entertaining, but these guys are usually intelligent, observant, and pragmatic (which means that just because nothing has happened, or might happen next month, or even in the next year does not mean that these people are all sitting around taking bets on the size of women's knockers).

 

The message that I'm getting, and these people would be getting from these posts is that cowboy activity is the way to go.

 

 

[David Isaac]

.... The message that I'm getting, and these people would be getting from these posts is that cowboy activity is the way to go.

I certainly hope NOT Tubz, certainly not the message that I or any of my associates wish to convey, it is that element (the cowboy element) that will ultimately bring us all undone.

[Guest ratchet]

A lot of whistling past the graveyard going on here.I know what some of the politicians know, and it isn't limited to cardboard cutouts of aeroplanes, it involves the names of individuals, the makes and models of aircraft and the satisfactory level of legislation or otherwise.

If you fall for the popular image of politicians as portrayed by GG, take a few mintutes to go onto a Parliamentary Website (Federal or State) and look at the running schedule of their workload, and the massive variety of subjects they have to study and absorb.

 

Watching "Yes Minister" may be entertaining, but these guys are usually intelligent, observant, and pragmatic (which means that just because nothing has happened, or might happen next month, or even in the next year does not mean that these people are all sitting around taking bets on the size of women's knockers).

 

The message that I'm getting, and these people would be getting from these posts is that cowboy activity is the way to go.

I think these posts and the safety record of the movement is very far from cowboy activity. Recognising the way

 

that politics and the society works is not the same as endorsing cowboy activity. Nobody said that accidents

 

and incidents were acceptable, just inevitable given that the universe is real and lots of it we don't control-

 

even with legislation.

 

As for the assertion that the children we observe in parliament are intelligent- depends on the definition I guess.

 

If self interest, blind ego, narcissism and sociopathy are associated with intelligence then I suppose they are.

 

If stabbing your way to the front of pre-selection after 20 years is intelligence then i agree.

 

Otherwise I prefer to infer what i can from what i observe and all it says is that in the immortal words of Bob Hawke

 

"just get elected first" (as repeated by peter garrett years later).

 

So pollies know a lot of stuff because their webmaster puts lots on the site, they have busy schedules and apparently

 

are all guys?

 

I don't think it matters. In the end it's votes votes votes. Intelligence is not needed if promises and lies will

 

suffice.

 

Votes votes votes bought with money money money. Hospital beds, waiting lists, schools, mining tax, carbon tax, defence spending, asylum seekers, floods, fires, ultralight crashes.

 

Err who slipped the last one in?

 

CASA

 

What?

 

 

[68volksy]

Horrific maybe. A near miss yes. The word ultralight was smeared everywhere but what i saw and mostpeople saw was a slick REAL aircraft (as people say) pranged in the air.

The public are so dumb about flying that they see it in very simple terms. Anything with tube and wire is an

 

ultralight and is flown by a crazy. Slick, rounded things that look fast are little planes that are sexy but i still

 

wouldn't fly them. The words mean little. The picture is everything.

 

I doubt the population are up in arms about an ULTRALIGHT nearly killing them. I think they saw what

 

they think was another GA accident.

 

.

This would be precisely the main problem with the incident and why ATSB/CASA are so interested in it. If incidents such as these drag all aviation safety into question then these organisation are seen to be not doing their job and generally someone's head will roll. As you can imagine these organisations are chock full of people who have put a great deal of sweat into making sure it looks like they're doing their job. Cross them at your peril.

 

.

 

 

[Guest ratchet]

This would be precisely the main problem with the incident and why ATSB/CASA are so interested in it. If incidents such as these drag all aviation safety into question then these organisation are seen to be not doing their job and generally someone's head will roll. As you can imagine these organisations are chock full of people who have put a great deal of sweat into making sure it looks like they're doing their job. Cross them at your peril..

Trouble is a knock em down fight with RAA will only reveal to all that CASA HASN'T been doing its job as

 

revealed by 4 (count em) audit failures in which CASA had the opportunity to oversee the remediation of 3.

 

Seems to me they already haven't been doing their job and if I was CASA I would want a nice back room

 

negotiated deal rather than the details of these failures to act faxed through to every parliamentarian

 

and especially those in rural and marginal seats.

 

If CASA want a knife fight then they will inevitably get cut.

 

Gentlepersons ;ike my good self would be civil and work a way through this this bearing in mind that only a bit of carnival gear has been harmed and the innocent voting public is neither harmed nor gives a proverbial.

 

The ambitions and egos of bureaucrats are trampled by the importance of the voter fallout from a fight that doesn;t

 

need to happen and I bet never will.

 

At the least there would be parliamentary questions as to why Romania can have a well regulated sports

 

aviation industry and we can't. Class actions from 10,000 people (i'd contribute) asking why the US can

 

have safe aviation with activity 10 fold or more greater than ours in a jam packed continent and we can't

 

and the discrimination that affects us and not other sporting activities that neither harm the public

 

nor excessively harm ourselves.

 

Be strong young skywalker.

 

 

[farri]

Every time there`s an accident, fatal or otherwise, I try to learn as much as I can from it and I can`t recall a single accident ( unless I`m missing something ) in the last 12 months that would have been avoided by more regulations and paperwork. If I`m wrong, someone please correct me!

 

As I see it, everyone down the chain of command ( CASA and RAA ) is simply trying to make sure that it`s not their backside that will be grilled when someone hits a ferris wheel or leaves it too late in the afternoon to take off for home and doesn`t make it.

 

Frank.

 

 

[68volksy]

I'm not sure I agree that CASA would get cut in a knife fight. I think it'd be more along the lines of the RA-Aus butter-knife jugglers versus the Enloa Gay.

 

I think the public would be finally happy to see something getting done rather than getting uppity about being a bit too lenient in the past. Quite sure any politicians spin machine would handle that.

 

End of the day if I was CASA and had 9,000 whinging pilots constantly shaking their fists at me as though they really had any power i know the approach i'd be taking...

 

 

[Guest ratchet]

Every time there`s an accident, fatal or otherwise, I try to learn as much as I can from it and I can`t recall a single accident ( unless I`m missing something ) in the last 12 months that would have been avoided by more regulations and paperwork. If I`m wrong, someone please correct me!

 

As I see it, everyone down the chain of command ( CASA and RAA ) is simply trying to make sure that it`s not their backside that will be grilled when someone hits a ferris wheel or leaves it too late in the afternoon to take off for home and doesn`t make it.

 

Frank.

 

That's right Frank.

 

If someone(s) in CASA is in strife over the Ferris wheel then their priority is to make this all go away

 

as quickly and quietly as possible.

 

The only bum that can't be kicked is the minister's.

 

Hence i think CASA will not inflame this with over the top hysteria or draconian rules because

 

the blowback from RAA members will only identify the failure of CASA to respond to the previous

 

3 failed audits. Then those backsides will get an even greater kicking from the media.

 

However I doubt the public really cares and neither CASA nor the minister will win anything from

 

turning this into a public bun fight. Not in an election year especially.

 

Cool heads will prevail.

 

 

[David Isaac]

Interesting perspective Ratchet ... believable this election year.

 

 

[Guest ratchet]

I'm not sure I agree that CASA would get cut in a knife fight. I think it'd be more along the lines of the RA-Aus butter-knife jugglers versus the Enloa Gay.I think the public would be finally happy to see something getting done rather than getting uppity about being a bit too lenient in the past. Quite sure any politicians spin machine would handle that.

 

End of the day if I was CASA and had 9,000 whinging pilots constantly shaking their fists at me as though they really had any power i know the approach i'd be taking...

If that logic prevailed then there would have been no change in a/c performance or airspace privileges in the

 

last 20 years. CASA would have just said "stuff yez".

 

The fact that they allowed a rag tag bunch of rag tag fliers up the ladder and then a whole bunch of GA cheap

 

charlies swelled the ranks and got even more privileges says we have more power than you believe. They

 

could have always waved the safety flag to protect the public but that is ancient history. We've flown for

 

30 years and no-one can say we have affected the public beyond the 2 stroke noise.

 

Even with the threat of a collision with a 747 they could not stop us when the rest of the world is our bench mark and

 

now the threat of the 747 collision is no argument at all and other countries with greater issues successfully

 

run sport aviation.

 

Again i think the public you're seeing and the one I see are very different. I don't see a public that wants

 

anything done. Again, i think we think we are more important than we really are. Common mistake.

 

If you think 9000 pilots whinging at CASA is of no concern, just get them to fax the minister's office.

 

Bureaucrats and pollies respond to different things and in the end as i've said repeatedly it's votes and

 

not phone calls to bureaucrats that actually matter.

 

 

[68volksy]

It's funny that this has turned from a discussion on the safety aspects (or potential dangers) that could have arisen into a discussion purely based on politics. I think it's important to remember that it's purely the failures of RA-Aus that led to the ferris wheel accident - nothing at all to do with CASA. CASA walks away from this one as clean as a slate (as do any politicians) blaming the failures of RA-Aus. That in my mind is the case that seems to be building.

 

Regardless of the political machinations underway there are serious public safety issues that have been uncovered due to the accident. I include the everyday pilot as a member of the public as they're the ones getting the training and buying the aircraft who are then finding themselves so often in situations they cannot handle.

 

 

[David Isaac]

... I think it's important to remember that it's purely the failures of RA-Aus that led to the ferris wheel accident - nothing at all to do with CASA. CASA walks away from this one as clean as a slate (as do any politicians) blaming the failures of RA-Aus.....

Volksy, if I may respectfully correct you; the crash at Old Bar had nothing to do with RA Aus, it had everything to do with an obstruction in the splay of an ALA.

It had nothing to do with the airworthiness of the aircraft and everything to do with pilot skill and the obstruction.

 

If the Ferris Wheel had not been in the splay, the aircraft would have departed without incident (as ugly as the departure would have been) except to scare a few people from the low altitude as it departed (after all it is the splay of an active ALA).

 

It was the crash that led to the discovered issues within RA Aus.

 

 

[68volksy]

Agreed David - that was the point I was trying to make. (I don't believe that the issue was with the splay but that's another discussion!)

 

 

[dodo]

Agreed David - that was the point I was trying to make. (I don't believe that the issue was with the splay but that's another discussion!)

The ferris wheel was less than 40m off the runway centreline. No problem with the splay?

I am not necessarily blaming the splay, but that is not a good place to put a structure,

 

dodo

 

 

[kaz3g]

Agreed David - that was the point I was trying to make. (I don't believe that the issue was with the splay but that's another discussion!)

When all the dust settles, it is down to the pilot to decide if the ALA is suitable and he can safely use it.

 

kaz

 

 

[Guest ratchet]

It's funny that this has turned from a discussion on the safety aspecots (or potential dangers) that could have arisen into a discussion purely based on politics. I think it's important to remember that it's purely the failures of RA-Aus that led to the ferris wheel accident - nothing at all to do with CASA. CASA walks away from this one as clean as a slate (as do any politicians) blaming the failures of RA-Aus. That in my mind is the case that seems to be building.

 

Regardless of the political machinations underway there are serious public safety issues that have been uncovered due to the accident. I include the everyday pilot as a member of the public as they're the ones getting the training and buying the aircraft who are then finding themselves so often in situations they cannot handle.

Let me see if i understand your logic: the failure of RAA to keep forms well led to a current pilot in an airworthy registered aircraft to make a late decision on a go around- something that happens many days in many places- and just

 

happened to collide with a structure that would not be there if the hot dog stand had been moved 50 metres.

 

I really see a causal chain there. Actually, no-one does because it doesn;t exist.

 

The facts are that the accident and injury/fatality rate of RAA is unchanged over 20 years at least. A couple of

 

minor blips in some years but you would be hard pressed to even force it into statistical significance and

 

even if it was significant in the statistical sense, it will never be in the real sense of numbers dead- apologies

 

to all those families affected- since it would easily compare with rock fishing, motocross or others.

 

If our safety record was fine for all those years then logically it is now and a single incident partly blameable on

 

carnival workers, cannot change that --especially when no-one was harmed.

 

People here seem to want to turn this into a safety issue when it is no such thing when the evidence

 

is examined.

 

The failure to keep records well cannot be linked in any way to the crash into a structure that shouldn't

 

have even been there and an event that would have just been a flakey go round otherwise.

 

There is a huge amount of paranoia and poor logic in this. The reason it has devolved into a political discussion

 

is because it always was. Turning a single harmless event against 20 years of sound safety is not logic.

 

it's just politics in which we all know how to play the game. Agree to a deal or pull out your gun in which

 

case we all lose a bit.

 

Sensible people will see this for what it is unless this issue is being transformed by different political agendas

 

between personalities within RAA, old feuds and current ambitions.

 

If so that's a shame since it will only make a straightforward negotiation harder if internal politics

 

sabotages a united, reasoning and proactive negotiation with CASA.

 

 

[Guest ratchet]

When all the dust settles, it is down to the pilot to decide if the ALA is suitable and he can safely use itkaz

Or, maybe people setting up vertical structures in a flightpath could ask someone. Apparently councils have to

 

put fence warning signs up because gravity has been known to operate in the vicinity of cliffs. But sticking metal

 

up in a flightpath poses no danger to anyone.