SGM

Our insurance is currently via Geoff Tonkin at https://insurancehouse.com.au/. It is 50% QBE and 50% Agile and is deliberately designed to "top-up" the RAAus insurance... specifically it has this clause "RECREATIONAL AIRCRAFT AUSTRALIA LIABILITY ENDORSEMENT It is hereby noted and agreed that coverage under Sections 2 and 3 of this Policy shall come into effect only after insurance available to You because of Your membership of Recreational Aviation Australia Inc. has been exhausted." In our case the RAAus sub-limit of $250k for passengers was what we primarily wanted to increase. Our view was that in the event of ongoing rehab required for a passenger, $250k would not last long. There are a few others clarification etc in the top up document, like removing the pro-rata clause (which would mean the replacement of any avionics etc only calculated on estimated remaining service life) and coverage for forced landing transport costs. I'll attach that full document here. Note 1: Previously we had dealt with Sonya at Bill Owen Insurance (now trading as https://www.aviatorrisk.com.au/) - They also offered excellent advice and customer service, but at the last requote was just a bit more expensive. I would speak to both. Note 2: This year our premium did not go up - much to my surprise. RA Aus Additional Benefits endorsement (latest).pdf

UPDATE : On Friday I received a call from NSW Fair Trading which is the lead agency in this prosecution. They can't say too much, but the main "players" should enjoy this Christmas on the "outside"! If you have any evidence, knowledge or tip-offs, PM me and I will give you the details of the lead investigator.

OK update on my initial post. I completed the BFR yesterday (and it is called BFR on my RAAus app at least) with Adam from Kyneton, Victoria (YKTN). Thanks for the tip off @pmccarthy We did all the usual, stalls, Practice Forced Landing, and navigated to an impromptu and unfamiliar airfield (Maryborough YMBU) which was 37 NM away. I keyed it into my panel-mounted Garmin 296, iPad and bugged the heading. As luck would have it I lost GPS signal about 15 NM before Maryborough but with the iPad, heading and trusty paper map meant there was no issue. Eventually, GPS came back 5 minutes later. I got to ask Adam a few questions about flying that I hadn't fully resolved in my own mind (exact ruling on the distance flying before a flightplan is required), got some advice about choosing runways where there is nil wind and cross runways, and a few other comments. The entire process took 1.5 hours and I felt the money was well spent on relevant content. Adam is a super nice guy and an experienced CFI. Highly recommend him for your next BFR in Victoria. He flys Friday - Sunday's. If you need his mobile number PM me.

My Biennial Flight Review (RAAus Pilot) is approaching. When I checked two years ago with RAAus, the cross-country endorsement is not actually a separate BFR retest requirement... however, the flight instructor I chose last time decided to make it so. So I ended up navigating without GPS for a few hours just to demonstrate I could still do it. Whilst it's probably a good relearning exercise, I have 2 separate GPS on the panel and two further (Ipad, Iphone) in the aircraft, so perhaps the E6B/map/watch approach was not the best use of either my time or my money. Two questions to the forum a. Have you been required to do cross-country navs on a BFR? b. Can you recommend a good RAAus CFI in the Melbourne area who is "pragmatic"?

Is it an official position that ATSB doesn't examine accidents of RAAus aircraft? Does anyone have that in writing? With many factory-built aircraft now RAAus registered and many flight schools in RAAus, there seems to be as much to learn going forward from any RAAus aircraft accidents, as there would be from accidents on (rare) experimental class VH-registered aircraft.

Hard to believe that an 800kg aircraft of this size could stall at 27kts... looks like this was questioned 14 years ago too...

I'm planning (another) trip flying Melbourne to Gold Coast. It works out at about 440 minutes (7 hours 20 minutes) of flight time, no autopilot. I've done before (once up, once back), but as a comparatively low-time pilot I have previously had a passenger and overnight stop halfway. This time I am solo and I am interested to know whether others have done... (trying poll feature)

I think your main options would be Lilydale ($110/month on tiedown, ~$550/month hangar but may not be available), Coldstream (soon to be redeveloped?), or maybe Mansfield (Walsh's).

Maybe don't buy an Angel Flights lottery ticket... that reminds me I wonder how the co-promoters Royce Crown and Margorie Pagani are going.

I have a stupid question... are their generic 912ULS engine mounts? or does each airframe manufacturer have their own?

Hi Friends I watched this https://iview.abc.net.au/video/RF2327V010S00 the other day and noticed (at 2:30) the Cesssna Caravan VH-MFD - which is presumably the most practical way around this part of Australia Has anyone from this forum flown their aircraft into these areas? Any advice on planning etc appreciated.

As an FYI the NOTAM is live for the above drone service : C1115/24 REVIEW C969/24 UA OPS (FIXED-WING BLW 7KG) WILL TAKE PLACE WI 4NM OF PSN 374845.70S 1451346.40E BRG 032 MAG 11.5NM FM MOORABBIN AD (YMMB) OPR CTC 'WING AVIATION PTY LTD' TEL: 1800 022 350 SFC TO 400FT AGL FROM 06 260637 TO 08 310830 TUE-SUN 2230-0830

I had this flyer delivered to my physical letterbox this week. I couldn't help myself and had to ask them some questions ; ) Here are the answers Availability: The "Drone" option in the doordash app is not presently there (I checked)..response is "We are looking to launch in the coming weeks and will formally announce via our website". Weather : "Our drones are capable of safely delivering a package in a strong breeze and even rain. We've done extensive rain testing from winter test flights north of Helsinki, as well as in Alaska, to the summer heat of Texas to evaluate our fleet's ability to operate in such conditions". [Might be interesting to order sushi in 40 knot storm] Range : seems to be about 8km from their shopping centre base (based up a series of addresses the helpful rep looked up for me). I was hoping they would share a national rollout and coverage plan with me - but no luck. Payload: "Each drone can deliver a package weighing a maximum of 1.1kg, however if you decide to place a large order, multiple drones will deliver your goods one after the other" Discount: "As a small token of our thanks for your patience and feedback, please enjoy promo code EASTLANDRN10 for $10 off your first drone order" CASA info here: https://www.casa.gov.au/drones/industry-initiatives/drone-delivery-services#Approveddeliverylocations

My apologies, in the list above I omitted another director of the YourJetLife company that scammed us all.. Shane Woods, a helicopter pilot from Ormeau QLD with MECIR and CPL, He is in "Sales" at Monarc Global https://www.f6s.com/member/shanewoods#about the Royce Crown aviation company. He promotes the first draw https://www.facebook.com/watch/?ref=search&v=743927207518083 He hosts the "draw" https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?extid=CL-UNK-UNK-UNK-AN_GK0T-GK1C&mibextid=Nif5oz&ref=watch_permalink&v=225545423639721 he promotes the second helicopter lottery (long rambling podcast) https://verticalhelicasts.com/helipodcast/episode-38-shane-woods-australian-border-patrol-pilot-on-how-to-win-a-helicopter/ He has now deleted his Linkedin profile

Here is our friend Marjorie Pagani personally promoting the subsequent lotteries that police believe never even took place... if you are like me you got bombarded with subsequent lotteries. https://www.facebook.com/100088660381449/videos/296561926291261

it just keeps getting weirder...

So the materials by AngelFlight clearly show it was a "joint effort by Monarc Global and Angel Flight" (refer below) Based on public, self-disclosed information, I am recording for posterity the names of the Board members of both of these organisations: Monarc Global https://monarcglobal.com/ Royce Crown - CEO of both Monarc Global and YourJetLife (and the guy fleeing from journalists and under investigation by NSW Police) Monica Zagrodny - Co-Founder of Monarc Global , currently National Product & Supply Leader - Corporate Traveller at Flight Centre Travel Group Alister D. Punton - Advisory Board Member, CEO of Storylines Inc Jonathan Lerner - Advisory Board Member, Directory of Envy Group Benjamin J. Bickford - CEO & Founder BIONIC Corporation Angel Flight https://www.angelflight.org.au/ Margorie Pagani - CEO, Executive Director and Company Secretary Howard Hobbs - Chairman, Director Note : Angel Flight has $11.8m of assets so they are not going broke anytime soon.

As a volunteer for Angel Flight, I wrote to the Angel Flight CEO, as there has been zero correspondence on this to us. A pretty disappointing and blame-shifting reply is below.

ATSB vid released today

Juan Brown (Blancolirio channel)

Very sad. Some context: https://www.anyfoolcanfly.com/

This years insurance renewal bake-off: For our RAAus Evektor Sportar with $60k Hull, $1m additional extra liability for PAX (after the RAAus $250k), $1000 Excess, in Victoria. Last year = $1826* (*we elected to go with a $2500 excess last year) This year via "Bill Owen" (Agile) and the super helpful Sonya Smith = $2350 This year via "Insurance House" (Agile+QBE) and the super helpful Geoff Tonkin = $2193 AvCover: didn't quote as being RAAus they said the price would be the same as "Bill Owen" Conclusion: roughly 20% increase on last year, with about 7% difference between the main RAAus options.

Jabriu J160 per RAAus https://members.raa.asn.au/safety/accident-and-defect-summaries/

On our insurance, we had to nominate the pilot's name, and was slightly more expensive if they have less than 100 hours time... so not that practical to add/subtract renters/borrowers. BTW - I was able to add my daughter to the policy for her ab-initio training, but the insurer had to look at the flying school's track record when calculating the extra premium.

Update: I reached out to Kerry for some mountain flying training on my forthcoming NZ trip.. "Early August 2022 we had severe winds which caused the hangar to collapse destroying the aircraft inside it. The hangar has not been re-built and I am hiring a Maule aircraft, which is based in Alexandra" So it's great she is still in business, albeit with less availability. The website is parked, but her email is relatively easy to find online (if you can't find it - message me).