Ben Longden

Thanks. Bit of a Nikon freak (well, 25 years as a pro news snapper...) the cammy was the humble basic Nikon D70 mated with a Nikon 80-200 f2.8 with a Nikon TC-17. I was deadset slack and used the predictive AF (which was reeeeally useful in the low level 500 knot passes) Then made dial up friendly when processed in Photoshop 7. Ben

Here are a few pics of mine from the Airshow.. Ben

Agreed. With safety there should be no compromise. There is no grey area, its either safe or unsafe. That is one of the things hammered home to me by the team at Air Shepp. Ben

Melb Age March 23, 2007 Indonesia is giving six commercial airlines three months to improve safety standards or face closure, the country's aviation chief has said. The audit was ordered by the government to evaluate transport safety following a string of deadly air accidents in recent months. First an Adam Air jet carrying carrying 102 people disappeared in January, and on March 7 a Garuda plane overshot the runway and burst into flames, killing 21 people, including five Australians. An audit of 54 aviation firms revealed that none of them made it to the first of three rating classes, said Budhi Muliawan Suyitno, the director general of civil aviation at the transport ministry. Fifteen companies, including six scheduled passenger airlines, were placed in the lowest category and were considered to have met only minimal standards of safety. National carrier Garuda Indonesia made the second grade. Suyitno said airlines in the third category would be given warnings to improve standards in three months. "If there's no improvement within three months, there will be a suspension order, and if there's still no improvement they will be shut down," he told reporters. The airlines given three months to shape up were AdamAir, Kartika Airlines, Jatayu, Batavia, Trans Wisata Air and Dirgantara. Air travel in Indonesia, a sprawling country of more than 17,000 islands, has grown substantially since the liberalisation of the airline industry in 1999, which triggered price wars among airlines. The rapid growth raised questions over whether safety has been compromised and aviation infrastructure and personnel can cope with the huge increase. Indonesia is also grappling with problems in other modes of transportation. There have been two serious ferry disasters in recent months killing hundreds of people, while rail accidents on an ageing system built during the Dutch colonial era occur frequently. Reuters

My ex instructor now teaches chinese pilots, and he says the scariest thing are when he asks "did you hear that traffic?" and they say no. Then he asks if they saw the traffic.. and they say no. I was run over in the circuit a while ago, and its not much fun when the rear window is full of a 172 and you can see the pilot is looking inside the cockpit and disregarding you and any radio calls you make to him. Ben

Ever since I was a toddler. Dad was with 37sqn RAF as a wireless operator, air gunner, nav and bomb aimer in the Wellingtons. He was also an instructor as well. He could also relieve the pilot and fly straight and level and often did on the way home. He was one of those guys who used to visit Germany but only at night...:) My Uncle was a Sqn leader in the RAF and did the same as dad, but in Sunderlands and Liberators, even flying for the spook 101Sqn at one stage. After the war, he flew nuke bombers and ended up being their chief test pilot on the Victors, and won an AFC for his work in perfecting mid air refuelling techniques. His son in law is a Captain with 10 Sqn RAF at Brize Norton, and flys VC10s with what he calls "self loading cargo"... read troop ships. I always wanted to fly, and dad encouraged me, but at that time if you wore glasses you were grounded. That nearly did it for me, until about five years ago when I realised it was no problem.. just rotten timing (wife ran off with another bloke). April 2006, I rang Air Shepparton and spoke to Tristo and went in the next day and did my TIF. Its the best thing I have ever done for myself. Ben

Looks great... Ben

Agreed, but there are cultural differences as well, where many indonesian pilots have a problem with being trained, listening and accepting others advice. Sorry, but this comes from a guy who trains these guys. His advice is not to fly with them - he wont. On the lighter side, I wonder if there will be any voice recordings like "Boss, why are we landing at takeoff speed?" Ben

The good guys and gals at CASA have a math equation for this; VMC into IMC = CD Where VMC is visual Met conditions, into a flight that is instrument rated equals certain death. Or As a training vid they have for VMC / VFR pilots without any instrument training who decide to fly into cloud, you have "178 seconds to live". One accident site they investigated and did during a CASA training seminar at Shepparton was a flight such as this, that ended up with the aircraft decending, inverted at 4000 feet per minute, from an altitude of 2000ft. The blunt message was if you ever contemplate IMC conditions, then make sure you are instrument rated. Ben

Nooooo.... it can't be! The tail fin hasn't been sprayed black, and you can still read the rego..... ;) Seems like its a "loss of face" amongst peers to do a go around in Indonesia. Ben

This was the first one... and from what I hear, its the first of many.. ;) Bloody brilliant idea really. Ben

Speed caused Garuda crash Article from: </IMG> Wing flaps failed to function Plane travelling at 'crazy' speed Black-box recorder fixed THE Garuda Indonesia aircraft crash that killed 21 people, including five Australians, was caused by the passenger jet attempting to land at a higher than normal speed. The Boeing 737-400 was carrying 140 people when it overshot the runway at Yogyakarta on March 7. The chief crash investigator, Mardjono Siswosuwarno, said the aircraft's wing flaps failed to extend for landing and that might have been caused by the high speed. "This could be a contributing factor, but what is more important is that the plane's speed was higher than normal. Why? We don't know yet," said Siswosuwarno, from the National Transport Safety Commission. Survivors of the crash have described how the aircraft approached the runway at a "crazy" speed. Siswosuwarno said experts in the US had fixed the cockpit voice recorder after it was badly burnt when the plane burst into flames. Investigators can download the last 30 minutes of the crew's conversations, he said. Police have questioned the pilots and cabin crew. Public pressure for better safety in Indonesia's skies is building following a string of recent air accidents, including a sea crash that left 102 dead, and two crash landings. The country's new air transport chief, Budhi Muliawan Suyitno, will next week announce a list of domestic airlines that have failed safety standards and will be given three months to comply or cease operations. "We aim to secure zero-accident status within the next few years, something that has been achieved by the aviation industries of other countries," he told The Jakarta Post. "They operate the same type of planes, sometimes of the same age. If they can, why can't we?" Vice-President Jusuf Kalla said airlines would be warned, suspended or shut down if the audit found they had violated safety regulations. The Media Indonesia newspaper quoted a Transport Ministry source as saying that the Government planned to revoke the operation licence on 11 airlines that had been inactive for months. Reuters, AFP in The Australian

Its a day you will NEVER forget. When I did mine, Shepp Aero living treasure Frank P said he still remembers his first solo.. Ben

Brilliant article... Ben

ONLY five? Gee Mike, youre letting the side down! ;) I spoke to Celia for a while and she was utterly convinced you were going to take every aircraft on or near the flight line for a test flight!! I had a great flight in the Pioneer 300 - hundred horse Rotax and cruising at 130 knots.. simply beautiful machine..... *dribble.... uncontrollable drooling* It was great to catch up with you again, meet Celia and hope to see you both at Avalon. Ben

I've always wanted to know this... How do deaf people have phone sex? Ben

Hey, dont keep us waiting now you've already told us a bit about flying there.... its gonna be murder waiting to read the story!! ;) Ben

And what a worthy winner as well. That pic is simply bloody brilliant! Ben

Aint THAT the truth.... :big_grin: A couple of years ago, I used to be a friend of a Caltex rep. I asked him why the average price of petrol in Echuca was 10c a litre higher than Shepparton (supermarket discounts not included) and an average of 15c/l higher than Bendigo. He didnt answer. Then I asked him how come the prices in Echuca were within 1cent of each operator, and how come the prices changed in town at the same time. He didnt answer. Then I said to him to do the maths.. If he was serious about getting people to do their shopping in town, then the prices were interesting. it was actually worthwhile taking a trip to Shepp or Bendigo to do the weekly grocery shop AND buy fuel at the same time. He has'nt spoken to me since. :;)3: Ben

Hats off to the guys and gals at RAA... I got home today and in the mailbox was my Pilot certificate, only days after passing the exams... Gee, no mucking around with the paperwork at all!! ;) Ben

March 13, 2007 - 2:32PM The Age An All Nippon Airways passenger plane with 60 people aboard made a successful emergency landing today after circling an airport in western Japan for nearly two hours when its front landing gear failed to descend. No one was injured when the Bombardier DHC-8 turboprop made a controlled landing on its rear wheels and then carefully touched its nose to the runway. Sparks shot from the bottom of the white and blue fuselage as the plane skidded to a halt, but the pilot kept it on the tarmac. Public broadcaster NHK showed rescue trucks spraying the plane with fire retardant chemicals and relieved passengers deboarding. Transportation Ministry spokesman Tetsu Shimizu said there were no injuries. The plane was carrying 56 passengers and four crew members and was scheduled to land at Kochi airport in western Japan shortly before 9am, the airline said. It circled for nearly two hours as it tried to extend its front wheels and negotiate an emergency landing. The cause of the failure was not immediately known, ANA spokesman Daisuke Kato said. The Transportation Ministry planned to launch an investigation, Shimizu said. In February 2006, another Canadian-made Bombardier plane operated by ANA experienced landing gear problems. That pilot aborted an initial landing attempt after all three sets of wheels failed to deploy. The landing gear were later deployed manually, and none of the 25 passengers and crew was injured. Later that month, two ANA-operated Bombardier airliners made emergency landings at Osaka airport shortly after taking off. One had problems with its heating system, while a warning lamp in the other signalled something was wrong with one of its doors. No one was injured. The plane today had made an earlier approach to the runway but pulled up. It was unclear whether the pilot was practising a touchdown or trying to use up fuel to reduce the risk of fire in the event of a crash landing. The plane had left Osaka airport earlier in the morning. The worst single airplane disaster in history occurred in Japan in 1985, when a Japan Airlines Boeing jumbo jet crashed into a remote mountain, killing 520 of the 524 people aboard. The jet was en route from Tokyo to Osaka when it lost control of its vertical tail section. AP More info; http://www.theage.com.au/news/travel/plane-lands-without-wheel/2007/03/13/1173722438782.html

Hi Bob, Just adding to Mikes' welcome... the crew at Air Shepp and at Gawnes are nothing short of bloody brilliant, and the club is well known for its friendliness. Dont forget the Saturday lunches! Ben

And its a long weekend.... no matter how hard the ACCC accuse the oil companies of collusion and deliberately ripping us off, they always get away with it... B'STARDS! Ben

:confused: A bit strong.... perhaps..... What I would like to know was why did the 02 fail on the crew? In the King Air's the mask is right over their outboard shoulder. Ben

I love it! Ive just finished watching an old safety training vid entitled "17 ways to fall out of the sky"... The use of humour goes a long way in cementing training and safety awareness. Some examples I use and freely thank the guys and gal from CASA who orgainised the Shepparton conference late last year are; VMC/IMC=CD Where VMC into Instrument conditions equals Certain Death. for fuel management, various ones on fuel contamination... such as the fuel tanks became contaminated with 100% air, Fuel/air mix to full air and the like. But my favourite; For 30% of the population who suffer a heart attack, the first symptom is sudden death. Ben