Mike Borgelt

Yenn, clinically indicated would be you had a heart attack, stroke or other identified medical condition. I'll repeat - UNLESS CLINICALLY indicated there is no rule that over 60, PRIVATE pilots must have any extra tests. I've had 5 PPL Class 2 medicals since age 60 and no extra tests. So stop rabbiting on about the points system.

"The gut-feeling that society has that flying an aircraft is so stressful or demanding that people with underlying diseases will suddenly have medical incapacitations is actually not supported by any evidence." Not helped by Hollywood depictions of sweating pilots wrestling aircraft through the sky. The dirty little secret of aviation is that aircraft do a pretty good job of flying themselves most of the time and the decision cycle is measured in minutes much of the time, not in seconds or fractions thereof as in a motor vehicle. In a car you are risking yourself and your passengers as much as you are putting other road users at risk and there is a not inconsiderable risk to innocent bystanders such as pedestrians but society accepts this (while making rules to attempt to minimise the human cost) as it would be too inconvenient and expensive to do otherwise given the huge numbers of people involved. In aviation the risk to yourself and anyone silly enough to fly with you is much higher but the risk to innocent third parties is utterly miniscule. Unfortunately not very many people fly themselves (about 1 in 1000 Australians is a pilot in round numbers) and the activity is visible and not many people are inconvenienced when much stupid and ineffective regulation is imposed, so there is no effective political lobby against it.

Yes I agree it is poorly written, ya ain't gunna get Shakespear from people who work for CASA but GO TO THE NEXT PAGE.

You could even try reading the page properly. IF CLINICALLY INDICATED for private pilots.

fer chrisssakes, this was done to death a few months ago here. Go to the NEXT page of the DAME handbook. Some of you ought to be disqualified on the grounds of piss poor memory.

Yenn, why do you need extra tests because of your age. ? This was discussed here a few months ago. The over 60 stuff DOES NOT apply to private pilots unless clinically indicated.

Yep, sounds like your body had developed its own bypasses around the narrowings if you could do the work you did under those conditions. They will have gone away now and you got to take a big risk on the CABG. Fortunately, sounds like you got away with it. I know several people who have had CABGs. Some aren't at all the same people afterwards (effects of deep anaethesia for long time). Neil Armstrong (first human to walk on another world, then and forever) died of complications 6 weeks after his and my wife's eldest brother one year after his and he never made a real recovery.

"There's a good chance it is a Trojan horse and is there to make CASA look like they are doing something and stop the complaints while actually doing nothing". You've got it in one Jaba-who. This is still several levels of red tape and buggeration above the UK and USA. Typically Australian even though the extra trouble won't make the already very low medical causes accident rate any lower. I strongly suspect that if you pass the Basic you would be able to get a full Class 2 anyway without the stupid restrictions. Can someone explain how the type of propulsion has any bearing on the pilot's medical? We've all seen the small turboprops under development, right here on this site.

People, this is "reform" in name only. Nothing like the UK or US, some stupid restrictions such as piston engine only and not likely to get people into aviation or keep them. It's a dud. The RAMPC will likely be abolished and the Basic Class 2 replace it. ZERO change in medical standards really and I bet it will come with a list of conditions that require you to see a DAME anyway, just like the RAMPC. Looks at this point like the RPC is exempted but I wouldn't count on that forever as Carmody apparently has asked "how come RAAus pilots can fly without a aviation medical".

My wife (former RN) has been looking at all this CABG stuff, diet etc for the last few years. If you haven't had a CABG and are fit and active with no symptoms you may indeed have some narrowing but there are small vessels which develop around the narrowing. A week or so ago I saw a short film where they inject the dye and find the blockage all right but ignore the fact that dye immediately starts appearing the OTHER side of the blockage. The small vessels don't show up due to limitations of the imaging! The medical profession aren't as smart as they think and tell you. Here's a nice link on type 2 diabetes: Schwarzbein Principle - The Transition Program To Optimum Health You may like to look up Dr Malcolm Kendrick's blog too. Cynical Scots GP who likes doing science.

Blower, all you produce is high pressure hot air.

See here: CASA to introduce New Basic Class 2 Medical Standard - Australian Flying

Happens now and again. A guy I know did one over the middle of Perth in the mid 1970s in a Macchi. One of the engineering officers was in the back seat and they put him on TV where he managed to blame Air Traffic Control.

Thanks guys. Makes me kind of homesick for W.A.

Brings back memories. The "half acre" at Subiaco age 10 with my Sabre Trainer, the Causeway, Victoria Park on weekend afternoons.

Turbo, you clearly haven't ever been a GFA member. The last time someone went to the AGM of the GFA and tried to change things was about 25 years ago. He was a relatively new member IIRC and went along with a bunch of his mates. I don't know exactly what happened, they may have just been ruled out of order or simply intimidated to sit down and shut up. For their trouble they were then berated and belittled in print in the magazine the next month by the President for having the temerity to try to have their say at the AGM. If any body tries something similar they would usually have to give notice. This gives the Board time to get their mates along to the meeting so the upstarts can be voted down. See below 1. I do know that when the GFA was formed (personal communication with one of those at the formation) that the GFA was very worried that they could be infiltrated by people from the Regulator or from powered aviation who might want to change things so they very carefully structured the organisation to be completely resistant to any change not initiated by the management cronies. The organisation had its peak membership numbers in 1983-84 at around 4500 members, maybe a little more. It now has 2700 although the numbers may be exaggerated by different counting methods/membership classes, while the population of the country has gone up by over 50%. The number of active sailplanes is around 700 and this has not changed much in 30+ years. There is a "churn" of at least 600 members a year who never re-join. The GFA can't figure out why. The safety record is not wonderful. Gliders are flown on nice days so the continued VFR into IMC class of accident doesn't happen, most still don't have engines, so don't "run out of fuel" and generally operate over benign terrain away from crowded airspace. We just had 4 deaths in 3 accidents in a 20 day period. The setup is such that bullying, intimidation, abuse of power and extra- legal threats can be made against members and clubs, due to the GFA having the power to simply either throw you out of the organisation, remove a club's approval (yes the grip is that tight) or take away ratings and CASA not providing for a RPL or PPL with glider rating (Gliders are legally VH registered aircraft) because of regulatory capture of CASA by GFA over the years. See below 2. They have had "moles in the Kremlin" for decades. You then cannot fly and make beneficial use of your investment in a glider. Yes all this has happened. Private bodies should NEVER have such powers. There is such a concept as RULE OF LAW after all. I said earlier see below, so here it is: 1.I know of a gliding club where something similar happened. The cronies who ran the club had bought a couple of Chipmunks which were used as towplanes but did most of the maintenance themselves under supervision, hence there were many times no launching was available. Somehow the club found itself with some money and the cronies wanted to build a toilet block for the caravan park they were planning. A bunch of the newer members wanted a towplane that could be professionally maintained and available so they could fly. They called a special general meeting so the cronies dug up people who had not been seen for years who simply paid a current year membership, turned up at the SGM and narrowly rolled the new people who were then sent letters suspending their flying privileges. They were forced to leave and some joined other clubs. Unfortunately when it comes to GFA there are no alternatives. 2.There is in fact an Australian PPL (G) because otherwise Australian glider pilots cannot fly overseas in contests. Other countries aren't interested in rubbish pieces of paper issued by GFA, they want to see a government issued licence. Even if you are current in gliders and have a PPL you have to jump through a lot of hoops to get one. However when you get it it is NOT FOR USE INSIDE AUSTRALIA. I wonder if it is in fact meaningful overseas because a temporary foreign licence is usually issued on the basis of the qualification that lets you fly legally at home. This doesn't.

"If the SCC you are referring to is the "Standards Consultative Committee", it's being described as the "former Standards Consultative Committee", which I would take to be playing no part in current activities, other than its files being reference materials from past discussions." Correct. That meeting was the last of the SCC Sport aviation meetings and the subcommittee was disbanded right afterwards to be replaced by working groups. I was on it on behalf of the Australian EAA Chapter 1308 Inc. and the subcommittee had zero meetings in the last 18 months before the recent final one and there was no email discussion about the meeting beyond notification that it would happen. The meeting was on Tuesday 17th October and the agenda was sent out late on Friday 13th. I didn't attend as all but an hour and a half was scheduled to be a CASA "Dog and Pony show" (see definition on Wikipedia), not only subcommittee members were invited (an attendee list was not promulgated and the implications were as many as could fit could come) so it wasn't a real meeting just more CASA fake consultation in name only so I couldn't justify spending member funds on this. As Jim McDowall says not all the submissions to the Part 149 NPRM have been released and the document with CASA comments on a summary of responses was marked "Restricted". "Practically this would be the Officials, eg Presidents etc.of the Self-Administrating organisations, the organisations being: Australian Ballooning Federation (ABF) Australian Parachute Federation (APF) Australian Skydiving Association (ASA) Australian Sport Rotorcraft Association (ASRA) Australian Warbirds Association Limited (AWAL) Gliding Federation of Australia (GFA) Hang Gliding Federation of Australia (HGFA) Model Aircraft Association of Australia (MAAA) Recreational Aviation Australia (RA-Aus) Sport Aircraft Association of Australia (SAAA)" Yes these plus various others including some approved persons and a member of the Honorable Order of Air Pilots which appears to be a British organisation and the representative is a former CASA employee and GFA member. Just what he and that organisation have to do with this is beyond me. The Boards of these organisations see Part 149 as a way to cement their current powers and finances but aren't smart enough to realise it is a poisoned chalice which comes with onerous responsibilities and duties. These people aren't the only ones with a legitimate interest though. Any group which DOES NOT want to be a Part 149 org has a legitimate interest as do innocent third parties on the ground and all other airspace users. "Whether these organisations communicated and met with the members and with each other would be the first question I would ask." Ask the members? ROTFLMAO. What planet are you from? This is Australia. Only in the last couple of years has a GFA member been able to run for the Board without the written agreement of two existing Board members. It is a closed shop and with the organisation's control of information, NOBODY who isn't one of the "in" group will ever get a look in. One former GFA president was heard to say "we can't have real elections because the wrong people might get in". These people have the mindset of slaveowners. Nobody should be legally compelled to be a part of any organisation. Amongst other things it transgresses on your right to free association and is no different from "no ticket, no start" which I thought was gone in this country and organisations get lazy and detached from the interests of their members. Part 149 has various problems as does Part 132 for the Warbird people. What happens if nobody in that branch of aviation wants to be a Part 149 organisation? What happens if an existing Part 149 organisation can no longer continue to operate due to financial or any other reasons such as lack of people wanting to do the jobs? What happens when somebody invents some new form of sport aviation - take a look at all the jet packs, flying motorcycles, piloted quadcopters etc on Youtube? Being forced to be a member of a private body is equivalent to being forced to join the NRMA to own and drive a car and putting the NRMA in charge of licencing and rules enforcement. Or being forced to be a member of the Shell Oil Company Users Club to buy petrol with that company being the only one allowed. Safety is compromised by dividing branches of aviation from each other. It is all aviation and the lessons do in most cases carry over but the flow of information is inhibited. This Australian model is historically based on the GFA model. When the GFA was formed it was probably fair enough when you consider what was happening at the time in 1949. Roughly equivalent to what the first ultralight guys were doing at The Oaks etc during the mid 1970's (I have a nice video of Caversham WA - the latter part has the flying of the GCWA Slingsby T31b, in which I had my first glider flight at age 9). By the early 1970's with the advent of composite structures and relatively easy availability of new gliders, the numbers were growing quickly and gliders were routinely flying hundreds of kilometers cross country and interacting with other airspace users and in retrospect the old model should have been abandoned then. It never worked as well in Australia as the BGA (British Gliding Association) model, on which it was based, anyway. It may be helpful to ask, why is there even such a thing as a regulator recognising something called "Sport Aviation"? It is all private general aviation. WHY you fly has nothing to do with safety outcomes. Looking at all the paperwork requirements in both RAAus and GFA nowadays can anyone legitimately say it is an improvement on GA run by CASA? GFA has mindlessly mirrored CASA maintenance (yes the flawed and widely hated in the industry system), RAAus anf GFA are busy creating more maintenance hurdles and in both organisations the accident rate is nothing short of terrible, mostly from operational causes, not maintenance. Operational causes usually boils down to plane stupidity (dog fighting at low level, low flying and hitting powerlines, buzzing the strip etc or simply inability to do the right thing due to poor instruction. Not surprising as the total hours required for beginning instructional training in GFA is 80 hours. You can be a level One with 100 hours. This is ludicrous and from my conversations with my customers I know that the theoretical knowledge imparted by the GFA instructional system is close to zero. In aviation what you don't know CAN and WILL hurt you. The American FAA system seems far preferable. All aviation except for FAR 103 ultralights (which aren't considered US aircraft by the FAA) is under the direct responsibility of the FAA. The various bodies such as the SSA (Soaring Society of America) and EAA have no legal powers. They advise, educate and promote. As recognised legitimate parts of aviation, safety information flows easily in all directions and there is no compulsion to join anything. People join because they feel their membership is something valuable which lets market forces act to improve the organisation.

"level of recognition and uniformity to the sport and recreational aviation sector by formalising a close and collaborative regulatory relationship between CASA and peak organisations." Read CASA takeover of the private organisations who are meant to represent the interests of their members and capture of the regulator by the larger organisations. The whole basis that this setup gives "the same or better safety results and CASA's direct oversight of GA" is a pack of lies and is based on wilful ignorance of the real safety statistics and bogus data.

There is a helicopter school at Toowoomba that trains you but then won't private hire to you. My suggestion is that if you want to be in recreational/private/gliding figure out how you are going to own your own aircraft before starting. It's tough but that's the way it is and being away to take the aircraft away for as long as you please is heaps of fun particularly if you can share it with your partner.

The late Maurie Bradney of Waikerie gliding fame used to reckon every 3 seconds to look at the ASI in circuit. Seems about right. There is interest in the USA in flying the 180 degree circuit from downwind to final. A FAA/University of North Dakota project and the latest EAA Sport Aviation has an interesting article about actual measurements of bank angle G load airspeed during the square circuit and the 180 degree circuit. I've been trying the 180 degree circuit and it seems much easier. No large bank angles, seems very sedate. Aim is to prevent the turning base/final stall spins.Military uses it.

I know the original MicroAir designer demonstrated such a system to CASA in Canberra 20 years ago. They thought it was wonderful until they realised it wasn't an international standard and promptly lost interest. It really would have been the best and by far the cheapest. Flarm would never have got off the ground.

The proper response is "CLEAR PROP".

Blower clearly has a totally unwarranted belief in the effectiveness of authority and should seek professional help for his nasty authoritarian tendencies. What he is proposing results in people being unable to fly because somebody in a private body decides they don't like that person for some reason without the person being convicted of anything in a proper court of law. This should be anathema to people in a liberal democracy, which Australia claims to be. As M61A1 says he knows of people who don't glide because of the way the GFA makes rules which give people far less freedom than is available to a RPL or PPL holder. So do I. Their rules also clearly don't work as the accident rate is horrendous and far worse than officially stated as the GFA annual hours flown has been overstated for decades. Blower wants these sort of people in charge of your operation complete with reams of paperwork and mini Hitlers doing "enforcement". This IS currently the GFA. Will anybody be still interested in the activity then ? An organisation that isn't even honest with itself cannot possibly improve safety. The public service is bad enough, private bodies with State power are worse. Lots of detailed rules can simply be used against the organisation or individuals when something does go wrong as when you have enough of them people need to work around them to get anything done. Requiring compulsory membership of organisations like GFA and RAAus is the same as requiring membership of the NRMA in order to own a car and drive it, get a licence (lessons and tests done by NRMA allowed people), be allowed to do any work on the car and NRMA enforcing and collecting fines for traffic infringements and being able to take away your licence if you voice your displeasure with the system. I know of a couple of people who were threatened with being thrown out of RAAus and one out of the GFA for political statements. All of sport aviation in Australia except for SAAA , up to now is based on the GFA as a model. CASA thinks the GFA does a good job (they certainly have done a good job of placing people inside CASA who push the GFA line) because they uncritically accept that GFA does a good, safe job. With Part 149 they are going to cement in place a State organised compulsion which is designed to benefit the people running these private bodies, however poorly they manage it. Instead we could have a simple extension to current pilot licencing and maintenance in the regulations. An RPL as a start similar to RAAus certificate for under 600Kg with suitable endorsement for over 600Kg aircraft (which may require different medical standard but should not in light of recent changes in the USA and UK), endorsements for different categories of sport aircraft (gliders, rotorcraft etc), controlled airspace endorsement available, PPL as now. Maintenance by a simple short course. USA has 16 hours instruction for LSA to maintain the aircraft. This should be enough for our simple aircraft, gliders etc. Airworthiness certification - anything certified by an ICAO complying country will be acceptable of course but amateur built aircraft aren't required to comply with any standard (nobody designs one without looking at a known standard for loads etc though) and don't seem to be terrible after the initial test flight hours are flown but you aren't allowed to contract someone to build you one, although you can buy a used one from somebody who did it for the first time (I know, I own one of those). Frankly this is ridiculous and the South African authorities have seen the light in this regard. We should do the same and just let manufacturers publish what the designed the aircraft to and the details and results of testing they do and leave it up to the consumer to decide. The popularity of homebuilts in the USA with builder assist and a great deal of the work already done shows that formal certification doesn't feature big in a lot of people's minds. There should also be a relatively simple procedure to get modifications to factory built sporting aircraft approved. The sport aviation bodies can then properly represent their members, lobby politically for minimum sensible regulation, promote their activities and educate in safe operation. Under Part 149 CASA can simply require some new rule or regulation of the organisation and threaten to take away their Part 149 approval if the organisation objects. Total capture. A way to take away beneficial use of your property without due process. Lastly, we have the technology to have a just about a 100% total surveillance society. Does anyone REALLY want this? i.e. your car/aircraft has mobile phone chip reporting your identity, GPS location and speed to a central computer at all times (yeah just like ADSB). Camera facing driver with face recognition software. George Orwell wrote 1984 as a warning, let's not use it as a how to manual.

If they are smart they will sell it as a homebuilt Experimental kit for the USA market. Now the US has the new relaxed Class 3 medical for private, nobody will bother with the stupid restrictions of LSA.

Reading this thread makes you realise what a shambles Australian aviation regulation is at the low end. turbo:"that's true, but add an effective compliance and enforcement operation, and you'll see a big reduction." What utter drivel. Give us a break, mate. Do you work for CASA? Or some other part of the public service?