[Peetwo]

Germanwings knock on effect - Part II

Here we go another sad, tragic story of a pilot suicide that the MMSM (Murdoch Mainstream Media) have jumped on in a typically sick attempt to connect the dots to the remote possibility of another Germanwings 30,000 ft death plunge:

Suicidal pilot was cleared for duty by Qantas one month before he crashed plane into ocean off northern NSW

March 25, 2016 1:00am

Exclusive Jack Houghton The Courier-Mail


Paul Whyte.


QANTAS cleared international pilot Paul Whyte to fly one month before police believe he deliberately crashed his light aircraft into the ocean off northern NSW.

The Lennox Head man passed a mental health check in February even though he had been struggling to deal with a marriage breakdown for nearly a year.

Qantas confirmed the father-of-two had flown Boeing 747 aircraft with a capacity of 467 passengers on the Brisbane to Los Angeles route as a first officer in the weeks before his death on Monday.

Qantas pilot Paul Whyte was struggling to deal with his marriage breakup when he hired a light aircraft in Lismore and crashed it into the sea near Byron Bay after sending a farewell message to his daughters. Source: Facebook

The Australian and International Pilots Association has repeatedly declined to comment saying ‘we are not obligated’ to speak about the incident, despite Mr Whyte officially representing the union at Civil Aviation Safety Authority meetings in recent years.

Revelations Mr Whyte was cleared for duty have raised questions from mental health experts about the quality and frequency of checks.

Griffith University psychiatrist Harry McConnell said mental health checks could not pick up sudden changes in stability and called for pilots to more readily report warning signs of their peers to managers.

“Even if he had a mental health screening, it would only have been valid at the time,” he said.


“Even if he wasn’t suicidal a month ago, obviously there was something that happened in the interim that has changed his way of thinking and his mental state.

“These peer programs like they have in North America are good for that and lets mates to look out for mates.

Paul Whyte.

“It would allow airlines to keep track of mental health on a more immediate level.”

A Qantas spokesman said all pilots had annual health checks which involved “a number of physical and psychological tests”.

The tests rely heavily on pilots themselves reporting any “significant” change in their health to obtain a medical certificate.

“Pilots who have a history of psychosis, alcoholism, drug dependence, personality disorder, mental abnormality or neurosis are disqualified from holding a Class 1 medical certificate — therefore cannot be a commercial airline pilot,” he said.

“As per CASA regulations, all Qantas pilots undergo annual medical evaluations in order to maintain their flying licence.

A Qantas spokesman said all pilots had annual health checks which involved “a number of physical and psychological tests”.

“This includes a number of physical and psychological tests conducted by a designated aviation medical doctor in a process overseen by CASA.

“Paul passed his annual medical check in February this year. He also passed his proficiency check in November 2015, which includes simulator testing.”

The spokesman added: “There are a number of failsafes from a safety of flight perspective, including the ‘two in the cockpit’ rule that was introduced last year.
“On most international flights there are generally four pilots on board each flight.”

Qantas Chief Pilot Captain Richard Tobiano told the Gold Coast Bulletin the tragedy was “very upsetting” for Mr Whyte’s “family, friends and colleagues”.

“It is with great sadness that I confirm that an off-duty Qantas pilot was flying a light aircraft which went missing off the northern coast of New South Wales on Monday evening,” he said.

“As you can imagine this is a very upsetting time for his family, friends and colleagues, and we’re providing them with as much support as we can.
“I ask you to respect their privacy at this time.

On Monday the father of two rented a Cessna 172 from the Northern Rivers Aero Club in Lismore, sent a final text message to his family and crashed the plane six nautical miles offshore from Byron Bay. Qantas has confirmed he was in cleared for active duty on the day he died.

Meanwhile, in a parallel aviation v MSM world, Clive Irving (via the Daily Beast) made this excellent contribution to the conversation on the knock on effect & the lessons to be learnt from the horrific Germanwings tragedy... :

Andreas Lubitz and the Global Pilot Scam Threatening Your Safety


Airlines in Europe push young pilots to the edge in a desperate struggle to live with huge debts as they fly without any job security. It’s enough to drive some mad, like the Germanwings flier who murdered 149 passengers.

Looming behind the actions of Andreas Lubitz, who deliberately flew himself and 149 others into a French mountainside a year ago this week, is an increasing body of evidence that something is seriously wrong with how young pilots are trained, recruited, and treated by many of Europe’s budget airlines.

Last week’s report by French investigators into the crash focused on Lubitz’s record of psychiatric problems and the failure of his family, colleagues, and the airline, Germanwings, to detect what some of his doctors already knew: He should not have been flying and, indeed, should have been hospitalized.

But the report gave brief attention to work pressures that probably contributed to his increasingly desperate state of mind—pressures that are felt by thousands of pilots as a result of how a number of airlines now treat them as a cost to be ruthlessly controlled and exploited rather than an indispensable asset central to the safety of flying.

It is now clear that, in addition to Lubitz’s medical problems, nobody detected or caught the part played by what the French investigators called the “socio-economic” pressures on his deeply troubled state of mind.

The investigators point out in their conclusions: “One of the explanations lays in the financial consequences he would have faced in the case of loss of license. His limited Loss of License insurance could not cover his loss of income resulting from unfitness to fly.”

And the European Cockpit Association, representing 38,000 European pilots, applauded the French report for recognizing the link between “employees’ socio-economic risks” and aviation safety and said that it needed to be “more in the focus of the aviation industry and European institutions.”

Indeed, in Europe nearly half of the pilots between the ages of 20 and 30 are flying without the security of being directly employed by an airline. Thousands of young pilots like Lubtiz often face a long chain of debt and financial stress.

Lufthansa, the parent company of Germanwings, charges students it selects for training a fee of 60,000 euros out of a total cost for training of 150,000 euros—Lubitz had taken out a loan of 41,000 euros to pay for his training.



Ina Fassbender/Reuters


But the costs of satisfying the ambition to become a pilot can be a lot higher than those faced by Lubitz.

The Irish budget carrier Ryanair, for example, unlike Lufthansa, pays nothing toward the costs of qualifying as a pilot, which can be as high as 130,000 euros before even getting into a Ryanair cockpit. All this occurs at an age when mortgages and new families frequently add to the obligations. Lubitz reportedly planned to marry his girlfriend.

At the core of this widely practiced regime are “bogus” employment contracts—a term used to describe how young pilots are hired through an agency, not the airline, as though they are self-employed contractors, thereby stripping them of normal professional employment security and benefits.

This practice (for various reasons not possible for airline pilots in the U.S.) is part of profound changes that are putting new stresses on pilots in Europe, including one that was cited in the French report on Lubitz: the high costs to students of learning to fly and the debts that they incur, often lasting for years.

“There are plenty of people ready to lend you the money to become a pilot, certainly in Europe, even though the job market is quite precarious in your first few years of flying,” Capt. Martin Chalk, the president of the International Federation of Airline Pilots’ Associations, IFALPA, told The Daily Beast. “I am aware of more than one airline where their recruiting and training programs are profitable to the airline. They don’t care if the pilot fails because they have made their profit from them anyway.”

The full extent of the stressful conditions facing pilots became clear only after work by researchers at Ghent University in Holland. In 2014, at the request of the European Commission, they set out to survey airline employment practices across Europe. More than 6,600 pilots, out of a total of around 65,000 in Europe, responded to the researchers, an unusually high response rate for a survey.

Much of what the pilots said was alarming and the researchers quickly realized that they were looking at an unsuspected level of concern among pilots about not just the experiences of their workplace but the implications of these experiences for airline safety.
“Originally, the surveying was not done to unearth safety-related issues,” a veteran pilot told The Daily Beast. “It was done to identify employment-related issues. But the safety implications became an emergent outcome that wasn’t expected. But it wasn’t necessary to do that study to find that causal link. It was self-evident to people like me.”

The Ghent University researchers realized that what was happening as a result of the competition among pilots for jobs was similar to what had happened in the international shipping industry, where lax labor laws had been exploited to drive down costs and strip crews of job security—what the researchers called “a race to the bottom.” This should, they said, “raise an intense sense of urgency with regard to flight safety…we call upon all stakeholders to act on this clear warning. In the civil aviation industry it’s minutes past midnight.”

One of many pilots quoted by the researchers repeated that warning.

“The race to the bottom needs to be regulated by the European Union before passengers get killed. People are committing suicide because of this outrageous way they are being treated.”

Another said, “This industry is a disgrace. European employment law and working regulations do not seem to apply to the aviation industry, and those that are certainly not enforced.”

In answer to questions from The Daily Beast, the International Air Transport Association, IATA, said, “Issues concerning employment contracts are the prerogative of individual airlines. We are confident in the present system of pilot training and safety, however we believe that further standardization of activities and the creation of a performance oversight environment may help to drive further improvements.”

The IATA spokesman said he was not familiar with the Ghent University report and did not respond to the specific question of whether IATA had studied it. IATA’s principal role is lobbying governments and regulators on behalf of the airlines, not advocacy on behalf of either airline employees or the public.

IFALPA, on the other hand, represents more than 100,000 pilots employed in nearly 100 countries. Capt. Chalk, whose day job is as a senior captain on a major international airline based in Europe, says, “Stresses have been created that weren’t there before. We need to ensure that a highly competitive marketplace doesn’t have collateral damage. We shouldn’t be allowing airlines to erode safety margins, working pilots beyond sensible fatigue or stress limits.

“Even when people are taken on it will be on a piecemeal basis where, from month to month, they get whatever work their employer gives them. They often have high loan costs to pay, and all that bundles up into a very low standard of living for a period that may appear to be unending. It is a question with Andreas Lubitz, he was 27 years old and had only been flying for Germanwings for 18 months. He doesn’t appear to have had any other form of career.”

Capt. Chalk wanted to make it clear to me that he wasn’t including all airlines or even all budget airlines in his warnings.

“Some airlines are better than others, and the answer is not to pick on budget airlines but, rather, to ensure that regulators are insisting on minimal levels of safety that are prescribed at a global level.”

However, in the responses to the Dutch researchers, among the European budget carriers one stood out as the most egregious. They wrote: “The conditions at Ryanair are observed to be an area of concern… the position of pilots is becoming increasingly more precarious.”

Ryanair, based in Ireland, dwarfs all other European airlines. From January to November last year it carried 99.9 million passengers, and is planning to carry as many as 180 million by 2024. (In 2015 the total number of passengers carried by all U.S. airlines was 798 million.) In the six months ending Sept. 30, 2015, it had record earnings of 1.09 billion euros and expects its year-end profits to be up by at least 35 percent on the previous year.

Although Ryanair originally followed the business model pioneered by Southwest Airlines in the U.S., using only one type of airplane, the Boeing 737, and turning flights around much faster on each stop to get the most efficient use of equipment, the company’s notoriously hard-charging boss, Michael O’Leary, has since developed his own business model that screws down far harder on his airline’s costs; Ryanair’s unit labor cost is 6 euros per seat-mile, compared with Southwest’s equivalent of 35 euros.

Capt. Chalk’s problem with the Ryanair model is that it “moves risks from the employer to the employee.” And as a consequence, he says: “If you take away employment security from safety-sensitive staff you cause them to be much more careful about raising issues that they feel the employer doesn’t want to hear.”

One clear effect of this tension is that because pilots responding to the Ghent University survey were assured anonymity the number of Ryanair pilots who seized the opportunity to speak out was unusually high, 650 out of a total of around 3,000. (In contrast, out of 3,662 British Airways pilots only 73 responded.)

Of the total number of Ryanair pilots (the actual number can fluctuate between 3,000 and around 3,400) around 1,400 are captains and 1,700 are first officers. Between 85 and 90 percent of the captains are on permanent employee contracts, whereas as many as 80 to 90 percent of the first officers are on the self-employed contracts—the so-called bogus or agency contracts—where the pilot is acting, in effect, as a one-man company hiring out his services.

As the veteran pilot (who requested anonymity) points out, that’s a situation in which the majority of captains have job security and most of the first officers do not.

“Anybody who thinks there is no difference in the way those two groups respond to safety issues is living in Alice in Wonderland.”

Experienced captains get the better deal, he says, because “they are a core group and are much more difficult to replace.” On the other hand, “a first officer on an agency contract doesn’t get paid if he doesn’t fly.”

The airline’s pilots have frequently complained about how the company assigns home bases to its crews—these are the cities throughout Europe where crews are based according to the routes they fly. Generally senior captains can choose the cities closest to where they live, but first officers have complained of arbitrary assignments at short notice.

For example, last month the Ryanair Pilot Group that represents more than half of the airline’s pilots, complained that pilots at two German bases, Frankfurt-Hahn and Bremen, had been told that because fewer flights were being operated from these cities in the summer they would have to move to other cities. The pilots, said the Group, had been given just eight days to respond with their preferences without any indication that they would be met.

Ryanair pilots replying to the Ghent University survey also cited lack of sick leave as a source of undue pressure.

As one Ryanair pilot told The Daily Beast: “The typical pattern is that a pilot who has had more than five sick days in a year will get a notification on a Thursday or Friday to go to a meeting either in Stansted [near London] or Dublin the following Monday or Tuesday. In that time they have no possibility of getting professional advice over the weekend, and they won’t be told any specific details of what the meeting will focus on. It will be pointed out to them that it’s not really acceptable to be sick for more than five or six days in a year.”

Every six months all Ryanair pilots, captains and first officers, are required to have what is called recurrent training, where they are checked for their flying proficiency in a flight simulator. For every hour a Ryanair pilot flies passengers, 4.2 euros are deducted from his pay to cover the costs of this training.

However, despite what many pilots see as an unusually relentless pressure applied to the human costs of operating at Ryanair the airline has a virtually flawless record—not one fatal accident in 30 years of rapid expansion.

As Capt. Chalk noted: “Ryanair, along with all the other low-cost airlines, are very vocal that they do not compromise on safety. In large part, that is true. They often have young fleets of airplanes. I have no evidence that they cut corners with engineering, or that they don’t fulfill all the training criteria.”

It is also important to acknowledge that regimes like those at Ryanair and other low-cost carriers are, of course, part of the bargain that has been struck between us, the passengers, and an airline industry that has delivered a level of value and convenience that only a few decades ago would have seemed unattainable, and in doing so they ended a system of cartels that had kept fares beyond the reach of many.

This year nearly half the world’s population, 3.5 billion people, will be flying on scheduled air routes throughout the globe. And the safety record has never been better: In 2015 there were only three fatal accidents worldwide. That included the Germanwings mass murder-suicide and the Russian Metrojet crash in the Sinai that has been attributed to terrorism.

Those numbers translate into one death for every 40 million passengers.

How has this been achieved? Two things have happened simultaneously and coincided in their effects: radical new business models that make flying accessible to many more millions of people, and a technological leap in the safety-critical elements of commercial aviation. So staggering is this advance that if the ratio of fatal accidents to the number of flights remained where it was in 1962 we would be seeing a serious air crash every other day instead of barely any in a whole year.

In this transformation the pilots haven’t got smarter, the airplanes have, as well as all the navigation aids that support them. One by one the original main causes of crashes have been virtually eliminated: engine failure, metal fatigue and structural failure, weather, human error. (Last week’s crash of a FlyDubai Boeing 737 in Russia seems to have demonstrated that weather, if it combines with a chain of other factors, can still be lethal if due caution is not exercised by pilots and air traffic controllers. Fly Dubai has a budget-airline business model and the BBC is reporting that the pilot involved in the crash was about to quit because of fatigue problems—and that another pilot had fallen asleep at the controls from exhaustion.)

In an analysis made by Boeing, the three threads that characterize airline disasters—the overall accident rate, the fatal accident rate, and the total loss of an airplane—have all fallen steadily over the decades to a point where they very nearly merge at zero.
But pilots will always remain at the core of safety, the last resort in an emergency. And the demand for them will increase. Boeing has predicted that by 2034 as many as 558,000 pilots will be needed worldwide.

At the moment in Europe, though, there is a surplus of qualified pilots. (There is a shortage of pilots in the Middle East and China, and in North America the pool of pilots will soon be inadequate to meet growing demand.)

Cockpit automation has meant that the new generation of pilots has never had the “seat of the pants” instincts wired into them that older generations brought to the job. Nonetheless recent experiences (notably the crash of AirAsia Flight 8501 in December 2014) have shown that, more than ever, pilots need to keep sharp reflexes and well-trained responses for those moments when a human needs to intervene if the technology fails.

For that reason it would be dangerously complacent to see safety solely in terms of what shows up in accident statistics.

In the culture of budget airlines, for example, there could be, Capt. Chalk warns, “a growing risk that the management hasn’t yet become aware of, and may not be aware of until it manifests.”

And the veteran pilot adds: “If the criterion is simply, ‘Did we kill people?’ then safety isn’t a problem. But safety is not an absolute, it’s a spectrum of possibilities. The real question is not how many events you have had, but how many times did you come close?”
Of course, given all the pressures and personal hardships described here that are faced by aspiring airline pilots in Europe, the question is: Why do young people, as they clearly do, continue to enlist for pilot training? One pilot quoted in the Ghent University report said, “The flight schools are selling a dream to 18-year-old kids.”

And Captain Chalk agrees: “There is still an allure to flying, people will bend over backwards to get into the job.”

But then he cautions: “In this profession it’s not until your mid-thirties that you are getting to a point where most people would anticipate being in their mid-twenties. Income stability available to most professionals in their mid-twenties, certainly by the end of their twenties, is pushed back here a number of years beyond. It’s something that the Germanwings report didn’t address.

“When I began my career somebody paid for my training and I signed a commitment to work for them for a period of time, and so long as I worked for that period of time the training cost was absorbed by the company. They sank a significant investment in me and they wanted to see a return.

“But the path I took to get my job is no longer available. It doesn’t exist any more. It is a very difficult prospect now. I’m not sure I would encourage my children to take up flying.”

   
Like chalk & cheese the quality & journalistic integrity of those two articles, choc frog to Clive...  


MTF..P2  

[Peetwo]

Germanwings knock on effect - Part II

Here we go another sad, tragic story of a pilot suicide that the MMSM (Murdoch Mainstream Media) have jumped on in a typically sick attempt to connect the dots to the remote possibility of another Germanwings 30,000 ft death plunge:

Suicidal pilot was cleared for duty by Qantas one month before he crashed plane into ocean off northern NSW

March 25, 2016 1:00am

Exclusive Jack Houghton The Courier-Mail


Paul Whyte.


QANTAS cleared international pilot Paul Whyte to fly one month before police believe he deliberately crashed his light aircraft into the ocean off northern NSW.

The Lennox Head man passed a mental health check in February even though he had been struggling to deal with a marriage breakdown for nearly a year.

Qantas confirmed the father-of-two had flown Boeing 747 aircraft with a capacity of 467 passengers on the Brisbane to Los Angeles route as a first officer in the weeks before his death on Monday.

Qantas pilot Paul Whyte was struggling to deal with his marriage breakup when he hired a light aircraft in Lismore and crashed it into the sea near Byron Bay after sending a farewell message to his daughters. Source: Facebook

The Australian and International Pilots Association has repeatedly declined to comment saying ‘we are not obligated’ to speak about the incident, despite Mr Whyte officially representing the union at Civil Aviation Safety Authority meetings in recent years.

Revelations Mr Whyte was cleared for duty have raised questions from mental health experts about the quality and frequency of checks.

Griffith University psychiatrist Harry McConnell said mental health checks could not pick up sudden changes in stability and called for pilots to more readily report warning signs of their peers to managers.

“Even if he had a mental health screening, it would only have been valid at the time,” he said.


“Even if he wasn’t suicidal a month ago, obviously there was something that happened in the interim that has changed his way of thinking and his mental state.

“These peer programs like they have in North America are good for that and lets mates to look out for mates.

Paul Whyte.

“It would allow airlines to keep track of mental health on a more immediate level.”

A Qantas spokesman said all pilots had annual health checks which involved “a number of physical and psychological tests”.

The tests rely heavily on pilots themselves reporting any “significant” change in their health to obtain a medical certificate.

“Pilots who have a history of psychosis, alcoholism, drug dependence, personality disorder, mental abnormality or neurosis are disqualified from holding a Class 1 medical certificate — therefore cannot be a commercial airline pilot,” he said.

“As per CASA regulations, all Qantas pilots undergo annual medical evaluations in order to maintain their flying licence.

A Qantas spokesman said all pilots had annual health checks which involved “a number of physical and psychological tests”.

“This includes a number of physical and psychological tests conducted by a designated aviation medical doctor in a process overseen by CASA.

“Paul passed his annual medical check in February this year. He also passed his proficiency check in November 2015, which includes simulator testing.”

The spokesman added: “There are a number of failsafes from a safety of flight perspective, including the ‘two in the cockpit’ rule that was introduced last year.
“On most international flights there are generally four pilots on board each flight.”

Qantas Chief Pilot Captain Richard Tobiano told the Gold Coast Bulletin the tragedy was “very upsetting” for Mr Whyte’s “family, friends and colleagues”.

“It is with great sadness that I confirm that an off-duty Qantas pilot was flying a light aircraft which went missing off the northern coast of New South Wales on Monday evening,” he said.

“As you can imagine this is a very upsetting time for his family, friends and colleagues, and we’re providing them with as much support as we can.
“I ask you to respect their privacy at this time.

On Monday the father of two rented a Cessna 172 from the Northern Rivers Aero Club in Lismore, sent a final text message to his family and crashed the plane six nautical miles offshore from Byron Bay. Qantas has confirmed he was in cleared for active duty on the day he died.

Meanwhile, in a parallel aviation v MSM world, Clive Irving (via the Daily Beast) made this excellent contribution to the conversation on the knock on effect & the lessons to be learnt from the horrific Germanwings tragedy... :

RYANAIR'S CABIN CREW RECRUITMENT FOR TERMINATION SCAM INVOLVING RYANAIR-CREWLINK IRELAND-DALMAC-WORKFORCE INTERNATIONAL - DALMAC RECRUITMENT & AVIATION-CABIN CREW EUROPE.


Ryanairdontcarecrew
 

25 Mar 2016
 
ANDREAS LUBITZ AND GLOBAL PILOT SCAM THREATENING PASSENGER SAFETY.RYANAIR BEING THE BEST AT IT....

Andreas Lubitz And The Global Pilot Scam Threatening Your Safety with Ryanair being no1
 [i][b]A brilliant article here from Clive Irving from the daily beast regarding pilots that all passengers must read then decide which airline you fly with.[/b][/i]
Airlines in Europe push young pilots to the edge in a desperate struggle to live with huge debts as they fly without any job security. It’s enough to drive some mad, like the Germanwings flier who murdered 149

Andreas Lubitz and the Global Pilot Scam Threatening Your Safety


Airlines in Europe push young pilots to the edge in a desperate struggle to live with huge debts as they fly without any job security. It’s enough to drive some mad, like the Germanwings flier who murdered 149 passengers.

Looming behind the actions of Andreas Lubitz, who deliberately flew himself and 149 others into a French mountainside a year ago this week, is an increasing body of evidence that something is seriously wrong with how young pilots are trained, recruited, and treated by many of Europe’s budget airlines.

Last week’s report by French investigators into the crash focused on Lubitz’s record of psychiatric problems and the failure of his family, colleagues, and the airline, Germanwings, to detect what some of his doctors already knew: He should not have been flying and, indeed, should have been hospitalized.

But the report gave brief attention to work pressures that probably contributed to his increasingly desperate state of mind—pressures that are felt by thousands of pilots as a result of how a number of airlines now treat them as a cost to be ruthlessly controlled and exploited rather than an indispensable asset central to the safety of flying.

It is now clear that, in addition to Lubitz’s medical problems, nobody detected or caught the part played by what the French investigators called the “socio-economic” pressures on his deeply troubled state of mind.

The investigators point out in their conclusions: “One of the explanations lays in the financial consequences he would have faced in the case of loss of license. His limited Loss of License insurance could not cover his loss of income resulting from unfitness to fly.”

And the European Cockpit Association, representing 38,000 European pilots, applauded the French report for recognizing the link between “employees’ socio-economic risks” and aviation safety and said that it needed to be “more in the focus of the aviation industry and European institutions.”

Indeed, in Europe nearly half of the pilots between the ages of 20 and 30 are flying without the security of being directly employed by an airline. Thousands of young pilots like Lubtiz often face a long chain of debt and financial stress.

Lufthansa, the parent company of Germanwings, charges students it selects for training a fee of 60,000 euros out of a total cost for training of 150,000 euros—Lubitz had taken out a loan of 41,000 euros to pay for his training.



Ina Fassbender/Reuters


But the costs of satisfying the ambition to become a pilot can be a lot higher than those faced by Lubitz.

The Irish budget carrier Ryanair, for example, unlike Lufthansa, pays nothing toward the costs of qualifying as a pilot, which can be as high as 130,000 euros before even getting into a Ryanair cockpit. All this occurs at an age when mortgages and new families frequently add to the obligations. Lubitz reportedly planned to marry his girlfriend.

At the core of this widely practiced regime are “bogus” employment contracts—a term used to describe how young pilots are hired through an agency, not the airline, as though they are self-employed contractors, thereby stripping them of normal professional employment security and benefits.

This practice (for various reasons not possible for airline pilots in the U.S.) is part of profound changes that are putting new stresses on pilots in Europe, including one that was cited in the French report on Lubitz: the high costs to students of learning to fly and the debts that they incur, often lasting for years.

“There are plenty of people ready to lend you the money to become a pilot, certainly in Europe, even though the job market is quite precarious in your first few years of flying,” Capt. Martin Chalk, the president of the International Federation of Airline Pilots’ Associations, IFALPA, told The Daily Beast. “I am aware of more than one airline where their recruiting and training programs are profitable to the airline. They don’t care if the pilot fails because they have made their profit from them anyway.”

The full extent of the stressful conditions facing pilots became clear only after work by researchers at Ghent University in Holland. In 2014, at the request of the European Commission, they set out to survey airline employment practices across Europe. More than 6,600 pilots, out of a total of around 65,000 in Europe, responded to the researchers, an unusually high response rate for a survey.

Much of what the pilots said was alarming and the researchers quickly realized that they were looking at an unsuspected level of concern among pilots about not just the experiences of their workplace but the implications of these experiences for airline safety.
“Originally, the surveying was not done to unearth safety-related issues,” a veteran pilot told The Daily Beast. “It was done to identify employment-related issues. But the safety implications became an emergent outcome that wasn’t expected. But it wasn’t necessary to do that study to find that causal link. It was self-evident to people like me.”

The Ghent University researchers realized that what was happening as a result of the competition among pilots for jobs was similar to what had happened in the international shipping industry, where lax labor laws had been exploited to drive down costs and strip crews of job security—what the researchers called “a race to the bottom.” This should, they said, “raise an intense sense of urgency with regard to flight safety…we call upon all stakeholders to act on this clear warning. In the civil aviation industry it’s minutes past midnight.”

One of many pilots quoted by the researchers repeated that warning.

“The race to the bottom needs to be regulated by the European Union before passengers get killed. People are committing suicide because of this outrageous way they are being treated.”

Another said, “This industry is a disgrace. European employment law and working regulations do not seem to apply to the aviation industry, and those that are certainly not enforced.”

In answer to questions from The Daily Beast, the International Air Transport Association, IATA, said, “Issues concerning employment contracts are the prerogative of individual airlines. We are confident in the present system of pilot training and safety, however we believe that further standardization of activities and the creation of a performance oversight environment may help to drive further improvements.”

The IATA spokesman said he was not familiar with the Ghent University report and did not respond to the specific question of whether IATA had studied it. IATA’s principal role is lobbying governments and regulators on behalf of the airlines, not advocacy on behalf of either airline employees or the public.

IFALPA, on the other hand, represents more than 100,000 pilots employed in nearly 100 countries. Capt. Chalk, whose day job is as a senior captain on a major international airline based in Europe, says, “Stresses have been created that weren’t there before. We need to ensure that a highly competitive marketplace doesn’t have collateral damage. We shouldn’t be allowing airlines to erode safety margins, working pilots beyond sensible fatigue or stress limits.

“Even when people are taken on it will be on a piecemeal basis where, from month to month, they get whatever work their employer gives them. They often have high loan costs to pay, and all that bundles up into a very low standard of living for a period that may appear to be unending. It is a question with Andreas Lubitz, he was 27 years old and had only been flying for Germanwings for 18 months. He doesn’t appear to have had any other form of career.”

Capt. Chalk wanted to make it clear to me that he wasn’t including all airlines or even all budget airlines in his warnings.

“Some airlines are better than others, and the answer is not to pick on budget airlines but, rather, to ensure that regulators are insisting on minimal levels of safety that are prescribed at a global level.”

However, in the responses to the Dutch researchers, among the European budget carriers one stood out as the most egregious. They wrote: “The conditions at Ryanair are observed to be an area of concern… the position of pilots is becoming increasingly more precarious.”

Ryanair, based in Ireland, dwarfs all other European airlines. From January to November last year it carried 99.9 million passengers, and is planning to carry as many as 180 million by 2024. (In 2015 the total number of passengers carried by all U.S. airlines was 798 million.) In the six months ending Sept. 30, 2015, it had record earnings of 1.09 billion euros and expects its year-end profits to be up by at least 35 percent on the previous year.

Although Ryanair originally followed the business model pioneered by Southwest Airlines in the U.S., using only one type of airplane, the Boeing 737, and turning flights around much faster on each stop to get the most efficient use of equipment, the company’s notoriously hard-charging boss, Michael O’Leary, has since developed his own business model that screws down far harder on his airline’s costs; Ryanair’s unit labor cost is 6 euros per seat-mile, compared with Southwest’s equivalent of 35 euros.

Capt. Chalk’s problem with the Ryanair model is that it “moves risks from the employer to the employee.” And as a consequence, he says: “If you take away employment security from safety-sensitive staff you cause them to be much more careful about raising issues that they feel the employer doesn’t want to hear.”

One clear effect of this tension is that because pilots responding to the Ghent University survey were assured anonymity the number of Ryanair pilots who seized the opportunity to speak out was unusually high, 650 out of a total of around 3,000. (In contrast, out of 3,662 British Airways pilots only 73 responded.)

Of the total number of Ryanair pilots (the actual number can fluctuate between 3,000 and around 3,400) around 1,400 are captains and 1,700 are first officers. Between 85 and 90 percent of the captains are on permanent employee contracts, whereas as many as 80 to 90 percent of the first officers are on the self-employed contracts—the so-called bogus or agency contracts—where the pilot is acting, in effect, as a one-man company hiring out his services.

As the veteran pilot (who requested anonymity) points out, that’s a situation in which the majority of captains have job security and most of the first officers do not.

“Anybody who thinks there is no difference in the way those two groups respond to safety issues is living in Alice in Wonderland.”

Experienced captains get the better deal, he says, because “they are a core group and are much more difficult to replace.” On the other hand, “a first officer on an agency contract doesn’t get paid if he doesn’t fly.”

The airline’s pilots have frequently complained about how the company assigns home bases to its crews—these are the cities throughout Europe where crews are based according to the routes they fly. Generally senior captains can choose the cities closest to where they live, but first officers have complained of arbitrary assignments at short notice.

For example, last month the Ryanair Pilot Group that represents more than half of the airline’s pilots, complained that pilots at two German bases, Frankfurt-Hahn and Bremen, had been told that because fewer flights were being operated from these cities in the summer they would have to move to other cities. The pilots, said the Group, had been given just eight days to respond with their preferences without any indication that they would be met.

Ryanair pilots replying to the Ghent University survey also cited lack of sick leave as a source of undue pressure.

As one Ryanair pilot told The Daily Beast: “The typical pattern is that a pilot who has had more than five sick days in a year will get a notification on a Thursday or Friday to go to a meeting either in Stansted [near London] or Dublin the following Monday or Tuesday. In that time they have no possibility of getting professional advice over the weekend, and they won’t be told any specific details of what the meeting will focus on. It will be pointed out to them that it’s not really acceptable to be sick for more than five or six days in a year.”

Every six months all Ryanair pilots, captains and first officers, are required to have what is called recurrent training, where they are checked for their flying proficiency in a flight simulator. For every hour a Ryanair pilot flies passengers, 4.2 euros are deducted from his pay to cover the costs of this training.

However, despite what many pilots see as an unusually relentless pressure applied to the human costs of operating at Ryanair the airline has a virtually flawless record—not one fatal accident in 30 years of rapid expansion.

As Capt. Chalk noted: “Ryanair, along with all the other low-cost airlines, are very vocal that they do not compromise on safety. In large part, that is true. They often have young fleets of airplanes. I have no evidence that they cut corners with engineering, or that they don’t fulfill all the training criteria.”

It is also important to acknowledge that regimes like those at Ryanair and other low-cost carriers are, of course, part of the bargain that has been struck between us, the passengers, and an airline industry that has delivered a level of value and convenience that only a few decades ago would have seemed unattainable, and in doing so they ended a system of cartels that had kept fares beyond the reach of many.

This year nearly half the world’s population, 3.5 billion people, will be flying on scheduled air routes throughout the globe. And the safety record has never been better: In 2015 there were only three fatal accidents worldwide. That included the Germanwings mass murder-suicide and the Russian Metrojet crash in the Sinai that has been attributed to terrorism.

Those numbers translate into one death for every 40 million passengers.

How has this been achieved? Two things have happened simultaneously and coincided in their effects: radical new business models that make flying accessible to many more millions of people, and a technological leap in the safety-critical elements of commercial aviation. So staggering is this advance that if the ratio of fatal accidents to the number of flights remained where it was in 1962 we would be seeing a serious air crash every other day instead of barely any in a whole year.

In this transformation the pilots haven’t got smarter, the airplanes have, as well as all the navigation aids that support them. One by one the original main causes of crashes have been virtually eliminated: engine failure, metal fatigue and structural failure, weather, human error. (Last week’s crash of a FlyDubai Boeing 737 in Russia seems to have demonstrated that weather, if it combines with a chain of other factors, can still be lethal if due caution is not exercised by pilots and air traffic controllers. Fly Dubai has a budget-airline business model and the BBC is reporting that the pilot involved in the crash was about to quit because of fatigue problems—and that another pilot had fallen asleep at the controls from exhaustion.)

In an analysis made by Boeing, the three threads that characterize airline disasters—the overall accident rate, the fatal accident rate, and the total loss of an airplane—have all fallen steadily over the decades to a point where they very nearly merge at zero.
But pilots will always remain at the core of safety, the last resort in an emergency. And the demand for them will increase. Boeing has predicted that by 2034 as many as 558,000 pilots will be needed worldwide.

At the moment in Europe, though, there is a surplus of qualified pilots. (There is a shortage of pilots in the Middle East and China, and in North America the pool of pilots will soon be inadequate to meet growing demand.)

Cockpit automation has meant that the new generation of pilots has never had the “seat of the pants” instincts wired into them that older generations brought to the job. Nonetheless recent experiences (notably the crash of AirAsia Flight 8501 in December 2014) have shown that, more than ever, pilots need to keep sharp reflexes and well-trained responses for those moments when a human needs to intervene if the technology fails.

For that reason it would be dangerously complacent to see safety solely in terms of what shows up in accident statistics.

In the culture of budget airlines, for example, there could be, Capt. Chalk warns, “a growing risk that the management hasn’t yet become aware of, and may not be aware of until it manifests.”

And the veteran pilot adds: “If the criterion is simply, ‘Did we kill people?’ then safety isn’t a problem. But safety is not an absolute, it’s a spectrum of possibilities. The real question is not how many events you have had, but how many times did you come close?”
Of course, given all the pressures and personal hardships described here that are faced by aspiring airline pilots in Europe, the question is: Why do young people, as they clearly do, continue to enlist for pilot training? One pilot quoted in the Ghent University report said, “The flight schools are selling a dream to 18-year-old kids.”

And Captain Chalk agrees: “There is still an allure to flying, people will bend over backwards to get into the job.”

But then he cautions: “In this profession it’s not until your mid-thirties that you are getting to a point where most people would anticipate being in their mid-twenties. Income stability available to most professionals in their mid-twenties, certainly by the end of their twenties, is pushed back here a number of years beyond. It’s something that the Germanwings report didn’t address.

“When I began my career somebody paid for my training and I signed a commitment to work for them for a period of time, and so long as I worked for that period of time the training cost was absorbed by the company. They sank a significant investment in me and they wanted to see a return.

“But the path I took to get my job is no longer available. It doesn’t exist any more. It is a very difficult prospect now. I’m not sure I would encourage my children to take up flying.”

   
Like chalk & cheese the quality & journalistic integrity of those two articles, choc frog to Clive...   

Update today in the Weekend Oz:

Suspected suicide of a ­Qantas pilot: Screening ‘relies on honesty’

• Simon King
  
• The Australian
  
• March 26, 2016 12:00AM
  

Senior reporter
Sydney

The circumstances ­surrounding first officer Paul Whyte’s actions on Monday are unknown.

The suspected suicide of a ­Qantas pilot who flew a private plane into the ocean at 200km/h has sparked debate about airline screening processes, with a leading depression expert saying the system is not foolproof.

While the circumstances ­surrounding first officer Paul Whyte’s actions on Monday are unknown, air traffic control monitored the single-engine aircraft he had hired for the day from the Northern Rivers Aero Club in Lismore before it crashed into the ocean about 11km northeast of Byron Bay. Police have been unable to recover the ­Lismore man’s body or the wreckage, but said there were no suspicious ­circumstances.

The incident comes a year after 27-year-old Germanwings co-pilot And­reas Lubitz locked his captain out of the cockpit of an Airbus A320 during a flight from Barcelona to Dusseldorf and flew into the French Alps, killing all 150 ­people. In a report released this month, investigators said the remains of Lubitz — who had a history of psychological issues — contained traces of antidepressants.

Pilot suicide is also a theory in the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 two years ago.

The head of the psychiatry school at the University of NSW, Philip Mitchell, a professorial fellow at the Black Dog Institute, said there was a difference ­between pilots who took down their plane and those who took hundreds with them.

“In general, when people are depressed … they only take their own life. When there’s the taking of a whole plane with passengers ­involved, it just doesn’t fit the usual pattern,” Professor Mitchell said.

In Australia, pilots of passenger planes must hold a Civil Aviation Safety Authority medical certificate that has to be renewed annually and includes psychological testing.
CASA requires pilots to dec­lare any significant changes in their mental health. Anyone with a history of psychosis, alcoholism, drug dependence, personality disorder or mental abnormality is forbidden to fly.

Professor Mitchell, who has done a number of pilot reviews for CASA, said its current honesty system, “clearly implies there needs to be a frankness on behalf of the pilot”.

“My experience is most pilots are pretty frank about those things,” he said.

“The issue is how often people are reviewed and the adequacy of that — you can never have a completely foolproof system.”

MTF...P2

[Cap'n Wannabe]

1.Warwick Daw is a commercial airline pilot. He also holds a private pilot’s licence. On 5 December 2012, he had a stroke. He was grounded for a time but he has since made a good recovery. On 12 August 2013, he applied for Class 1 and Class 2 medical certificates so that he could return to work as a co-pilot on commercial flights. He cannot fly without those medical certificates. The [Image: displeft.png] Civil Aviation Safety Authority [Image: dispright.png] (CASA) decided it would issue the certificates but with a limitation: he was only permitted to operate a simulator. Mr Daw has asked the Tribunal to reconsider that decision. He says the certificates should be issued without the limits CASA has imposed.

Does anybody know how to contact Mr Daw?  I'd be very interested in speaking with him regarding his situation..

[Peetwo]

Even the Poms are walkin' the walk on PBR -   

Sandy last week, on a recently released UK CAA consultation paper on proposed changes to private pilot medical requirements:

U.K. CAA, 9th May, 'latest news' segment on their website

Quote: 

 "..Changes to private pilot medical requirements announced

Following a public consultation, 96% of those responding agreed with our proposals, which will lead to both cost and time savings for pilots and, in most cases, remove the need for GP or AME involvement..."

 
And:

"The change is supported by a study of the risks associated with GA flying, together with a review of the causes of light aircraft accidents and the likelihood of these being triggered by a pilot being medically incapacitated. The risk to third parties has been considered and the regulatory approach taken by the Federal Aviation Administration in the USA, which mirrors the UK proposal, was also reviewed.


Today's announcement is in line with the CAA's top level principles for GA regulation:

• Only regulate directly when necessary and do so proportionately
  
• Deregulate where we can
  
• Delegate where appropriate
  
• Do not gold-plate, and quickly and efficiently remove gold-plating that already exists
  
• Help create a vibrant and dynamic GA sector in the UK.
  

The consultation response document can be seen at www.caa.co.uk/cap1397."

  
Could I be forgiven for asking why we are not progressing on medicals? There is no safety case and yet CASA persists with the WW11 aviation military type medicals at enormous expense and extreme dislocation for many, especially those pilots in the outback. 

If we can't be leaders then at least we can follow sensible policies. 

Sandy

Ben Morgan quite rightly jumped all over this as yet another example of CASA's backward, costly and over prescriptive regulation of the GA industry:

Dear Ministers & Chairman,


UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA)
leads Australia on general aviation reform.

I would like to draw your attention to a media release issued by the United Kingdom’s Civil Aviation Authority 8th May 2016 regarding changes to private pilot medical requirements (see attached below).  With the regulator now moving to reduce the Private Pilots License medical requirements to that of an ordinary Drivers License.

Click to view UK CAA’s Media Release

The UK CAA makes clear that it has formulated its aviation policy in line with “the CAA’s top level principles for GA regulation”, which are;

- Only regulate directly when necessary and do so proportionately
- Deregulate where we can
- Delegate where appropriate
- Do not gold-plate, and quickly and efficiently remove gold-plating that already exists
- Help create a vibrant and dynamic GA sector in the UK

Australia’s leading general aviation associations and peak-bodies have been calling for aviation medical reform now for too long.  Their calls for reform totally ignored and sidelined by Australia’s safety regulator.

The UK CAA’s aviation medical policy change was supported via a process of industry engagement which involved some 1,823 industry responses, with the regulator commenting that it was “one of the highest responses we have ever had to public consultation”.
Comment response document:  UK Private Pilots License and National Pilots License Medical Requirements - CAP1397

The UK CAA makes clear that the policy change will save its general aviation industry approximately $2 million and some 10,000 hours expended by private pilots dealing with the legacy regulatory processes.

Ministers and Chairman, I implore you all to take the necessary steps to provide immediate relief to Australia’s general aviation industry by directing the Civil Aviation Safety Authority to adopt the UK CAA’s position on Private Pilot Medicals.

Give the Australian general aviation industry the tools and resources it needs to succeed.

I and the industry would appreciate a response.

Yours sincerely,

BENJAMIN MORGAN

  
And then two days ago on the same theme (i.e. private pilot medicals), this time from the US:

Third class medical reform included in defense bill
May 16, 2016 by General Aviation News Staff 6 Comments

Third class medical reform will once again go to the full Senate for a vote, this time as part of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).

On May 13, the Senate Armed Services Committee approved the NDAA, including third class medical reform language from the Pilot’s Bill of Rights 2 (PBR2), by a vote of 23-to-3. The full Senate is expected to take up the measure later this month, according to officials with the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association.


AOPA President Mark Baker

“This is great news for general aviation,” said Mark Baker, AOPA president and CEO.

“Third class medical reform is vital to our community, and it has widespread bipartisan support. We applaud Sen. James Inhofe and the Senate Armed Services Committee for taking action to update an unreasonably cumbersome system that costs pilots millions of dollars and countless hours while doing little or nothing to improve safety.”

Inhofe (R-Okla.), who introduced PBR2 and has championed its adoption by the Senate, expressed appreciation for AOPA’s consistent support of the legislation.


Senator James Inhofe

“Including the Pilot’s Bill of Rights 2 in the National Defense Authorization Act demonstrates the commitment of the Senate to getting third class medical reform passed this year,” said Inhofe. “As always, I thank AOPA for all of the hard work they’ve done to make this a priority in Congress. I look forward to working with them to get this across the finish line.”

The Senate has already approved third class medical reform language from the Pilot’s Bill of Rights 2 (PBR2) twice in the past five months — first as standalone legislation and then as part of the Senate’s FAA reauthorization

Meanwhile in Dunce-unda land Skidmore, the Iron ring & Murky are seemingly determined to take the industry back to at least the 19th cetnury with regressive & unworkable overregulation - FDS!


MTF...P2

[Peetwo]

From Tony Taggart via Sandy: 

To: Tony Taggart
 
Subject: RE: 2015/4552 - RE Taggart and Civil Aviation Safety Authority

UNCLASSIFIED
Mr Taggart

I acknowledge receipt of your email which I have forwarded to the Director.

A response will be provided to you as soon as practicable

Regards

Carolyn

Carolyn Hutton
Manager Government and International Relations Stakeholder Engagement Group Civil Aviation Safety Authority

---

Attn: DAS Mark Skidmore

G'day Mark,

Thought that you might be interested in the outcome of my appeal to the AAT re the documents withheld from me by your Avmed and legal office.

Not much joy for me, plenty for you and your legal team of 12 lawyers = Or is it a poisoned challis??

The decision reveals some very interesting issues:

- None of my arguments were refuted. Your legal team has some work to do to censor documents previously denied to me that now must be made available to me.

- The problem that the Deputy president had was purely technical in that her hands were tied in how she could apply the letter of the law. That should give you NO comfort.

- The issue of how and why Avmed made its over night ie from the 10th Dec 2014 to the 11th Dec 2014, decision to remove all the previous restrictions that it had unfairly placed on my medical certificate, remains a mystery because it has not produced a single note that gives rise to actually create the motion to issue the new Certificate and to write the accompanying letter to me.

- It seems that by an act of osmosis, the computer has just fired up, created the certificate, drafted the letter and mysteriously Navathe's signature appears on it. Incredible and unbelievable!!

- Most interesting of all is that the issue of Legal Professional Privilege and the act of denial of access to documents CAN, not withstanding any legal right to do so, be waived should the Director of Air Safety ie you, wish it.

- None of the points that I made about the Windsor File or the Brazil Convention or the incredulity of the lack of decision documents fell on fallow grounds. Ie those points were taken as being correct.

- The pity was that it was all to late in the chain of events which gave rise to the application for access via the AAT. Sorry - hands are tied it doesn't have the jurisdictional power to make the Decision.

So Mark, This case now gives the industry the ability to argue that, unless there is some real harm caused to CASA by you waiving a so called right to withhold information from it (the industry) you can be called out for not being open and honest with the industry if you deny access to documents under what are, by any measure, dubious FOI rules. And in any case, what possible damage can be caused by being open and honest?

In my case, what possible damage can be caused by me being advised why AVMED changed its hitherto entrenched position which saw me as nothing but a danger to the safety of air navigation for some years and then suddenly and without any recorded decision I was (correctly as history has proved) not? Just what has been the cost of the obfuscation?

I will be very pleased to hear from you about this matter.

Best Wishes

Tony Taggart

---

Dear Mr Taggart

Please find attached a copy of a Decision that the Tribunal has made in this application, together with a copy of a covering letter accompanying the Decision.

Please note that generally AAT decisions are made publicly available.

Yours sincerely

///

Keith Sypott
ASSOCIATE
Melbourne Registry
Administrative Appeals Tribunal
Tel 03 9282 8444 Fax 03 9282 8480
Email melbourne.registry@aat.gov.au
Level 16, HWT Tower, Southgate 40 City Road, Southbank VIC 3006 GPO Box 9955  Melbourne VIC 3001

www.aat.gov.au

Here is the AAT decision: Taggart and Civil Aviation Safety Authority (Freedom of information) [2016] AATA 327 (20 May 2016)

(From Administrative Appeals Tribunal of Australia; 20 May 2016; 166 KB)

And this was Sandy's reply email to TT:

Date: Tuesday, 24 May 2016
Subject: FW: 2015/4552 - RE Taggart and Civil Aviation Safety Authority

Tony,

All the more maddening in view of the rational approach being taken by the US, and very recently, by the UK CAA to virtually do away with aviation specific medicals for PPL, on the basis that fit to drive a car is quite sufficient, and that we self assess between examinations. Furthermore medical science is nowhere near being able to forecast an incapacitating event in flight. I expect that if and when we come to that day, well into the future, automatic flight will be commonplace anyway.

Why are the US and UK proceeding in this new direction? Because of surveys which show that there is no safety case. These are not third world countries, they are not idiots and they certainly don't move on such matters without careful study and good cause.

To bad that our troglodyte leadership in CASA can't bear to come out into the sunlight, but that would hurt egos and pay packets so we should not be surprised that vested interests beat the national interest.

More power to your arm for keeping on the pressure, it is adding up I think daily. Tomorrow some of our frontline are in CB for talks and the pussyfooting of the past is just that....past.

Sandy

MTF...P2

[Kharon]

Here we go - again:-

From the UP - HERE - (Whoops -   ).

Well, there you go Capt. Wannabe, finally the ‘associations’ are being forced to take action – maybe; AVMED in the spotlight.  It’s only a dim light but at least it’s on; even the UP crew have caught on to the fact that far from a little improvement to the $75 service provided things have, if it was possible, actually gotten worse under the ‘new’ leadership.  Skidmore is in denial – again, which is no surprise; but the numbers of pilots being taken ‘off roster’ due to either no certificate arriving, even after a three month delay or, for the need of specialist consultation is beginning to hurt.  

These are not odd, isolated cases, but a steadily increasing number.  ‘We’ have been keeping a log for a good long while now, delayed certificate issue was the leading contender, many instances of folk spending days on the telephone, desperately trying to remain ‘legal’ before the cut off date.  Many tried to request and require their certificate weeks before the ‘illegal’ part kicked in, to no avail.  But the latest leader is the rejection of specialist advice; it goes like this.  You pass your medical and the DAME extends that to 90 days; CASA decide you have a ‘problem’ and require ‘specialist’ advice; off you go and spend the required dollars to obtain said specialist advice, this is duly forwarded to Avmed.  Then you wait until the ‘experts’ at Avmed overturn the specialist advice which say’s you are fine and there you are; heading for the AAAT, or the knackers yard.  It was bad when Pooh-Shambollic ran the joint, but despite the rhetoric things have not improved, far from it.  

This topic has been ‘done to death’, what has happened? SFA is what.  A concerted effort from industry operators and the pilot body federation, associations and unions to pull Avmed into gear in overdue.  Until there is a real demand for change, this medical madness will just keep getting worse.   CASA and Avmed are in denial, their system and methodology have been proved flawed, time and time again through medical science, both court and AAT and yet nothing changes.  We now have part 61 grounded pilots and medically grounded pilots, as a perfect example of just how ducked up the CASA is.  Will industry get off it’s collective and push back; or, will it just live in hope that things may, someday improve?

I know where my two bob bet will be placed, safe as houses.

Aye, it’s tedious to watch this topic rise to the surface (again) only to watch it sink (again), particularly when the rest of the grown up world is taking sensible strides away from WW2 standards.  Always made me smile, you need to be in superb condition to be a front line fighting soldier, but to sit on your arse in an aircraft do you really need much more than a pulse? Never figured that one out yet.

Heigh-Ho back to my knitting.

Lead Balloon:- 

And you must submit a formal complaint to CASA and the Commonwealth Ombudsman.

The figleaf that Mr Skidmore puts over AVMED is that CASA has "only received 13 formal complaints about AVMED." (My recollection is that 13 was the number. My recollection may be inaccurate, but it was a very small number.)

It appears that the trenchant criticisms of AVMED in the submissions of the pilot representative bodies to the ASRR don't count in Mr Skidmore's mind. It appears that the number of AVMED decision overturned by the AAT, or overturned before an embarrassing decision by the AAT, don't count in Mr Skidmore's mind.

I think Mr Skidmore isn't allowed to do much independent thinking.

He's good,

[Kharon]

Self service and Avmed portals.

Anyone else had problems getting established?  Tried to register with the new fangled Avmed system – got knocked back; seems they don’t have an email address for me.  WTF; same email address for at least 15 years; medical every six month with email address noted; emails everyday from CASA to that address; miles of correspondence etc. but now I need to find time to ring during business hours to sort it out.  Again.

Bugger that, thinks I – I’ll tackle the infamous ‘self service portal’, time to get modernised.  Nope, the system ain't having any of that; pink notice – insufficient data to register there.  WTF I got my licence about the same time Pontius did.

I wonder how much the new whiz-bang system cost; also, why it insists I am a figment of my own imagination; cranky now.  I intend to keep track of this little breeze blowing over my tea cup.  So far, the bill is not too bad, lets call it 20 minutes, I had little else to do so the time cannot be counted as counterproductive, however…..

MTF I expect.

Heh heh; Just had a very funny PM from P26, suggests it’s all an IP trap; CASA malware by return; bag OST – computer crash, take the Mickey out of CASA, bang, blue screen etc.  (big smile).  Which is all jolly good fun, but don’t they have to let you into the system first?  What a joke this outfit is. 

[Peetwo]

Self service and Avmed portals. - P2

Anyone else had problems getting established?  Tried to register with the new fangled Avmed system – got knocked back; seems they don’t have an email address for me.  WTF; same email address for at least 15 years; medical every six month with email address noted; emails everyday from CASA to that address; miles of correspondence etc. but now I need to find time to ring during business hours to sort it out.  Again.

Bugger that, thinks I – I’ll tackle the infamous ‘self service portal’, time to get modernised.  Nope, the system ain't having any of that; pink notice – insufficient data to register there.  WTF I got my licence about the same time Pontius did.

I wonder how much the new whiz-bang system cost; also, why it insists I am a figment of my own imagination; cranky now.  I intend to keep track of this little breeze blowing over my tea cup.  So far, the bill is not too bad, lets call it 20 minutes, I had little else to do so the time cannot be counted as counterproductive, however…..

MTF I expect.

Heh heh; Just had a very funny PM from P26, suggests it’s all an IP trap; CASA malware by return; bag OST – computer crash, take the Mickey out of CASA, bang, blue screen etc.  (big smile).  Which is all jolly good fun, but don’t they have to let you into the system first?  What a joke this outfit is. 

Hey "K" according to Binger's article in the Oz today; a) you are definitely not on your Pat Malone; and b) apparently that is just the tip of the iceberg with many future frustrations yet to be experienced...  

Pilots face grounding over medical delays

• Mitchell Bingemann
  
• The Australian
  
• 12:00AM June 24, 2016[img=0x0]http://pixel.tcog.cp1.news.com.au/track/component/author/4c134add4c3a9e4881f7841b69d9ac85/?esi=true&t_product=the-australian&t_template=s3/austemp-article_common/vertical/author/widget[/img]
  

Almost 1000 pilots are facing delays of two months or more to receive the medical certificates they need to fly because of a mammoth backlog within the aviation regulator’s new online medical portal.

About 170 pilots are also within 14 days of having their medical certificates expire — which will ­effectively ground them and put them out of work — as the backlog continues to grow and slow down the processing system.

The logjam was created with the introduction of Civil Aviation Safety Authority’s online medical records system, which has been in operation since March 21. The new system was meant to streamline the application process and create a repository of pilot medical records for future use but teething problems with the system has instead created a slowdown that is now affecting hundreds of pilots.

The new system is processing about 1700 medical certificates a month, down from the 2000 a month that the old system was capable of issuing.

The delays mean there is now a backlog of about 900 pilots who are being told to expect waits of two months to receive their certificates. In about 400 cases, some are being told the wait is even longer.

Under the old system, the average processing time for Class 1 medical certificates — which are issued to holders of Air Transport Pilot Licences, Commercial Pilot Licences, Multi-crew Pilot Licences and Flight Engineer Licences — was 17 days.

But that time has now blown out to an average of 20 days as pilots and doctors come to grips with the new system.

The average processing time for Class 2 medical certificates (for student pilots, private pilots and balloon operators) is taking 27 days and Class 3 medical certificates (for air traffic controllers and flight service officers) about 21 days.

One pilot who contacted The Australian — but asked to remain anonymous — has had to wait six months to get clearance for a Class 1 Medical certificate and has lost work as a result of the delays.

“It’s been a total ‘fubar’. I’ve missed out on some jobs because this is hanging over my head,” the pilot said.

An investigation by The Australian prompted the Australian Federation of Air Pilots — the largest industrial and professional association for commercial ­pilots in Australia with over 3500 commercial pilots — to survey its members about issues with the new system.

The response rate on the survey set a record for the AFAP which has collated 19 pages of complaints about the system. In total, some 69 per cent of the 312 respondents to the survey have reported problems and major delays with the new online system.

Many of those surveyed pilots reported around a seven- to eight- week wait to receive their medical certificates, while the most severe cases had seen waits of up to four months.

The most common complaints about the system are that it is slow or not working, recurring glitches resulting in incomplete applications and payment problems.

“My company has been on my back about the expiry and renewal and told me that if my medical expires they will stop paying me until it is renewed,” one pilot said.

“All the while, CASA is still sending me emails reminding me that my medical expires within 60 days, and what the renewal process is. I have done everything required to renew it, well ahead of the expiry date.”

CASA has acknowledged the problem and is shifting additional staff into its aviation medicine branch to cope with the strains on the system. Changes are also being made to workflow practices to improve turnaround times.

“Some medical certificates are taking more time to process. CASA apologises to pilots who have been waiting longer than normal for their medical to be ­finalised and thanks everyone for their patience,” a CASA spokesman said.

“Anyone who considers they are facing hardship due to a delay in medical processing should contact CASA as soon as possible, and assistance will be provided.”

The aviation regulator is also prioritising medical certificate ­applications where the current certificate is due to expire within 14 days.

“There are more than 400 medical certificate applications that have been lodged for eight weeks or longer. In the majority of these applications CASA requires further information from the applicant and/or specialist medical reports,” the CASA spokesman said.

  
While on the subject of Pilot Licence medicals, I note the filing of a recent AAT decision which highlights the 'fubar' situation of differing interpretations of AvMed Part 67 regulations. Also ironically this case could represent an indication of a more 'conciliatory approach' to placing conditions on pilot medicals...

Barnes and  Civil Aviation Safety Authority  [2016] AATA 401 (17 June 2016)

...SUBSEQUENT GRANT OF CLASS 2 MEDICAL CERTIFICATE
25. Even if the decision I have come to on the extension application is incorrect, the consequences for Mr Barnes would not alter. I alluded to this possibility in my earlier decision regarding Mr Barnes’ right to apply for review, which is dated 21 April 2016 at [31]. That is because CASA issued to Mr Barnes on 17 February 2016 a Class 2 medical certificate valid for 24 months, subject to a number of conditions.

26. Regulation 67.205(6) of the CASR provides:

If a new medical certificate is issued to a person who holds a current medical certificate, and the new certificate comes into force before the current medical certificate is due to expire, the current certificate ceases to be in force at the last moment of the day before the day when the new certificate comes into force.

27. Accordingly, if the correct outcome of this application was that an extension of the period for which his 11 August 2014 Class 2 medical certificate remained in force should be granted, it would be taken to have been in force at the time CASA issued to Mr Barnes a 24 month Class 2 medical certificate on 17 February 2016. In fact, in accordance with Reg 67.205(2)(a), given that Mr Barnes’ last medical examination was done on 21 December 2015, that medical certificate came into force on the certificate’s appropriate day, which, for a person who has undergone any relevant examinations required for the purpose of the issue of the certificate, is the day when the last relevant examination was completed. That is, the 24 month Class 2 medical certificate came into force on 21 December 2015. If the extension of time were granted to his 11 August 2014 medical certificate, by reason of Reg 67.205 (6) of the CASR, his 11 August 2014 medical certificate ceased to be in force on 20 December 2015.

28.The 24 month Class 2 medical certificate contains restrictions, including a Special Condition which is set out in the letter of 17 February 2016. It requires Mr Barnes to provide to the Aviation Medicine Branch of CASA on or before 28 February 2017 a progress report from the doctor monitoring his diabetes, detailing a number of matters set out in that letter. In other words, Mr Barnes need do nothing until February 2017 to maintain a current Class 2 medical certificate. However he must comply with the Special Condition on or before 28 February 2017. Otherwise, that medical certificate will cease to be in force.

29. The fact that I have come to the conclusion that the Class 2 medical certificate issued to Mr Barnes on 11 August 2014 should not be extended does not alter the conclusion that at the present time, Mr Barnes holds a valid Class 2 medical certificate which will remain in force until 21 December 2017 subject only to the restrictions set out on that certificate including the Special Condition.

CONCLUSION

30. I find that the decision made by CASA on 15 June 2014 to refuse to extend Mr Barnes’ Class 2 medical certificate issued on 11 August 2014 was the correct decision. I affirm that decision...

MTF...P2

[thorn bird]

Attitudes,attitudes and competence?
Its strange that I can visit my friendly FAA approved doctor, complete my medical in about half an hour, pay the doctor his fee, around $250 and walk out with my medical, another years worth of flying, no hassles, no stress, no delay.
Is that because in the USA time is money and the "Foster and Promote" ethos of the american regulator ensures there are no road blocks to you earning your living.
The FAA trust the competence of their appointed doctors to assess a pilot fit to fly and pilots are charged with self assessing their fitness each time they are about to commit aviation.

In OZ our Authority with its roots in the military have no regard for time and money, they are not required by our government to have any consideration of commercial reality.

The past decade or so, with no constraint or scrutiny by politicians has seen our regulator morph into a Pseudo police force with no judicial revie.The concept of just culture and model litigant thrown in the bin for expediancy and to disguise their incompetency.

The net result of this uncontrolled culture has allowed the promotion of incompetent egotists into management positions who reinforce the military ethos, you do what your told without question.
Anyone who joins CAsA automatically becomes a beyond reproach expert, anyone outside CAsA is viewed as an incompetent criminal completely lacking in probity.

[Kharon]

Full steam GD – NOW!
{Blame P2 - he kicked it off} - HERE-.

In any, and I do mean any activity or pursuit which has a ‘risk’ element the essential thing is to address any item which may increase that risk, immediately.  The ‘snow-ball’ syndrome, delight of simulator instructors, is a classic example; where a simple fault which, if not dealt with promptly and correctly, can trigger multiple warnings, leading to a potential accident situation.  But one does not need to look at the extreme, esoteric situations to see the potential for ‘trouble’ that allowing things to escalate causes; a simple thing like putting off the laundry creates a situation where additional time, effort and expense is a direct result of allowing things to pile up. For the sake of a nail etc.  

And on Friday, CASA apologised to pilots and air traffic controllers who have faced delays in obtaining an aviation medical certificate.

Here we find the quintessential example; how can a supposedly ‘modern’ department with unlimited resources get into such a diabolical mess.  This huge log jam did not magically appear last Monday morning when sleepy and rumpled the Avmed turned up according to their own flexi-time preference. This backlog has been piling up, steadily, day by day with the Avmed crew sitting back, watching it happen.  And the best they can do is apologise.  BOLLOCKS.  Resignation of the ‘PMO’ is the minimum acceptable form of apology.  Out in the real world, this chump would, with malice aforethought, be fired, just for the embarrassment caused to a corporation.  This is not just one or two being inconvenienced; or, some hapless character with a dodgy ticker being bully-ragged though the AAAT; this is hundreds of pilots and Atco potentially becoming unemployable.  It is a ducking disgrace and an apology is no where near good enough, not by a bloody long march it ain’t.

CASA said it had put on more staff to address the delays in processing medical certificates.

WTF, why now, suddenly?  Why was the situation ever allowed to develop beyond the usual, inevitable delay we have experienced for years now? It is an absolutely ludicrous situation which become untenable, when you look at the ease with which FAA manage three or four times the number of ‘routine’ medicals.

“Sorry – we have put on a couple of extra clerical staff, please be patient”  BOLLOCKS - They are just taking the Mickey and expecting industry to nod, smile and come over all understanding like.  BOLLOCKS.

Hurst - “Whoever the new Minister is after the election, they will have a massive task still ahead of them which may require further personnel changes if reform cannot be delivered rapidly – something supported by an industry focussed on outcomes not talk.”

Amen. Here, here: Bravo, well said Phil Hurst.  They new boy (or girl) need not worry too much about reforming the regulations, reform this useless, incompetent crew running the departments, before they bring this industry to it’s knees.  FFS just imagine the trouble if the public transport drivers of buses and trains has this sort of carry on; better yet reduced services during peak hour because none of their union members had current medicals.  Pony-pooh.

It’s the sheer  bloody lunacy, purblind, total incompetence we have come to expect from an 'authority' which needs to be reformed, NOW, not in some distant century, far far, away.

There, I feel much better now – “Yeah, turn it off GD; we’re done here”.

Toot (exasperated) Toot.

How much better an example of the total shambles CASA has become do you need? Seriously.  Avmed typifies the complicated, costly, counterproductive, counter intuitive, of no practical (as in ‘safety’) or intrinsic value (as it saves everyone time and money) system to anyone.  Ayup; Keep that boiler warm GD; there will be more on this almost unbelievable, ‘cept it’s true, CASA cock up. UFB.

[Peetwo]

Full steam GD – NOW!
{Blame P2 - he kicked it off} - HERE-.

In any, and I do mean any activity or pursuit which has a ‘risk’ element the essential thing is to address any item which may increase that risk, immediately.  The ‘snow-ball’ syndrome, delight of simulator instructors, is a classic example; where a simple fault which, if not dealt with promptly and correctly, can trigger multiple warnings, leading to a potential accident situation.  But one does not need to look at the extreme, esoteric situations to see the potential for ‘trouble’ that allowing things to escalate causes; a simple thing like putting off the laundry creates a situation where additional time, effort and expense is a direct result of allowing things to pile up. For the sake of a nail etc.  

And on Friday, CASA apologised to pilots and air traffic controllers who have faced delays in obtaining an aviation medical certificate.

Here we find the quintessential example; how can a supposedly ‘modern’ department with unlimited resources get into such a diabolical mess.  This huge log jam did not magically appear last Monday morning when sleepy and rumpled the Avmed turned up according to their own flexi-time preference. This backlog has been piling up, steadily, day by day with the Avmed crew sitting back, watching it happen.  And the best they can do is apologise.  BOLLOCKS.  Resignation of the ‘PMO’ is the minimum acceptable form of apology.  Out in the real world, this chump would, with malice aforethought, be fired, just for the embarrassment caused to a corporation.  This is not just one or two being inconvenienced; or, some hapless character with a dodgy ticker being bully-ragged though the AAAT; this is hundreds of pilots and Atco potentially becoming unemployable.  It is a ducking disgrace and an apology is no where near good enough, not by a bloody long march it ain’t.

CASA said it had put on more staff to address the delays in processing medical certificates.

WTF, why now, suddenly?  Why was the situation ever allowed to develop beyond the usual, inevitable delay we have experienced for years now? It is an absolutely ludicrous situation which become untenable, when you look at the ease with which FAA manage three or four times the number of ‘routine’ medicals.

“Sorry – we have put on a couple of extra clerical staff, please be patient”  BOLLOCKS - They are just taking the Mickey and expecting industry to nod, smile and come over all understanding like.  BOLLOCKS.

Hurst - “Whoever the new Minister is after the election, they will have a massive task still ahead of them which may require further personnel changes if reform cannot be delivered rapidly – something supported by an industry focussed on outcomes not talk.”

Amen. Here, here: Bravo, well said Phil Hurst.  They new boy (or girl) need not worry too much about reforming the regulations, reform this useless, incompetent crew running the departments, before they bring this industry to it’s knees.  FFS just imagine the trouble if the public transport drivers of buses and trains has this sort of carry on; better yet reduced services during peak hour because none of their union members had current medicals.  Pony-pooh.

It’s the sheer  bloody lunacy, purblind, total incompetence we have come to expect from an 'authority' which needs to be reformed, NOW, not in some distant century, far far, away.

There, I feel much better now – “Yeah, turn it off GD; we’re done here”.

Toot (exasperated) Toot.

How much better an example of the total shambles CASA has become do you need? Seriously.  Avmed typifies the complicated, costly, counterproductive, counter intuitive, of no practical (as in ‘safety’) or intrinsic value (as it saves everyone time and money) system to anyone.  Ayup; Keep that boiler warm GD; there will be more on this almost unbelievable, ‘cept it’s true, CASA cock up. UFB.

Well vented "K" clear as mud to me and what's left of the long suffering survivors of a totally regulator embuggered industry. However to perhaps clear it up for those more legally moribund pollies and self-righteous bureaucrats, here is the sticking point articulately spelt out by the resident UP legal eagle Lead Balloon (aka Creampuff):

If 11.140 applies to medical certificates, it operates way beyond mere bureaucratic delay in doing a 're-print' of a medical certificate. It would mean that if you put in everything necessary at least 21 days before expiry of your current certificate, 11.140 keeps that certificate alive until CASA makes and implements a final decision, whether that's one month later or 2 years later. It would also mean that if, having received your application, CASA asks for the results of specified tests to be provided to it within 2 weeks, and you then provide those results within that time, the certificate continues to be kept alive until CASA makes and implements a final decision.


So it would cover all of the time wasted by Avmed in its deep thought processes in second-guessing mere private practitioners and specialists, and "complex case management meetings", as well as the basic inefficiencies of having turned what used to be an efficient process into a dog's breakfast. (All to 'value-add' to the safety of air navigation, of course.)

It's almost unthinkable to contemplate, but maybe 11.140 was put there precisely for the purpose of protecting the holders of time limited authorisations from this kind of bureaucratic inefficiency and obfuscation.

(And remember: "authorisation" for the purposes of 11.140 is defined to mean, among other things, "a certificate capable of being granted to a person under these Regulations", "the Regulations" include Part 67, and 11.140(3) starts with the magic words "Despite any other provision of these Regulations...".)

Alas, this is all just domestic law, so I see the conundrum for pilots who fly internationally. Other countries can apply whatever medical certification rules they like to foreigners who fly into their jurisdiction. I can only speculate on how commercial international pilots and their associations have resisted nuking CASA from orbit as a consequence of the uncertainty and frustration caused by those who have the comfort of a nice office and a nice six figure salary no matter how inefficient and ineffectual they may be.

It might take the sting off a bit to contemplate the machinations that must be going on in CASA to avoid acknowledging and dealing with the consequences of the reality that 11.140 might apply to medical certificates. All of the faux concern about the safety of air navigation if the delays caused by their own incompetence, inefficiency and sense of self-importance resulted in people being able to continue to go to work to feed and house their families, instead of being 'grounded' until Avmed condescended to deal with the distracting trivia of plebs and their plebeian problems.

That is, of course, unless CASA considers 11.140 doesn't apply to medical certificates, in which case CASA should have the corporate integrity to step up and say that, and why.

   

MTF...P2

[Peetwo]

Fort Fumble AVMED under siege??

Another Skidmore induced clusterduck is rapidly escalating in the halls of Fort Fumble with DAMEs Australia wide getting frustrated with the growing backlog of medicals yet to be processed. Binger in the Oz today...

Flaws in pilots medical portal put doctors off

• Mitchell Bingemann
  
• The Australian
  
• 12:00AM July 8, 2016
  

[img=0x0]http://pixel.tcog.cp1.news.com.au/track/component/author/4c134add4c3a9e4881f7841b69d9ac85/?esi=true&t_product=the-australian&t_template=s3/austemp-article_common/vertical/author/widget[/img]
Doctors fed up with a backlog within the aviation regulator’s new online medical portal are refusing to conduct medicals on ­pilots, saying the new system is costing them too much time and money.

Designated Aviation Medical Examiners (DAMEs) — who conduct medicals on pilots in accordance with the Civil Aviation Safety Regulations — have reached out to The Australian to express their frustration at the new system, which they say is taking twice as long to navigate compared to the previous system.

The frustration of the doctors has fed into the list of perceived problems with the online medical record system that is straining under a backlog of 2281 certificate applications that have not been assessed within 20 days of being received.

The logjam was created with the introduction of Civil Aviation Safety Authority’s online medical records system, which has been in operation since March 21.

The new system was meant to streamline the application process and create a repository of pilot medical records for future use, but teething problems with the system has instead created a slowdown that is now affecting thousands of pilots.

Last month, The Australian revealed that 170 pilots were within 14 days of having their medical certificates expire — which will effectively ground them and put them out of work — as the backlog continues to grow and slow down the processing system. But the number of medicals within 14 days of expiry has now grown to 227. CASA has put these applications on an urgent priority list.

A recent survey about the new system conducted by the Australian Federation of Air Pilots — the largest industrial and professional association for commercial pilots in Australia with over 3500 commercial pilots — collated 19 pages of complaints about the system.

In total, some 69 per cent of the 312 respondents to the survey have reported problems and major delays with the online system. The most common complaints are that it is slow or not working, recurring glitches resulting in incomplete applications and payment problems.

The problems are not only causing headaches for pilots, but also the doctors who administer the medicals required by CASA to fly.

“(My) DAME informed me that the process is now so flawed he will cease being a DAME. The added administration and bureaucratic process no longer makes it worth his while,” said one pilot.

Another pilot said his DAME is now requiring a 90-minute appointment to complete the medical process and submit the required information to CASA.

“Finding a doctor in Brisbane who was willing to do my medical was difficult. The first three that I called refused to do pilot medicals anymore due to the complexity and lack of training in the new system,” said another pilot.

A CASA spokeswoman acknowledged there were ongoing issues with the portal, but said there were 834 active DAMEs “who appear to be meeting demand”.

“CASA is aware of DAMES having issues with using MRS and has two support officers available to help DAMEs during business hours,” she said.

“CASA has also just completed one-on-one training with 51 DAMEs who were having difficulty with using the new system, which was well received. CASA is also looking into other ways of providing ongoing training for MRS to DAMEs.”

In the past week CASA has issued 533 medicals, which was 61 more than the number of applications received during that time.

   

MTF...P2  

[Peetwo]

Fort Fumble AVMED under siege??

Another Skidmore induced clusterduck is rapidly escalating in the halls of Fort Fumble with DAMEs Australia wide getting frustrated with the growing backlog of medicals yet to be processed. Binger in the Oz today...

Flaws in pilots medical portal put doctors off

• Mitchell Bingemann
  
• The Australian
  
• 12:00AM July 8, 2016
  

[img=0x0]http://pixel.tcog.cp1.news.com.au/track/component/author/4c134add4c3a9e4881f7841b69d9ac85/?esi=true&t_product=the-australian&t_template=s3/austemp-article_common/vertical/author/widget[/img]

Meanwhile in a parallel, non-isolationist hemisphere -

Yesterday the US Senate voted in favour of the 3rd class medical measure, courtesy of AvWeb:

Senate Approves Third-Class Medical Reform (Updated)

By Elaine Kauh | July 13, 2016

Related Articles

• FAA Medical Reform Passes In House
  
• Criminal Charges Eyed In Airshow Crash
  
• Ditching Season Is Upon Us
  
• Two Killed In Bell Helicopter Test Flight
  

Third-class medical reform is on its way to becoming law after the Senate voted this afternoon to approve the measure as part of a short-term funding bill for the FAA. The legislation, which won House approval on Monday, is expected to be be signed by President Obama before the FAA’s current authorization expires on Friday. Many pilots who have had third-class medicals issued within the past 10 years of the bill's signing will not need another exam by an aviation medical examiner. However, the FAA will have up to a year to develop and finalize the new regulations, which will require at least a valid driver's license and a doctor's checkup every 48 months for eligible pilots.

Another requirement in lieu of a third-class medical is completing an aeromedical education course every two years. The reforms are for pilots who have never had their medicals denied or revoked. Those eligible to be exempt from future medical certification will be able to fly privately in aircraft with up to six seats and a maximum takeoff weight of 6,000 pounds. Flights can be VFR or IFR, but must be no higher than 18,000 feet with maximum indicated airspeeds of 250 knots. Pilots flying with third-class medicals with special issuances also would not have to be re-certified, unless they develop a medical condition requiring a new special issuance. Those who have never had a medical must still get one-time certification from an AME to fly under the specified conditions. 

“This is the most significant legislative victory for general aviation in decades,” AOPA President Mark Baker said. “These reforms will provide relief to hundreds of thousands of pilots from an outdated, costly, and unnecessarily burdensome system. This legislation will strengthen the private pilot-private physician relationship and improve awareness of medical issues throughout our community.  It will help pilots save time, money, and frustration.” AOPA explains some details of the reforms on its Web site.

The FAA Extension, Safety, and Security Act of 2016, which funds the agency through September 2017, also includes a variety of safety measures including tighter enforcement of unmanned aerial systems and tougher penalties for laser-pointing at aircraft. The FAA also must develop regulations for marking standalone towers between 50 and 200 feet tall located in rural or agricultural areas. The regulations would target meteorological evaluation towers, which can be marked voluntarily, under current FAA policy.

And from the AOPA blurb from earlier in the week when the legislative measure passed the HoR..

..“We have been working day in and day out to win much-needed medical reforms for pilots, and the inclusion of those reforms in the FAA extension, and the House’s overwhelming support puts us one step closer to getting this to the president’s desk,” said AOPA President Mark Baker. “We appreciate the leadership of Transportation Committee Chairman Bill Shuster (R-Pa.) and the steadfast support of general aviation’s friends in Congress.”

Third class medical reform was included in the House Pilot’s Bill of Rights 2 introduced last year by Reps. Sam Graves (R-Mo.), Dan Lipinski (D-Ill.), Todd Rokita (R-Ind.), and Collin Peterson (D-Minn.). Graves, Rokita, and Peterson are all AOPA members and House GA Caucus members, while Lipinski is a GA Caucus member who has been a stalwart GA supporter. The Pilot's Bill of Rights 2 garnered nearly 200 co-sponsors in the House.

“Today is a great day for general aviation” said Graves. “Many of us have been fighting for third class medical reform for well over five years and we are closer than ever to realizing our goal. It is truly a testament to the grassroots support for third class medical reform from our community and the continual advocacy of the House General Aviation Caucus and our GA industry leaders."  

Other key congressional advocates were equally pleased to see the legislation moving forward.

“As an aviator, I am pleased that the solution we negotiated makes it easier for pilots who love flying to continue doing so without onerous medical regulations,” said Rokita. “While the language does not go as far as I and other leaders have advocated, it represents real progress towards removing unneeded government bureaucracy that does nothing to maintain safety.

“I appreciate AOPA’s leadership and staff for their unwavering efforts on this important issue. I will continue to stand up for GA pilots everywhere, and look forward to continuing my efforts when Congress considers a long-term FAA reauthorization bill next year.”  

“The legislation approved by the House in the short-term extension is a long overdue victory for our nation’s general aviation pilots. This is a great example of what can be accomplished with bipartisan cooperation and stakeholder engagement,” said Lipinski and Peterson in a joint statement. “As strong supporters of general aviation, we look forward to securing additional commonsense reforms in the eventual comprehensive, long-term FAA reauthorization bill.”...

GREEN WITH ENVY -"..bipartisan cooperation and stakeholder engagement.."  - Fancy that??- A place where such words actually mean something while helping foster and promote a vibrant industry. Not the weasel-words that spew out of our pollies, like Albo & selfie King Dazzling Dazza. Who in the next breath turn cheek and abrogate all responsibility to the retrograde bureaucracy, that is seemingly hell bent on decimating the aviation industry with voluminous, overly prescriptive and outdated regulations -     



MTF...P2   

[Gobbledock]

Tick tock goes the AVmed heart monitoring clock...

Skidmore is an idiot. He himself should visit AVmed and have a DNA test done on his moustache, because I think it has collected a pile of Truss's and Dazza's shit and infected his brain.

AVmed is just another example of how bureaucrats completely screw up a system that in reality should be clear, concise, and quick moving. McComick, Pony Pooshan, now Skid'Mark...what a cluster of nimrods.
Everyone just shit into a test tube and post it to them. Duck em. Duck em all......

[thorn bird]

Better still Gobbles, send him a condom with a note "pull this over your head so you look like a Pr..ck!

[Peetwo]

Via the PAIN email chain - Sandy (17/07/16):

Momentous Private Pilot medical reform in the USA

This will give a great boost to General Aviation in the US. 

It would provide a considerably larger stimulus here if achieved in Australia. 

Our Private Pilot Licence Class 2 medicals have fallen off a cliff. Aaron Lane has compiled the attached table, Aaron has been commissioned to provide a GA report and this table will be part of that report.

Aviation Medical Certificates 2000-2015.docx

Car driver standard medicals for PPL is a crucial reform for Australia's GA revival.

Sandy

---------- Forwarded message ----------


From: EAA <connect@eaa.org>
Date: Saturday, 16 July 2016
Subject: EAA Reaches The Goal - Aeromedical Reform Is Now Law!
To: sandy@reith.com.au



View this email online

Third Class Medical Reform Signed into Law

Today, President Obama signed the 2016 FAA funding extension into law with third class medical reform attached. After years of effort by EAA advocacy, pilots will finally see relief from the constant hassle and expense associated with third class medical renewals.

The legislation allows most pilots who have held a valid medical certificate since July 2006 to fly without needing another FAA medical exam. Instead, pilots can be examined by their personal physician every four years and take an online aeromedical factors course every two years to remain medically qualified to fly.

EAA’s efforts to bring third medical class relief to pilots would not have been possible without the support of our members. The true strength of our advocacy efforts lies within the membership base that we represent, and every additional member increases our chances of affecting change. Today proves that together we can make a difference.

Please join EAA today!

Join EAA Now >>


For more information, see EAA's FAQ page on aeromedical reform.

Hmm...those figures for the Class 1 & 2 medicals is very disturbing...

Class one initials & renewals have basically flat-lined since 2004-5, but what is far worse is the rapid decline since 2008-9 of the class 2 initials & renewals. Especially when you consider that class 2 medicals also reflect the wannabes & commercial training pilot ranks (i.e. the future lifeblood of the industry)...  

MTF...P2

[P7_TOM]

Couldn't resist posting these comments from the 'innocent by-stander' e-mail loop.   Passed along by one of of the not so innocent, worth a read and a choc frog.

The following from somebody not implicated in this loop and the Medical data given without any identification of included recipients. May I say this person has a firm working knowledge of the CAsA theme. He fails to say what I may have by way of suggestion, in that the facts and figures and graphs should be read in conjunction with corresponding graphs of AVGAS sales, aircraft brokerage, RA-Aus figures and of course the telling Engineers data of loss of business through lack of aircraft and owners in their economic catchment and burdensome regulatory paperwork.

His input is obvious and telling... follows,

“But hardly surprising.  

The job of Avmed is to find something - anything - to create more intrusive busy-work, to save the world and demonstrate superior knowledge and expertise than mere private practitioners and specialists.   Think how distressing it would be for Avmed if Avmed had to face the reality that for all its efforts, the end result is a certificate holder with the same probabilities of sudden incapacity as the general population.  

And now we have the Orwellian spectacle of Mr Skidmore demanding "data" to show the current system isn't working.   Setting aside that he mouths the rhetoric of evidence-based and risk-based regulation, which would suggest CASA is supposed to come up with the evidence and do the objective risk/cost evaluation to justify Avmed's interventionist zeal, he puts the industry to proof of a negative:   The industry must prove that most of Avmed's recent adventurism does not contribute to safety, but to do that the industry would have to have control over Avmed.

Makes me sick, but I wouldn't tell Avmed that...”

[Peetwo]

Via the PAIN email chain - Sandy (17/07/16):

Momentous Private Pilot medical reform in the USA

This will give a great boost to General Aviation in the US. 

It would provide a considerably larger stimulus here if achieved in Australia. 

Our Private Pilot Licence Class 2 medicals have fallen off a cliff. Aaron Lane has compiled the attached table, Aaron has been commissioned to provide a GA report and this table will be part of that report.

Aviation Medical Certificates 2000-2015.docx

Car driver standard medicals for PPL is a crucial reform for Australia's GA revival.

Sandy

---------- Forwarded message ----------


From: EAA <connect@eaa.org>
Date: Saturday, 16 July 2016
Subject: EAA Reaches The Goal - Aeromedical Reform Is Now Law!
To: sandy@reith.com.au



View this email online

Third Class Medical Reform Signed into Law

Today, President Obama signed the 2016 FAA funding extension into law with third class medical reform attached. After years of effort by EAA advocacy, pilots will finally see relief from the constant hassle and expense associated with third class medical renewals.

The legislation allows most pilots who have held a valid medical certificate since July 2006 to fly without needing another FAA medical exam. Instead, pilots can be examined by their personal physician every four years and take an online aeromedical factors course every two years to remain medically qualified to fly.

EAA’s efforts to bring third medical class relief to pilots would not have been possible without the support of our members. The true strength of our advocacy efforts lies within the membership base that we represent, and every additional member increases our chances of affecting change. Today proves that together we can make a difference.

Please join EAA today!

Join EAA Now >>


For more information, see EAA's FAQ page on aeromedical reform.

Hmm...those figures for the Class 1 & 2 medicals is very disturbing...

Class one initials & renewals have basically flat-lined since 2004-5, but what is far worse is the rapid decline since 2008-9 of the class 2 initials & renewals. Especially when you consider that class 2 medicals also reflect the wannabes & commercial training pilot ranks (i.e. the future lifeblood of the industry)...   

Cont/- Via Pro Aviation:

Pro Aviation

Sharp End Aviation News and Features


Aeromedical Reform – a giant boost to USA’s general aviation sector


A decade of joint effort by USA general aviation interest groups culminated in a huge victory for American GA pilots last week when US President Barack Obama signed “third class” pilot medical reform into law as part of the 2016 Federal Aviation Administration Extension Bill passed by Congress in that week.

Ten years of teamwork has rewarded the USA Aircraft Owners & Pilots Association (AOPA) and Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA) with a breath of fresh air that will reaffirm the USA’s leadership in the help of strong government support of its vibrant general aviation sector.

The move will free thousands of USA pilots from restrictions on the former one-size-fits-all certificate that imposed similar limitations to those CASA applies to Australian class 2 medical certificate holders, which heavily limit aircraft speed, operating altitudes, number of passengers, systems complexity, and VFR-only operations.

The president’s signature came just hours before the FAA’s existing authorisations became law, and the clock is now ticking on FAA’s mandate to translate the new laws into its regulations with tight deadlines.

Who will benefit?

Prior to the new rules, USA third-class medical holders were limited to 4 seats but only one passenger, 180 hp, single-engine, fixed gear, day VFR-only conditions, a maximum altitude of 10,000 feet or up to 2,000 feet AGL and an obligation to take a (free) on-line aeromedical online training in aeromedical factors every two years.

Pilots flying under the new rules will now be allowed to operate aircraft weighing up to 6,000 pounds (2,721 kg), carrying up to five passengers plus the pilot in command, flying at up to 18,000 feet, and at cruising speeds of up to 250 knots. Pilots, if appropriately rated, can fly VFR or IFR in qualified aircraft. There are no limitations on horsepower, number of engines, or gear type.)

“This means almost any third-class medical certificate holder can benefit from these reforms,” says EAA. “In fact, almost anyone who has held a regular or special issuance third-class medical certificate within the 10 years preceding the date the legislation is enacted will never again need to visit an aviation medical examiner (AME). If you’ve never held a third-class medical certificate, you will need to get a medical certificate one-time only. If your regular or special issuance medical certificate lapsed more than 10 years before the legislation is enacted, you will need to get a medical certificate one time only. And if you develop certain cardiac, neurological, or psychological conditions, you will need a one-time only special issuance medical.”

What’s in the bill?

Pilots will still need to visit their personal physician at least once every four years and provide an FAA-developed checklist of issues to be discussed during the visit: “Both you and your physician will need to sign the checklist saying that you discussed the items on it. You will then need to make a note of the visit and include the checklist in your logbook. You do not need to report the outcome of the visit or file any paperwork with the FAA unless you are specifically requested to do so.

“You also will need to take online training in aeromedical factors every two years. The training will be offered free of charge.

“The legislation considerably expands the number of USA pilots and aircraft who will be eligible to fly under third-class medical reforms.”

Fuller detail is available on the web sites of the (USA) AOPA and the EAA

MTF...P2

[Peetwo]

A good news story for a change -

Former Director of CASA's AvMed & CVD Pilot advocate, Dr Rob Liddell was apparently in the right place at the right time to help prevent a precipitation of a health scare for an aviation legend:

Dr. Robert Liddell, R.A. Bob Hoover, and Michael Herman (left to right): Fred George

Airshow Legend Survives Health Scare

Jul 30, 2016 Fred George | The Weekly Of Business Aviation

OSHKOSH, Wisconsin—Legendary airshow performer R.A. Bob Hoover almost “Went West” on the eve of this year’s EAA AirVenture Oshkosh due to life-threatening anemia. 
                                                                      
It could have deprived his body of oxygen as effectively as carbon monoxide poisoning. Fortunately, Dr. Robert Liddell was visiting the 94-year-old Hoover at his home in Palos Verdes, California. Liddell, who was director of aviation medicine for Australia’s Civil Aviation Safety Authority (nee Civil Aviation Authority) from 1988 to 1997, noted Hoover’s shortness of breath and other signs of anemia. He immediately called a local hospital to order blood tests.

But the hospital would not take orders from a non-U.S. licensed physician. That’s when Michael Herman—Hoover’s longtime friend, personal Citation CJ3 air chauffeur and CEO of North American Communications—came to the rescue. Herman called Dr. Ned Chambers in San Diego and asked him to confer with Liddell.

Chambers immediately ordered the required blood tests at a local hospital. The results were clear and convincing. Hoover’s hemoglobin levels had indeed dropped precipitously to 7.7 gm/dl from the normal 15 gm/ dl. Chambers then ordered a large transfusion of blood, packed with extra hemoglobin, to cure the anemia. Quickly, the extra-strength transfusion produced the desired results. Hoover’s anemia vanished and he felt re-energized, ready to fly with Herman and Liddell to meet and greet all his friends and admirers at AirVenture 2016 here.

“Everyone has come close to going over the cliff at one time or another,” says Hoover, who narrowly escaped death more than a dozen times during his fighter pilot, test pilot and airshow careers. “This is the second time that Dr. Rob Liddell came to my rescue. The first was in 1994, when FAA pulled my medical certificate. Dr. Liddell and I have been lifelong friends ever since.”

In 1994, two FAA inspectors watched Hoover perform at airshows and declared his cognitive skills had deteriorated, rendering him unfit to fly. FAA’s Federal Air Surgeon subsequently revoked Hoover’s medical certificate.

Hoover no longer was able to fly in airshow events, most of which were booked years in advance. Some of those airshows were in Australia. At the urging of Australian airshow promotors, Liddell intervened. He called Dr. Lawrence Marinelli, an FAA aviation medical examiner based in Los Angeles who was also licensed by Australia’s CAA to perform medical exams on its behalf. Marinelli subjected Hoover to several cognitive tests and a stringent aviation medical exam that he passed with flying

Top job Rob Liddell...


MTF...P2  

[Kharon]

Kidnap.

Someone should kidnap Doc Liddell and coerce him into returning, even for a short while,  back to Avmed.  Gods know it needs a stern examination and a prescribed course of plain, old fashioned common sense and a large dose of humanity.  It amazes me the amount of good, solid people who should be, but cannot countenance the notion of working for CASA; driven away by those who lurk deep within the rotten core.

Nice to know Hoover is still kicking about the planet and there are folk savvy enough to keep the donkey ticking over and to take care that it does.  Big smile.