[Peetwo]

Latest Oz Aviation rumours, innuendo and commentary -    

Via Carmody Capers:

The Silent Majority; what a great team.

And; what a great pity it is that the Silent (and not so much) Majority of aviation folk can’t vote for the top deck crew at CASA; that would ‘rock ‘em’. Aunt Pru ran that ‘pol’ – the results NFP – but suffice to say the next miniscule will be shocked to discover the general, local and international, disgust, disquiet and lack of confidence in our overblown ‘safety’ agencies.

One interesting snippet – pure speculation now, based on some very small straws blowing about in a stiff breeze is that St. Commodes days are numbered. Just whispers and dot joining – but, rumour has it that our part time DAS not only wants to go, but there is a push from below, within the CASA ranks to be shed of the incubus. Naked ambition and political disquiet combined with a touch of madness seems to be in the air.

Nothing like a whisper of good rumour to start the week – believe it if you like.

Toot – toot.

&..

Not bad K as rumours go. Sets the mind to cogitating just how the apparatus of CAsA works, especially when it's difficult to imagine any logical explanation to what they do.

Their mantra is "Safety", yet they don't achieve any better safety outcome than any of their peers. They maintain they are first and foremost safety regulators, yet their regulations have very little positive affect on safety, some would say a negative effect. There is also the intended or unintended (you choose) consequence that it is now plainly obvious, their regulations have decimated a whole industry. To what end?

To my mind CAsA is a complete and obvious failure at what was intended, so why have they been allowed to continue as they are?

Ever since they were separated from mainstream governance as a government independent Statutory Authority, the key word there is "independent", there has been a subtle movement behind the scenes to separate its workings from any form of scrutiny or outside control.

There are those who would say the so called "Iron Ring" was responsible for that and to some extent is probably true, but I really do wonder how much influence their union has. Given they are paid extremely generous salaries, way above industry standard for equivalent positions or level of expertise and given everyone will endeavour to protect their rice bowl it would be understandable their union would be working very hard behind the scenes to maintain the status quo, no matter what affect their efforts have on the well being of the industry that supports them.

Whispers abound, that within CAsA the atmosphere is like a modern day game of thrones, especially amongst the upper echelon, the old saying power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely, perhaps rings true.

Has CAsA become so inwardly focused that it has become blind to what their actions are doing?

And Sandy in reply to the SBG on Farcebook: https://www.facebook.com/sandy.reith.31/...ed_comment

Sandy Reith Behind all worthwhile endeavours for improvements in life’s organisation it pays to keep an eye on principals and definitions. 

The then Minister Anthony Albanese in 2009 created the independent Commonwealth entity of the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) by removing the body of the same name out of his Department.

Mr. Albanese made it clear that it would be a great advantage to have this body removed from political influence, hence ‘independent.’ By reason it follows that Mr. Albanese expected ATSB to be altruistic, efficient and generally act only in the public interest. Unfortunately Mr. Albanese did not consider that by creating a monopoly funded by the taxpayer, similar to Air Services Australia and the Civil Aviation Safety Authority, that these bodies will, to some extent, exhibit all the undesirable attributes of monopolies of any stripe. 

These attributes will show characteristics of inefficiency and expensive bureaucratic procedures.

We see ever more complex rules, arrogance and worse because the governing law is so broad it becomes interpretive by the officials in charge. 

Without a much more direct linkage between responsibility and accountability back to the aviation industry and the general public little progress is possible. 

This has been the principal problem of aviation in Australia for a very long time and Mr. Albanese has not been alone in divesting himself of Ministerial responsibility and using a flawed rationale to justify his detrimental actions.

Do not get me started.

TB – “[yet] their regulations have very little positive affect on safety; some would say a negative effect. Etc.

This is a discussion we have not had on forum. The subject gets discussed at BRB & IOS indaba – a lot – there is even a draft ‘report’ I’ve sketched out (from the discussions) on the effect and ramifications some of the ‘regulations’ produce which identifies ‘real risk’ through bad law. (Lives 'on the shelf' , no one who gives a goddamn to give it to).

Many categories of faux ‘risk’ are subject to the CASA ethos; and it is becoming apparent that much of the ‘regulation’ is misdirected away from the core purpose; as in, what exactly is CASA trying to achieve. Shirley reckons the sole purpose should be to protect life and limb; those airborne and those below; which, standing alone, is a grand notion.

But from what and how? That is the question. From conception to the grave; each human is ‘at risk’ every moment of every day. The level of risk is a constantly changing ‘number’ – you’d think you were fairly safe tucked in bed after a good dinner – a fair bet to see the next sunrise – not so. Check out the statistics; lot’s of folk never make it through the night.  I digress…

It is possible to ‘identify’ and even enumerate ‘risk’. Insurance companies do it all the time – and they are pretty damn good at it – the higher the risk – the higher the premium and they don’t mess about. Their business is a ‘high risk’ one – big money, nerves of steel and teams of lawyers which would challenge the Ten Commandments if needed. In short, they are quite capable of defending their risk analysis (and investors money).

This is all well and good for insurance companies – but do the  ‘aviation’ agencies need this same level of protection, through ‘law’? Does aviation safety really need a mighty, complex rule set to keep the industry safe? Most would argue it does not. The notion of ‘sector risk analysis’ is (IMO) a brilliant one. At a very simple level, a stellar example is the Flight Safety Controlled Flight into Terrain (CFIT) analysis. For a start it’s ‘free’ – no cost and no legal binding or escape clauses. You download the paperwork, work through it and come up with a ‘risk score’ – say 25 (for sake of a number). Then – pre flight you run the numbers for the planned flight – if you arrive with a score of say 27 – then the ‘risk’ is higher than the norm. Then, pre flight the increased risk area can be identified and reduced. It ain’t infallible but and, here’s the rub; you are made aware – early in the piece – that there may be an increased ‘risk’. Takes about five minutes to do this. It is called ‘risk management’.

Australian aviation ‘rules’ are not about managing ‘flight risk’ – it could be argued that they are contradictory to their intended purpose. If anyone can prove that a silly thing like Part 61 (a) produces a better pilot (b) reduces the ‘risk matrix’ and © allows instructing pilots the use of discretion or judgement – I’ll stand bare arsed in Pitt St. Part 61 is a typical CASA abomination and an expensive, counterproductive detriment to safe training practice. Ticking a box don’t mean sod all – if the sequence is only ‘done’.

CASA arse covering began when the corruption associated with Lockhart River nearly got out of the box: CASA lost it’s way after the Seaview debacle – the terminal result of this clearly demonstrable through the Pel-Air fiasco. So long as the agency is a protection racket for useless crown ministers – nothing will improve. The worst of it is a simple matter – this is exactly how the politicians want it to be; no responsibility whatsoever.

It could all be sorted in a heartbeat – with the right minister and expert management of CASA – then again, I could win Lotto tomorrow and would not ever, never once look back at this shambles. CASA in the rear view mirror – Paradise here I come…….

Curse you Thorny; my bloody coffee’s gone cold.

Toot – toot.

TBC...P2