"Sheer bastardry" of the CASA Sydney Regional office.
Extract from SBG post:
CASA Sydney Regional Office: The last bastion of the McComic Stasi era?
Well it would seem that the McComic psychopaths at the CASA Sydney Office are at it again...
From 'that man', via the Oz...
Transplant air service grounded
![[Image: c37fe27de04c086e5117ccb60f3b8f99?width=650]](http://cdn.newsapi.com.au/image/v1/c37fe27de04c086e5117ccb60f3b8f99?width=650)
The Australian
12:00AM January 3, 2018
[size=undefined]7
EAN HIGGINS
![[Image: ean_higgins.png]](http://media.theaustralian.com.au/authors/images/bio/ean_higgins.png)
Reporter
Sydney
@EanHiggins
A Sydney patient missed out on a heart transplant last month because the aviation watchdog decided to ground all seven pilots of an air ambulance company over what senior industry figures call a minor technicality involving one of them.[/size]
The Civil Aviation Safety Authority refused to grant a short-term exemption for two days to charter flight company FalconAir, which would have meant it could have had one crew ready to fly urgent medical missions, including the later transplant flight.
Former CASA chairman and businessman Dick Smith described the regulator’s action as “absolute sheer bastardry” and a reflection of how bureaucracy and inflexibility were strangling general aviation.
But CASA said it had not been made aware of the problem of the heart transplant flight. “If we had been approached at the time, we would have done everything we could to facilitate that flight,” spokesman Peter Gibson said.
On December 8, CASA grounded not only FalconAir’s check pilot because an audit revealed he flew a competency flight on the wrong type of aircraft, but also the other six FalconAir pilots he had tested — because those checks were consequently deemed to be invalid.
An air ambulance flight broker contacted FalconAir on December 16 asking if the company could fly a St Vincent’s Hospital transplant team to Auckland on an urgent mission to take out the heart from a donor and bring it back to Sydney to transplant into the recipient patient. As a result of the groundings, FalconAir had to say no.
The broker, Nathan Gottle from NJP Aviation Services, wrote to FalconAir a few days later about the tragic outcome. “NJP was not successful in arranging a suitable aircraft for this mission from any operator on the east coast of Australia,” Mr Gottle said in the email. “After a period of approx. 3 hrs of attempting to source a suitable aircraft/crew, it was determined by the transplant team that the mission could no longer go ahead, as we would not be able to get the medical team to Auckland in time.”
A spokeswoman for St Vincent’s said the patient was “still on the waiting list” for a transplant.
FalconAir chief executive Marc De Stoop, who is also the president of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, accepted that “CASA staff doing the audit on FalconAir were just doing their job”. But he said the complex rules, legal constraints and red tape they operated under meant the opportunity for sensible and collaborative solutions, which would have been possible under US air regulations, were unavailable here.
“I have pilots sitting on the ground,” Mr De Stoop said, adding that only three out of the seven had since been granted an exemption.
While Mr Gibson would not provide an absolute guarantee that CASA would have lifted the ban on FalconAir pilots, he said it had the power to grant “mercy flight” exemptions. Mr De Stoop, however, said he had repeatedly told CASA from the day his pilots were grounded that he and Careflight needed one crew to fly “life-saving operations”, but the regulator had not granted an exemption. Since the “non-compliant” tests, his two check pilots had passed simulator proficiency checks in the US.
FalconAir operates two Dassault Falcon F-20 twin-engine jets out of Sydney, and one Falcon F-50 three-engined jet out of Brisbane. It offers corporate jet charters but specialises in aeromedical services including patient and organ transfers and medical evacuations.
Mr De Stoop said his check pilot made an error in good faith in interpreting the rules under which some checks but not others could be done in different types of aircraft.
Mr De Stoop pointed to a CASA “double standard”. The check pilot had been allowed to conduct a flight review of one pilot, with CASA witnesses on board, the day after he was grounded, but the authority “refused to grant him our request for a very limited exemption — two flights — to allow him to check two other of our pilots”.
Hmm...TICK..TOCK...Barnaby -
MTF...P2
Extract from SBG post:
CASA Sydney Regional Office: The last bastion of the McComic Stasi era?
Quote:Quote from today's Alphabet's post: Industry feedback on Chester dumping;
Quote:Hmm...passing strange that this week's SBG - The trick that wins the rubber. - would appear to highlight that the CASA Sydney Regional Office has missed the Carmody memo on embracing the ASRR reforms and indeed the DAS's very own instruction/directive on CASA adopting a 'just culture' - refer: E is for?? Part II: Proof is in the pudding; or Legerdemain– a handy skill. - so who is a poor dumbass knuckledragger meant to believe?
On a quick ring around of operators across Australia, represented by different CASA regional offices, the word was (besides one or two minor aberrations), that there was a definite cultural shift within the CASA coalface ranks that seemed to reflect the recent Carmody initiatives:
Quote:Oz Flying article: Carmody - "Most of the Aviation Safety Regulation Review recommendations are now ongoing as they are embedded into CASA's new policies, processes and procedures. Many of these will take time to bed down but we are making significant headway."
Carmody also revealed he had been collaborating with ASRR chairman and report author David Forsyth to track progress.
In early 2016, Forsyth assessed that CASA had completed only 29% of the reforms that applied to them, but indicated today that progress had been made since then.
"While a number of issues are still in work, there is clear progress on necessary improvements and re-establishing a trust based relationship with industry," Forsyth said.
Carmody also reiterated his belief in the value of the ASRR and the impact reforms are having.
"The review was a very important and valuable benchmarking exercise that has focussed CASA on making worthwhile improvements that are now paying dividends to the aviation community," he said.
However from recent evidence in the DJ embuggerance etc. it would seem that the Sydney Regional office is either in open defiance thumbing it's nose at the Carmody adopted ASRR policies; or the Carmody initiatives are nothing more than a 'show and tell' exercise to appease the pollies and industry till such time as big-R regulator 'business as usual' can be enforced.
The following historical collective Aunty Pru post extract IMO almost perfectly highlights why Carmody (or someone at a Crown Minister level) needs to clean out these former McComic acolyte grubs from the CASA Sydney Office ASAP: Ref - On joining the dots and making of dashes. post #18...
Well it would seem that the McComic psychopaths at the CASA Sydney Office are at it again...
From 'that man', via the Oz...
Transplant air service grounded
Marc De Stoop, head of FalconAir. Picture: James Croucher
The Australian
12:00AM January 3, 2018
[size=undefined]7
EAN HIGGINS
Reporter
Sydney
@EanHiggins
A Sydney patient missed out on a heart transplant last month because the aviation watchdog decided to ground all seven pilots of an air ambulance company over what senior industry figures call a minor technicality involving one of them.[/size]
The Civil Aviation Safety Authority refused to grant a short-term exemption for two days to charter flight company FalconAir, which would have meant it could have had one crew ready to fly urgent medical missions, including the later transplant flight.
Former CASA chairman and businessman Dick Smith described the regulator’s action as “absolute sheer bastardry” and a reflection of how bureaucracy and inflexibility were strangling general aviation.
But CASA said it had not been made aware of the problem of the heart transplant flight. “If we had been approached at the time, we would have done everything we could to facilitate that flight,” spokesman Peter Gibson said.
On December 8, CASA grounded not only FalconAir’s check pilot because an audit revealed he flew a competency flight on the wrong type of aircraft, but also the other six FalconAir pilots he had tested — because those checks were consequently deemed to be invalid.
An air ambulance flight broker contacted FalconAir on December 16 asking if the company could fly a St Vincent’s Hospital transplant team to Auckland on an urgent mission to take out the heart from a donor and bring it back to Sydney to transplant into the recipient patient. As a result of the groundings, FalconAir had to say no.
The broker, Nathan Gottle from NJP Aviation Services, wrote to FalconAir a few days later about the tragic outcome. “NJP was not successful in arranging a suitable aircraft for this mission from any operator on the east coast of Australia,” Mr Gottle said in the email. “After a period of approx. 3 hrs of attempting to source a suitable aircraft/crew, it was determined by the transplant team that the mission could no longer go ahead, as we would not be able to get the medical team to Auckland in time.”
A spokeswoman for St Vincent’s said the patient was “still on the waiting list” for a transplant.
FalconAir chief executive Marc De Stoop, who is also the president of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, accepted that “CASA staff doing the audit on FalconAir were just doing their job”. But he said the complex rules, legal constraints and red tape they operated under meant the opportunity for sensible and collaborative solutions, which would have been possible under US air regulations, were unavailable here.
“I have pilots sitting on the ground,” Mr De Stoop said, adding that only three out of the seven had since been granted an exemption.
While Mr Gibson would not provide an absolute guarantee that CASA would have lifted the ban on FalconAir pilots, he said it had the power to grant “mercy flight” exemptions. Mr De Stoop, however, said he had repeatedly told CASA from the day his pilots were grounded that he and Careflight needed one crew to fly “life-saving operations”, but the regulator had not granted an exemption. Since the “non-compliant” tests, his two check pilots had passed simulator proficiency checks in the US.
FalconAir operates two Dassault Falcon F-20 twin-engine jets out of Sydney, and one Falcon F-50 three-engined jet out of Brisbane. It offers corporate jet charters but specialises in aeromedical services including patient and organ transfers and medical evacuations.
Mr De Stoop said his check pilot made an error in good faith in interpreting the rules under which some checks but not others could be done in different types of aircraft.
Mr De Stoop pointed to a CASA “double standard”. The check pilot had been allowed to conduct a flight review of one pilot, with CASA witnesses on board, the day after he was grounded, but the authority “refused to grant him our request for a very limited exemption — two flights — to allow him to check two other of our pilots”.
Quote:Graham
When will this government have the guts to put the cleaners through CASA. An authority who is destroying the very industry it regulates.
Steve
When I moved to Oz in 1980, I went about converting my private pilot license and Class 1 Instrument Rating [Airline Pilot standard]. Bureaucratic madness (Sir Humphrey at his best), 12 months and $20K later...
Les
As a person who has been lucky enough to receive a transplant I know what this means to the person who missed out on the heart transplant. CASA should be ashamed of their actions.
Les Qld
William
I support Dick Smith's assertion that this regulator has gone too far. CASA saying that they weren't approached regarding the heart transplant flight is a lie. The patient should sue them for millions.
Peter
I am not an expert but from reports over the last few years, it seems as if the time has come for a review of the aviation industry and its associated bodies. It seems as if their has been a bit of empire building going on.
Oscar
CASA - staffed by public servants who love running meetings with no outcomes, with bosses that make decisions with no accountability. We need a Frank Lowy to fix this rotten organisation just like how he fixed Soccer Australia when it was infested with ethnic dysfunctionality.
Phil
CASA like the rest of the APS is there to cover its own butt and create jobs , plain and simple.
QANTAS And Virgin call the shots so the General Aviation sector is now so over burdened with regulation and complexity that it's is dying .
Not fuel prices or lack of business,no the regulator is literally choking General Aviation to death.
Only a complete reset of CASA back to the dual role of promoting aviation as well as regulating it (ie a CAA) will fix this.
Arthur
If the article is correct, someone is lying. The broker's statement seems to contradict CASA's statement. An Administrative Inquiry should be conducted from within the responsible Ministry, with the findings made public and officials held personally accountable for any poor decision making. This would supply evidence should the transplant non-recipient choose to seek compensation (from any individual as well as an organisation) - as it stands, that individual has only hearsay to support a claim. I don't believe that a Freedom of Information query would reveal where the failure lies, and a failure it surely is. Senior Management exists over peons to consider the bigger picture. Ambulances are required to follow the road rules until there is an emergency. It seems CASA doesn't understand that the same should apply to Air Ambulances.
Steve
Make no mistake, CASA is mostly responsible for the demise of aviation in Australia.
CASA public servants are out of control. No accountability and no scrutiny by either side of politics for decades.
No other country has an aviation regulator as incompetent or dysfunctional as CASA.
Ashley
Like everything else in Australia - over-regulated and antiquated bureaucracy stifles not only innovation, but just getting things done. This is why the smart money is moving offshore.
Vern
Bureaucracy, not common sense is running the country.
Kim
CASA has pulled more & more power into itself to justify its existence & provide it with plenty to do. It needs a thorough review and downsizing to get it back to being a public service and not a public supervisor. The other area that infuriated me is the delay these regulators like CASA take to investigate & report back on air accidents. Some of them take years for no logical reason. They need to have a boot up the tail to do their work quickly & efficiently.
Brian
Over the years, I have watched as this and another Aviation authority have seemed hell bent on driving general aviation in Australia to the wall. We need safety, but the sheer bloody mindedness of CASA over imposing petty rules at the expense of experience and common sense has long been apparent. The holy grail of absolute safety has been allowed to take over the day to day running of general aviation with impossible burdens and costs imposed which have not affected the already high standards. Dick Smith should be listened to and the Minister responsible should move quickly to an inquiry which could examine the red tape and recommend discarding the rubbish contained in the regulations
Hmm...TICK..TOCK...Barnaby -
MTF...P2