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Not Happy Shane! - 

From Ben Morgan, via AOPAA:

AOPA AUSTRALIA CALLS FOR CASA TO WITHDRAW CHANGES TO COMMUNITY SERVICE FLIGHTS MINIMUM STANDARDS
December 21, 2018 By Benjamin Morgan


Friday, 21st December 2018

Mr Shane Carmody
Director of Aviation Safety, CASA
GPO BOX 2005
Canberra ACT 2601, Australia

Mr Michael McCormack MP
Deputy Prime Minister
Minister for Infrastructure and Transport
PO Box 6022, House of Representatives
Parliament House
CANBERRA ACT 2600, Australia

Dr Jane Thompson
RRAT Committee Secretary
PO BOX 6100
CANBERRA ACT 2600, Australia.

Call to withdraw proposed changes to Community Service Flights CD 1814OS

Mr Carmody,

The Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association of Australia calls on CASA to immediately withdraw it’s proposed changes to Community Service Flights, as published in your discussion paper CD1814OS.  Should the changes proposed by CASA be implemented, they will entirely undermine the viability of Community Service Flights nationwide and will leave thousands of sick and disadvantaged Australians without essential transport for medical needs.  The proposed changes will preclude qualified pilots and aircraft owners by unnecessarily increasing the regulatory and cost burdens, further contributing to general aviation industry decline.

Throughout this past year, you have loudly espoused your commitment to a just-culture stating that CASA bases aviation safety outcomes on evidence-based risk assessment and takes a pragmatic and proportionate approach towards safety-outcomes.  In view of this, any proposed changes to Community Service Flights should be based on the assessment of direct evidence and risk, not the subjective speculation by the regulator towards a possible perceived risk.

Your discussion paper (CD1814OS) published on 18th December 2018, fails to provide any statistical or accident data to support CASA’s proposed changes.  AOPA Australia is only aware of two charity flight accidents spanning the past 16 years, of which we note the following important facts;

Accident 1:  Occurred in 2011, PPL holder, over 6,000 hours experience, flying Night VFR, had owned the accident aircraft for many years.  ATSB attributes the accident to a failure of the PIC to maintain lowest safe altitude of which the result was a CFIT event.

Accident 2:  Occurred in 2017, PPL holder, over 1,000 hours experience, flying VFR, had owned the aircraft for several years.  Whilst the final accident report has not yet been delivered, the preliminary report identifies that the pilot departed in inclement weather that precluded the ability to maintain VFR, resulting in inadvertent IFR and subsequent loss of control.

Whilst these two accidents were tragic, they did not reflect a failure of regulatory aviation safety standards, but rather were attributed to a failure in pilot decision making in the cockpit.  This highlights a need for better pilot education and support services, along with peer mentoring – not a need for greater regulation by CASA.

Based on the factual accident information;

1. Both pilots (Accident 1 and 2) were experienced PPL holders with over 6,000 and 1,000 hours in command;
   
   1. Neither accident reflects a substandard approach to existing minimum experience requirements;
      
   2. CASA’s proposal to increase minimum experience requirements from 250 to 400 hours would not have prevented the two historical accidents from occurring.
      

1. Both pilots were current in their respective aircraft and had conducted regular charity flights;
   
   1. Neither accident reflects a substandard approach to existing pilot currency requirements;
      
   2. CASA’s proposal to change pilot currency from 90 days to 30 days would not have prevented the two historical accidents from occurring.
      
2. Neither aircraft suffered a partial or full engine failure, or any other aircraft maintenance related event;
   
   1. Neither accident reflects a substandard approach to existing aircraft maintenance requirements;
      
   2. CASA’s proposal to require AD/ENG/4 will preclude a significant number of private aircraft from participating in Community Service Flights, by requiring them to maintain aircraft engines to commercial charter industry standards. For example, the cost to overhaul a Beechcraft Bonanza A36 engine (IO-550) to comply with AD/ENG/4 can be as high as $85,000 AUD.
      

In all three points above, CASA’s proposed changes;

1. Would not have stopped or prevented the two historical accidents from occurring;
   
2. Do not address the relevant safety need, which is pilot support, education and awareness;
   
3. Will result in increasing regulatory burden and costs to participating aircraft owners and pilots;
   
4. Will result in reducing Community Service Flight capabilities nationwide;
   
5. Will leave thousands of persons throughout regional Australia without essential transport;
   
6. Will contribute to general aviation industry decline.
   

None of the changes proposed by CASA appear to be responsive to any relevant safety factors.  Rather, they present as a knee-jerk reaction to a perceived requirement for the regulator to be seen to be taking action.

Furthermore, AOPA Australia is deeply concerned that CASA have moved to introduce these unnecessary changes during a Christmas holiday break when few aircraft owners and pilots can respond and at a time when Parliament has risen and won’t return until February 2019.  It would appear that CASA has been very selective in its timing, seeking to avoid political interference and/or scrutiny, which is both inappropriate and unfortunate.

We also make clear that we do not believe that CASA has adequately consulted with the industry or the major charities regarding these unnecessary changes.  We call on CASA to immediately withdraw CD1814OS and ask that the regulator establish a working group with representatives of each of the charities affected along with a representative of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association of Australia.

In 2017 the AOPA Australia met with Rob Walker, Industry Stakeholder Manager for CASA and extended an offer to help develop and deliver appropriate pilot education and support services for those conducting Community Service Flights focused on decision making in the cockpit.  Whilst our offer was not taken up, we remain ready and willing to assist.

Thank you for your time and we would appreciate your direct response.

Yours Sincerely,

BENJAMIN MORGAN
Executive Director
Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association of Australia (AOPA Australia)
Hangar 600, Prentice Street, Bankstown Airport NSW 2200 Australia.
PO BOX 26, Georges Hall NSW 2198 Australia.

 
And off the Yaffa:

Industry unhappy with Community Service Proposals
20 December 2018

The general aviation community has reacted with alarm to CASA proposals that would introduce stringent requirements for community service flights (CSF).

CSF flights are those where pilots volunteer their time and aircraft to save people needing medical treatment from long road trips to and from home.

These operations have traditionally been classified as private, but after two fatal accidents involving CSF aircraft, CASA is now seeking to tighten controls on the pilots and the operations.

"CASA is proposing the new requirements to support pilots who conduct community service flights and to enhance public confidence in the services," CASA CEO Shane Carmody said in his December CASA Briefing newsletter.

"The proposed requirements relate to pilot flight time experience, licensing and medicals, night operations and maintenance. In many cases pilots currently conducting community service flights will already meet the proposed requirements.

"However, CASA believes it is appropriate to formally set out these requirements as pilots carry out community service flights without the organisational structure and support provided by an air operator’s certificate."

The proposed new restrictions include:

• a landing in the previous 30 days on the aircraft type or aircraft class
  
• 10 hours time-on-type for VFR
  
• 20 hours time-on-type for IFR
  
• logbook entries to be identified as a CSF
  
• 400 hours total time for PPLs
  
• 250 hours in command
  
• 100 hours flight time for multi-engined aircraft
  
• No helicopter operations
  
• No night VFR
  
• No more than five passengers
  
• VFR flights must submit a flight plan, flight note or SARTIME to Airservices
  
• Pilots flying on a Basic Class 2 cannot do CSFs.
  

"The proposed conditions are necessary in an operation where there is no AOC or other structure to support the supervision and oversee the development of new and existing CSF pilots, or to ensure that maintenance standards appropriate to the nature of the operation have been satisfied," CASA states in the proposal.

Angel Flight CEO Marjorie Pagani told Australian Flying that the CASA proposals are bewildering.

"It does not make any sense at all, because CASA conceded it does not relate to accident causes or data," she said. "We and AOPA have called upon them to  provide supportive risk analyses or any statistical data, and they have not.

"The FAA publishes only recommendations. I suggested to CASA they publish a CAAP but they ignored that. They have not consulted us or any aviation organisation on this."

CASA consulted on community service flights in 2014, suggesting initally that co-ordinating organisations like Angel Flight or Little Wings would need to be full approved self-administering organisations (ASAO) under CASR Part 149. The proposal met with no support from the aviation community and was scrapped the following year.

Pagani also believes that CASA may be over-stepping their mark by telling pilots and owners what they can and can't do with their aeroplanes.

"There is a broader question, and that is the proscribing of lawful conduct by properly licensed pilots and owners, by the stroke of an administrative pen.

"This will affect many pilots, both in terms of flying and maintenance. If they succeed in this without challenge, they will use the precedent as enabling them to impose any conditions on any pilot, or, if they choose, to shut down all of the community flight organisations."

CASA said today that CSFs and private flights were different in nature.

"A person flying as a private passenger in an aircraft is not expecting their flight to be similar to a RPT or charter flight," the spokesperson said.

"They usually have some social connection with and knowledge of the pilot and the flight is not usually conducted under the operational pressures that are often associated with a CSF.

"Whereas a CSF is arranged and coordinated by a third party, the passenger and pilot have no connection to one another and there are operational pressures that apply which do not apply to an ordinary private flight, for example the need to get to a specialist medical appointment that has possibly been scheduled months in advance."

CASA has confirmed the new proposals will not apply to FunFlight because those flights don't involve travel to or from medical treatment.

Read more at http://www.australianflying.com.au/lates...tcXVuSZ.99

MTF...P2