[Peetwo]

Hitch early with Happy Easter wrap -

more news»

• CASA releases Part 141 Guidance Material
  
• Second Runway proposed for Sunshine Coast
  
• CASA to review Small Aircraft Maintenance Regulations
  
• Work starts on Bendigo Upgrade
  

The Last Minute Hitch: 24 March 2016
23 Mar 2016

Easter is here; a four-day break perfect for planning fly-aways. It's also the perfect trap for unwary fliers. Being at this time of year, the weather can vacillate between accomodating and downright hostile ... sometimes in a matter of hours. With many club excursions starting on Friday and ending on Monday, the time between going away and coming home is enough for the weather pattern to change significantly. Over the years, more than one fly-away has been extended by a day because the group encountered impassable skies on the way home. What fliers need to do is accept now that there's a chance they won't get home, and maybe even word-up the boss that they might not be in on Tuesday. Hopefully, that will ward off any cases of press-on-itis early.

Our new minister for transport Darren Chester has been a very busy person in the last couple of weeks. He's been through a string of briefings on the state of the aviation industry, and my agent in Canberra tells me he's got a few more to come. In a way that's a bit worrying ... exactly who is it that is conducting these briefings? There are a thousand individual opinions out there, each one carried to Canberra in a wheelbarrow pushed by self-interest. How does someone new to a portfolio sort out merit from madness when each one seems to stem from some level of expertise. Well, he has the Aviation Industry Consultative Council (AICC) set-up in December 2014 to work with. The idea of that council was to provide a direct link to the minister so feedback would get there without first going through the filters of CASA, Airservices and the department. With the Prime Minister pulling the trigger on a double-dissolution election (unless the senate caves in), we're bound to find out the results of these briefings in the form of a policy statement before polling day. That will be a good read ...

It has to be a relief for the MRO industry that CASA has decided to retain CAR 4A and update it to suit general aviation. It shows that the hard work done by Ken Cannane and the Aviation Maintenance Repair and Overhaul Business Association (AMROBA) is starting to leave a mark on the blackboards of Aviation House. AMROBA noted early that proposed new regs were simply not going to work if the same rules that applied to RPT aeroplanes were extended to GA. Cannane's work is not yet over (in fact it might be just starting); he and AMROBA will have a lot to do to make sure CAR 4A amendments are not infected with the same silliness that the proposed CASRs were going to have.

In other moves from Canberra, CASA has released guidance material for Part 141. This is the new suite of regs that apply to non-academy flying schools, to define it as simply as possible. Most of these schools and aero clubs have limited resources to deal with this sort of workload, and inevitably it falls to the Chief Flying Instructors to make it all work. That got me thinking. There is plenty of debate in the aviation community about the standard of flight training, especially that given by hour-building instructors who's eyes are more on their own log books than that of their students. So, in some kind of Bizarro World way, we take the best instructors we have (the CFIs) and pin them to their desks under a mass of paperwork. What we need is for them to be out in aeroplanes passing on years of experience. If CASA really wants to do something about flight training, they could always find away to get CFIs out from behind desks and back in aeroplanes. Simples.

May your gauges always be in the green,

Hitch

Also noticed a couple of comments from recent Oz Flying articles that I think deserve regurgitation, so here we go:-

First in response to Hitch's coverage of the Dick Smith UP post - Dick Smith urges Aviators to Quit:

Benjamin Morgan • 11 days ago

Astounded that Australian Flying would put the above to press. Rather than scaremonger, how about Australian Flying get behind those within the industry that are working hard to re-build the industry? Calling for the industry to pack up and leave is ridiculous.

• SteveHitchen Mod Benjamin Morgan • 11 days ago
  G'day, Ben. Australian Flying is totally behind those who are trying to re-build general aviation, and those people know that. However, as publishers we are obliged to run both sides of an argument provided it comes from someone who has industry credibility. Dick is one of the most controversial characters in aviation, and I don't necessarily agree with what he says (as I don't with this one), but that doesn't mean other people won't find merit in his argument.
   
  Benjamin Morgan SteveHitchen • 10 days ago
  Steve, I don't buy your position on this and feel its very irresponsible of you to be providing oxygen to such absurd commentary . If tomorrow Dick Smith releases a statement saying we should all jump of a cliff, would you feel it ethical to communicate it? Surely not.
  
  Ok, aviation is doing it tough in Australia and we are all feeling the pinch. That said, sinking the boot in and communicating to all and sundry for them sell their businesses, sell their aircraft and leave the industry, is hardly helping invigorate constructive debate with regard to solutions or pathways to recovery.
  
  What our industry needs right now is vision and leadership - not cheap scaremongering and sensationalist headlines.
  
  As one of our industry masthead publications - you can do better.
   
  
• SteveHitchen Mod Benjamin Morgan • 10 days ago
  Ben, you have an absolute right not to agree with my position, just as I have an absolute right not to agree with yours. Yes, if I thought Dick Smith had the background, expertise and integrity to advise us all to jump off a cliff, I would publish it. I wouldn't be jumping because I don't agree with it, but others might.
  

  
&..from same article:-

Alfred • 10 days ago

I am glad you guys posted this article. It's a shame what CASA have done to the industry with their backwards regulations. Just looks at NZ and how much easier it is to do things over there... Hopefully CASA one day will wake up and step back to realize before there's no industry left in Aus.

And remove that fricken' ATPL flight test, why bring that in? There were no issues before...

&..finally from Sandy on last week's Last minute Hitch:

Sandy Reith • 5 days ago

In regard to reform for General Aviation David Forsyth's score card should not be mistaken for real progress. The reality is that GA is in steep decline in spite of the ASRR recommendations and despite of any implementation of those recommendations. The new and unworkable rules and the long existing grinding machinery of CASA coupled with it's fear and fee mongering modus operandi, continues with scant abatement.

Without Parliamentary action and a change to the Civil Aviation Act the behemoth will continue to waste the GA industry at huge expense with loss of jobs and services to the Australian community.

MTF...P2