davidgrant
Gentlemen,
I've been reading the posts here and the issues raised, some I agree with some I dont. Many are missing the point a little. When our company began operating the Mustang in Charter category we felt we were lifting the game by offering an aircraft far superior in both comfort and above all in safety than many of the current 30 year old machines. We have also invested a considerable amount of money to equip the machine for aero medical transfers, which it can accomplish in a very cost affective manner. We are mindful of the fact that this is a whole new era we are entering, and perhaps we are the first to put our toe in the water so to speak. To say we would let anyone loose in the aircraft without proper experience and training is unimaginable, we already run a training and checking program close to CAR 217 standards.
I agree with CASA's concerns regarding oversight and standards for these VLJ aircraft, and I also agree that some sort of C&T should be required, but this is not a fleet of aircraft we are talking about here it is a single aircraft.
If it is successful I have no doubt that more will follow, where formal CAR 217 may become cost effective. The imposition of CAR 217 for a single aircraft is huge cost burden and in itself may be counter productive in encouraging operators into modern safer aircraft. I feel that oversight and standards could be tackled in a much more cost effective way.
Examination of the requirements of CAR 217 the regulations are written for a one size fits all, ie there is not much difference between what is required by say, Qantas, or for a small charter operator.
It has been mentioned here operators should carefully choose a multi purpose fleet of different types to fit the market, CAR 217 discourages that because once you go past 3 or 4 types your C&T staff would be spending more time doing checks on themselves than actually checking line pilots, CAR 217 is written basically for a single type fleet. CAR 217 will also not address the issue of private operation, there are already many far higher performing aircraft mixing it with the heavy traffic that have no CASA oversight, either because they are privately operated or on a foreign register.
The imposition of CAR 217 for a single aircraft also raises a safety issue of currency. The machine in its first year flew 300 hours, it is expected to fly 400 in its second. CAR 217 will require those hours to be divided between two pilots. There is a lot of evidence from the USA to suggest that when currency drops below 200 hours per year the potential for an accident rises dramatically.
The requirement for CAR 217 has been imposed selectively on VLJ's but not on their main competitors turbo prop and larger piston types which in many ways are far more complicated to fly yet share fairly close performance parameters.
Back when I first started flying all flight tests were conducted by CASA, an instrument ratings required a six monthly check by a CASA FOI. Perhaps the answer to this issue is put some wings on the emu's CASA employs as FOI's and get them out in the industry checking standards until such time as an operation can sustain a full CAR 217 organisation.