Chief pilots

[Super Cecil]

Seen some good, some bad. You'd rekon the job of AG chief pilots is to cream all the good work off so you can make the most money have the most time off. The down side of this is leaving all the crap work to the inexpirenced pilots, usually the smallest blocks with the most powerlines, supervision means seeing them walk into the pub when the've finished the work.

The good ones start the inexpirenced ones off on the bigger blocks, easy running and actually stand in the paddock watching and supervising. The good ones actually share the cream work and do those sh!tty blocks with all the powerlines so the young fellas can ease into it. The good ones also don't expect the new bloke to put a 12 hour day on their first day, starting with an hour or 2 and working up gradually.

With Charter/Training the chief pilot should also share the work out, how many do you know that do? I knew an great old bloke who rekoned that part of a chief pilots job was to clean the toilets! he used to do it himself, said it balanced things.
How many chief pilots do you know clean Aircraft, let alone toilets.

[currawong]

A good mate left a job recently for that very reason, Cecil.

I reckon a real problem can be when the owner/operator is also the chief pilot. Part of the chief pilots role is to filter out stupid/unreasonable/dangerous/vague requests that may be pressed onto line pilots. This may not always happen.

There is much talk about lowering accident rates at the moment.

Is supervision up to scratch?

[Super Cecil]

Supervision or keeping an eye out or whatever you call it should cover all pilots. If you have a mate that's very expirenced and has developed some bad habits, would you call him a boofhead to his face and have a talk with him about it? We all need to take more responsibility for our own actions and that of our industry.

We've all seen the "I've got 1000 hours now, I know everything" problems, the trouble is no matter what expirence you have, it can still (and does) happen to anybody, as we've seen lately.

Years ago, when there were more Aircraft and they were cheaper to replace it didn't seem to be the problem like now. Are the actual accident rates going up or is it just the Aircraft are worth more now? Years ago it seemed like we were losing 2 or more pilots a year for years on end, is it the same now? how do the hours flown/accident rate compare for the last 20 years? is it just the insurance company's making more noise? Might be an idea to get onto Full at AAAA to see if he has any figures to compare years?

Machinery is safer, more reliable and easier now even though the workload has gone up with more things to twiddle with in the office. It was simple with flagmen (when they wer'nt pissed, stoned, late, walked too far or too little or had flat batterys in their torches) because you had you eyes outside most of the time.
Now with GPS seems like most of your time is inside, though I'm sure the worst possible job done with GPS is still better than eyeballing or flagers.

So apart from being less mercenary and looking out more for each other, any ideas?

[currawong]

Some (good) ones will not task anyone with a job they are not prepared to do themselves.

Some (bad) ones hire others for that specific reason - to do the stuff they are not prepared to do themselves.

Some just crash a lot. If they are the boss, who is going to sack them for costing too much?