Originally Posted by
Okihara
You're right, albeit for the wrong reasons.
Low time PPLs are anyway not going to get an AG rating.
Why not? Because of CASR 61.1115 (1) (b) which requires candidates to hold a CPL or higher for the AG rating. Note that the rating itself is not enough, there's a requirement to hold the firebombing endorsement too.
Now that this has been clarified, I reiterate my suggestion that many who would otherwise be instructing or performing all sorts of less urgent flying activities when bushfires ravage Australia could get an AG rating with firebombing endorsement and act as reserve pilots.
Well, Squawk 7700 clearly wasn't. I'm not sure about the confusion, inefficiency and casualties part to be honest. Yes, there's a great deal of training involved but wouldn't that money be better invested so than spent in damage reparations? It'll take political impetus to implement. I'd rather read in the newspapers that a pilot died doing the right thing fighting fires than people who perished in the inferno trying to flee.
Many instructors have logged close to 1000 hours. As you say CASA would have the final say but I expect that things will change politically after this season's bushfires.
Please don’t keep telling me I’m wrong when I know what I’m talking about. A PPL (such as yourself) can get an AG rating, which comes after a CPL, but neither is a quick process which makes the suggestion rather laughable. As for reservists, forget it. Most instructors I know are lusting to fly a turbine more than ever and many will never get near one in the next 10 years.