Originally Posted by
Bksmithca
robsrich
Not sure I'm willing to buy the line about it being smaller private machines that are crashing at low energy. Accident rate are broken down to account for the various sizes of fleets across the world and with a rate of 8.14 per 100,000 flying hours One might question the training and testing methods in Australia
Agree it is hard to compare apples with oranges. Australian figures are somewhat different to CA and USA. A large number of mustering machines here are engaged in cattle/sheep herding on cattle/sheep ranches where the owner can buy his own helicopter and then muster livestock needing only a private license and some mustering training to fly on a commercial type activity as a private pilot over his property.
This causes a muddle - the private pilot is doing high risk flying on his own company property, and does not need to have a very complex safety system (if any?) Their accidents maybe overlooked during record keeping by the regulator. Thus a lot of losses are the result of low level relatively slow maneuvers chasing unhappy soon to be MacDonald's burgers.
Further to your comment on Australian training; the new regulations are coming into effect by early December, and we hope things will improve. Why? The insurance industry has said enough is enough, and are withdrawing from insuring machines in this part of the world! Or charging outlandish premiums.
Guess what - drones are making inroads in some areas - they are more readily accepted by the cattle and much cheaper to run - but we still need helicopters - these trends are interesting?