Originally Posted by
Lead Balloon
Interesting to read the (expensive) extent of CASA’s largely unsuccessful attempts to focus blame on a single individual and away from the systemic regulatory issues.
I wonder if Dr Stanton is CASA's subject matter expert for aerobatic training? I know that he has some experience at this and was highly regarded.
"132. Mr Awad, the former CEO of AWAL (from 2013 – 2021) gave evidence that his aerobatic endorsement in the USA took in the order of 10 hours. He undertook a series of training flights with a check pilot who was a very experienced aerobatic pilot with each flight being “roughly between one and 1.5 hours in duration”. He considered eight to ten hours to be “the basic”.
133. CASA’s Branch Manager of Sport and Recreation Aviation, Dr Anthony Stanton, gave evidence that he would expect a flight activity endorsement to take eight hours, and “on average 10 to 15 hours”. In his experience, the instruction should take place with a series of lessons. .....
134. Dr Stanton said that if a student seemed to have had some prior aerobatics training that would not justify a truncation or shortening of the instruction time. He added:
If he came to me, I would actually take longer ..."
Mr Awad could not have got an aerobatic endorsement in the USA because the FAA does not have such an endorsement. So, Dr Stanton would expect Mr Awad to undergo 10-15+ hours of training in Australia on top of his 10 hours in the USA to get a CASA aerobatic endorsement?
'Dr Stanton was specifically asked the following: Is it something that CASA can look into as to whether flying schools - have an adequate knowledge - if I can put it that way - of what they are meant to be doing in terms of (a) developing their syllabus and (b) ensuring that if the spin recovery methods are to be the methods prescribed in a pilot operating handbook or flight manual, that those are the methods only to be used? ---CASA recently did publish a spinning AC. I'm reasonably confident that that content is contained in that AC, but I certainly have a review of it to make sure it is, but I’d be surprised if that’s not in there
." Not true, Dr Stanton, there is no AC on spinning and you have withdrawn CAAP 155-1, Aerobatics, with no sign of a replacement AC on aerobatics & spinning!
""210. ... CASA takes issue as to the terminology used (“flight training operators or organizations” and “flight instructors”), submitting that it is neither necessary nor appropriate to review flight instructor standards of performance and consequentially, the recommendation should not be accepted."
What about the requirement for spin and aerobatic instructors in CASA 62/20 — Conditions on Flight Crew Authorisations (Edition 3) Instrument 2020..