About three years ago I was at the NBAA (National Business Aircraft Association) conference and in a meeting with the FAA about the future of airspace usage a spokesman for the FAA took the podium and announced that all aircraft operating above FL280 where going to have be RVSM equipped and certified by January, 2005. He pounded the top of podium to make his point and then stated “We (the FAA) are sick and tired of you operators dragging you feet to do these modifications, you guys are just like the airlines winning about how much money this cost and the downtime etc, etc.”
The poor foolish man asked if there were any questions.
Well, I got and asked a simple question. Why? We do not need RVSM in the United States airspace; we gots lots of airspace, what we need are runways. I then asked if RVSM would eliminate holding at DFW, ORD, ALT, STL and busy airports on days when the weather was good.
Well of course it won’t and now we have proof with ORD.
Waste of time and money.