Hi guys,
first, I am Austrian and come from an area about 100 klicks east of this site. My village basically lives of tourism - mainly winter but summer gets better every year. Cable-cars are an essential part of the business.
N5528P:
---"To the accident itself: As already pointed out here by many others, it is impossible to stop the operation of a cable car / tram / etc. etc. just because a chopper is flying somewhere overhead.
This would mean the immediate breakdown of any public transport in an urban area and would make a cable car useless.
There are not only cargo flights conducted throughout the day, but also emergency flights, police flights, military flights, traffic surveillance,.... "---
a) There is no one living up there! This is a tourist attraction so to speak! There is nothing braking down if the damn thing is not working for a couple of days! Okay the operator will cry a while, so what? The main income season is still 3 month away!
What happened will do way more damage to the economy than stopping cable car ops for a couple of days! The media will take care of that!
b) Don't exagerate, as stated before USL is not everyday flying.
Suppose you loose an engine, the pilot still has control over the aircraft (hopefully!) and can maneuver out of harms way ( ....for bystanders anyway) - Once a slingload goes its own way it is out of your control!
---"I cannot imagine that in every ski ressort in the US (for example), the cable cars cease their work just because a chopper is in the area . As a matter if fact, you do not have one cable car - in large ski ressorts you have 30 to 40 of such installations. Do you really believe they always stop because of a chopper? I really doubt that..."---
a) That's why you try to do these jobs off the main season, so you don't do that much economic damage while you close down the area! Also you don't have to shut down all 40 of them, just those that are in the way.....
In this case, the blame goes to the people who allowed this ops over an active skiing area!
I don't blame the operator (Knaus), if he has all the papers, this is his business! If he gets too concerned the competition will take the job. Nor do I blame the pilot, if he doesn't fly someone else will - especially if everything was kosher with the permits. I don't suppose that the cargo was dropped on purpose or by accidental release, but some mechanical/electrical failure.
It is just the general greed, that doesn't allow to clear the area for some time - even off-season.....
3top
Last edited by 3top; 10th Sep 2005 at 01:08.