Nobody to my knowledge has knocked back the EGPWS and nobody is saying that we shouldn't use it. What we are saying is "do we fully understand it and how it works in the offshore world?".
Undeniably the manufacturers have been slow to answer our queries and I suspect that their appreciation of the complex environment in which we work is not quite as comprehensive as their appreciation of overland ops.
Remember sods law - if it can happen then it will - one day. Remember Sioux City DC10, the Everglades DC9 of Valujet and countless others. Nothing to do with CFIT but excellent examples of what can happen when designs are inadequate or procedures are full of holes.
We are, I'm afraid duty-bound to ensure there are no traps in the EGPWS waiting to snare the unsuspecting pilot. In the meantime we can make the most of a great idea and not give those that introduced it the slightest opportunity to call us 'churlish'.
As to the continuing saga of the rigs and the radar can we put that to bed by simply saying that the 'E for enhanced' part of the EGPWS relies on a terrain database populated with data about the position and height of all obstructions.
If this function can live with an incomplete data-base of obstructions then OK, but if it cannot then we have to find a fix for all the obstructions we may encounter.
G
