CRAB - I see at last you show your true colours. When all else fails you resort to personal abuse. And why?? - because you cannot make me agree that rules are only for the less able than you who, by your own postings, seem to advocate that they do not/should not apply to you.
The first thing you learn in HEMs is the paradox of taking extreme risk (albiet afforded in the operating rules) only to find out that the victim has croaked, or has a minor injury. Slowly, over time, you learn to be much more discerning with how you choose to spend your own allocation of "Nine Lives". I am sure this is a concept common to most long term HEMs pilots. CRAB - by your approach to this thread I get the impression this penny has not really dropped with you!!
GEOFFERS - the voice of reason.
MISTERBONKERS - The H/V curve in a Limitations section - IS A LIMIT.
If it appears in the PERF section - IT IS A TOOL.
If the operating rules (Like PC3) require you to have a Safe Forced Landing Option at all/or some of the time, you use the PERF H/V Chart to help you retain this capability.
You cannot simplify any of this into a YOU CAN and YOU CAN'T statement and I apolgise if I gave you that impression. It depends on the location of the Chart in the AFM, the operating rules you are subject to and finally - AND PROBABLY THE MOST IMPORTANT what risks you are prepared to take. Like H500 says, he accepts some risk to his family when he is actually flying and he is talking about private night flights I suspect rather than CAT. Fair enough. He says his H500 has the H/V chart in the Perf section and not the limitations section.
Maybe H500 can put some meat on the bones here and give us his feeling about operating inside the avoid curve with his wife/kids on a private flight. Does he feel comfortable doing this or does he try to avoid this situation??
MISTERBONKERS - I am not sure we have established we can operate in the H/V avoid "Safely". I think we have established it can be done within the rules some of the time. It is safe as long as the donkey keeps on working. If it stops - you may then be unsafe, but even this is about "degrees" of safety. This is the really diffcult part of rule-making...where to draw the line. For pilots who are compelled by the needs of the task to operate beyond the line afforded by the rules, their airmanship becomes the last defence against either disaster, or just an undesirable event. This is a very difficult area and has been subject to much debate. Under JAR I feel we have a reasonable compromise that leaves much of this difficult decision making in the hands of the pilot provided he remains firmly within the guidelines and rules in play. It is for this reason that I give CRAB such a hard time for suggesting that the rule do not allow him to do SAR/HEMS to his liking. It is all there in the rules. They should be followed otherwise we do not accrue viable data to effect real change toward improvement and the alternative is aviation anarchy.
DB
Last edited by DOUBLE BOGEY; 11th November 2012 at 09:21.