Have taken a look at the regulator and bureau answer to questions on notice that were released on the Senate site yesterday. Boy both Federal agencies are sure digging themselves a very big hole!
Lets start with Fort Fumble’s arrogant replies to their QONs
:
CASA01: Experience of Pel-Air Chief Pilot
Hansard: p.34
CHAIR: It has been suggested to us that the chief pilot, who is now the CASA Bankstown person, did not really have a lot of experience himself with these types of aircraft. Do you know what his experience was with Westwind aircraft? I presume he was endorsed to fly the damn things—was he?
Mr McCormick: He was, but I do not have the figure in front of me showing what his experience was at the time. It may be in some of the documents we gave you.
CHAIR: Could you take that on notice?
Mr McCormick: Sure.
Answer:
Mr Wickham completed a co-pilot endorsement on the Westwind on 23 September 1992.
Mr Wickham has 50 hours experience on the aircraft as a co-pilot.
A chief pilot need not, in all cases, be endorsed to fly all of the aircraft types covered by an Air Operator’s Certificate as pilot-in-command. In such cases, the Civil Aviation Orders permit the chief pilot to delegate his or her operational duties to another member of the operator’s staff. In this case, the chief pilot’s operational duties in relation to Pel-Air’s Westwind aircraft had been delegated to the fleet manager, Mr Ian ‘Wally’ Meyer. At the time of the accident, Mr Meyer was fully endorsed on the Westwind aircraft, had over 20,000 hours total aeronautical experience with 147 hours as pilot-in-command on the Westwind in
the 12 months preceding the accident.
Doesn’t Fort Fumble realise how hypocritical and short-sighted that answer is especially when you put it into context of the following discourse from the hearing Hansard pg 35
:
Senator STERLE: Thank you. The problem that I think some of us on the committee are having is that we have seen, through evidence, that the chief pilot of Pel-Air at the time of the ditching has now moved to a higher grade job but it is also within CASA. So we are thinking, 'Hang on, while this was all going wrong at Pel-Air, who did it slip past?' Is that fair to ask?
Mr McCormick: Yes. I will ask Mr Hood to give you a bit more on this.
Mr Hood: I have a few notes in relation to Pel-Air and the safety alert. In 2008, following the issue of the safety alert to Pel-Air, CASA raised with Regional Express, which is the owner, and with Pel-Air the question of whether the then chief pilot was effective in his role. Pel-Air subsequently said that their view was that the chief pilot in 2008 may not have been effective in his role and therefore appointed Captain Wickham as the chief pilot. Following our assessment on 21 November 2008 Mr Wickham was appointed to the role of head of flight ops.
Senator STERLE: Thank you. Would it be fair to say that anyone can hold that certificate, but in these small operations like Pel-Air is there a trend set? Is it normally the chief pilot or is it a mixture of everyone?
Mr McCormick: No. As far as holding the certificate goes, the chief pilot is an identified position under the regulations and we have to approve the person.
Senator STERLE: Okay. In 2008 there was a different chief pilot, as we have established, because CASA said that the fellow was not up to the mark. All of a sudden there is a new chief pilot appointed, which is Mr Wickham, but for some reason the holding of the certificate does not flow to the chief pilot; it disappears somewhere else.
But hang on wasn’t this “Mr Ian ‘Wally’ Meyer” the former Chief Pilot that was deemed ‘ineffective’ in his role? Presumably he was also the individual that had overseen previous CASA audits, AOC changes etc..etc for a number of years prior to being forced to relinquish the CP position to Mr Wickham. Therefore it can be assumed that he was the main purveyor of sustained ‘normalised deviations’ within the Pel-Air AOC. Which ironically probably more than justifies Pel-Air’s decision to replace him as CP.
So the new CP then defers his ‘operational duties’ on the Westwind aircraft to WM who is designated the Westwind fleet manager. Presumably, aside from losing his CP approval, WM kept all his previous CASA approvals so in effect although he has swapped caps WM’s normalised deviations are allowed to continue albeit in a different role. Which the CASA special audit team more than adequately highlighted throughout the SAR. Some examples being (a) WM was one of two pilots who landed at Norfolk (05/10/09) with less than alternate fuel and; (b) WM was found to be giving less than adequate 20.11 training and checking.
Fort Fumble’s arrogance, disdain etc displayed in this reply is beyond belief! Do these numbnuts think we’re all stupid…sheesh and this is question one!
As Kelpie would say.. “more to follow”. 
The AQONs are down near the bottom of this page:Senate Committees – Parliament of Australia
ps UITA had to do it mate the yodelling was doing my head in!