CRAB et al
It may have escaped your notice but CAT is about flying A to B and delivering the goods as safely as possible with maximum customers satisfaction. It is not meant to be nor can it deliver happy smiley pilots grateful for the 'workout' and opportunity to broaden or polish their skills. If you want to do that then go find a job that requires near constant application of those skills, fire bombing, SAR, police ops, etc. CAT is what it is. The only saving grace is that so far we have no Cat 3 Autoland so at least we get to do that part of the flight and in the offshore world that can be quite stimulating, especially at night and/or in bad weather.
It of course is a shame that nobody seems to recognise that hand flying skills DO require practice as they are easily lost with the passage of time. Quite what the regulators imagine that a generic series of OEI exercises that have remained virtually unchanged for 45 years will do to help I don't know. We need to get the word out to the rest of the world. The current model for pilot training in helicopters is not working as I continue to see pilots who by no stretch of the imagination can be described as truly competent but they continue to make it through the system because the 'tick-box' approach is dysfunctional.
I am fascinated by HC's ability to twist the CAA into agreeing that there is no need for a manual raw data ILS. I wonder how widely known that little wrinkle is? Such enlightenment is most uncharacteristic not to say out of step with the rest of EASA-land. Of course, if we were using an Evidence Based Training model there would be time and opportunity for both manual and 'modified' AP based approaches but don't get me on that. (i'll just give myself a slap for being so 21st century).
G.