The crap posted by "Connedrod" and "Bandalot" - demonstrating their voluminous knowledge of the minutiae of CASA maintenance regulation simply demonstrates the corrupt, stupid and vicious nature of the regulations and those who administer them.
I call the regulations and the regulator "stupid" using the economic definition of stupidity: doing an act that does harm to everyone involved without producing any benefit at all to anyone with the possible exception of lawyers.
Lets be clear on this; a thief or a bandit is not stupid in the economic sense because they gain while the victim loses. Stupidity is where everyone loses.
What CASA does:
- produces no measurable gain in safety for the RPT travelling public. CASA can't regulate Qantas, they dont have the capability. As for second and Third tier operators, CASA admits in their response to the NGA ditching that they cannot detect safety errors.
- saddles industry with major compliance costs for no safety benefit.
- increases commercial risk through capricious behaviour.
The above two items have a negative effect on investment, growth and job creation.
So all around, Australia loses. We lose jobs, investment, economic growth opportunities, all for no nett safety increase and at an enormous cost in tax dollars.
We are stupid for putting up with this.
To put that another way, when has the calibration of a torque wrench used to tighten a tyre valve cap saved us from a major air disaster?
I spent two years as a plant engineer for a major oil terminal and then six at Ansett. The most important safety system component - common sense, is missing completely from CASA and the regulations.