An open Question to Dick Smith

[scramjet77]

Dick, You are always telling us just how much safer flying within Australia will be after the adoption of the NAS in its total form. If this is the case wil you:

Guarantee the financial security of my family if I am involved in a midair collision that is directly attributed to the changes brought about by the NAS.

None of your bulldust, no spin, no half truths and inaccuracies, no so called "Phd experts that you pull out of a hat" just a straight forward unambiguous YES or NO.

[Dick Smith]

scramjet77, unfortunately I can’t give an answer yes or no. This is because there is no such thing as perfect safety. There is nothing in life that is not without risk. All of the evidence that has been given to me from rational experts shows that by making the NAS changes we will reduce the chance of accidents.

For example, it is commonsense that safety would be improved if fewer aircraft flew up the light aircraft lane (missing airline jets by 300 metres) and instead flew over the top of Sydney Airport – where they would typically pass airline aircraft with many kilometres of separation.

All the evidence I have been given by the experts shows that there will be less chance of a mid-air collision that is “directly attributed to the changes brought about by NAS”. This doesn’t eliminate the chance of a mid-air collision and that is why I am not prepared to give the guarantee you require.

It looks to me as if you do not understand risk management. My suggestion is that you come up to speed on the US system with its 20 times greater traffic density. As you would know, our plan is to copy exactly the US procedures that they have within radar coverage, and to copy exactly the US procedures they have at the many airports without radar coverage. From that, the statistics show (when comparing the US history with ours) that we will have an improvement in safety.

Look at the situation at the present time. At Port Macquarie, I have to do my own self-separation when in IMC – i.e. I have to be the air traffic controller and there is no separation standard. If an airline aircraft is approaching Port Macquarie in IMC and there is a 300 hour bank run pilot doing the same, that low time pilot can decide what separation is to be used. In the US NAS system we are moving to, Port Macquarie will be Class E airspace and air traffic control (using the $300+ million TAAATS air traffic control system) will separate aircraft when in cloud to a standard. Safety will be improved and there will be less chance that your family will be left without the breadwinner.

Also under the NAS system we will have a proper radar flight following service for VFR traffic. As you probably know, Airservices has resisted the introduction of this service because more pilots may use it rather than file IFR. This means that the salaries of the management team of Airservices will drop. To ensure their high pay levels, they have to ensure that as many pilots are forced to operate IFR as possible – even in visual conditions.

In the USA they have a superb flight following service for VFR aircraft. This was to be introduced about a year ago under the NAS proposals. I have no authority so the management of Airservices consistently put off any safety improvements which may affect their profit levels.

By the way, I suggest you push for the flight following to go ahead as it will reduce the chance of you being involved in a mid-air collision – even if you are successful in removing most of the US NAS safety improvements.

[ferris]

By the way, I suggest you push for the flight following to go ahead as it will reduce the chance of you being involved in a mid-air collision How does that gel with your statement (on another pprune thread) that the NAS savings will come from removing those low level radar sectors that would provide this flight following? In fact, to provide such a service, free , AsA would indeed lose money as they would have to hire more people to provide it.

So, are you saying that really NAS will cost more, or that the ozNAS you are introducing will be more dangerous because it doesn't have flight following?

STOP LYING DICK.
http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=129694&perpage=15&pagenumber=1 (www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=129694&perpage=15&pagenumber=1)

Edited to add the hyperlink to show Dick LYING on the other thread. Just as one example, the Class G sector that operates within 30 miles of Sydney will be unnecessary under the NAS system

[Chief galah]

Dick,

Do you realise that in the Port Macquarie example you give, and you are the departing aircraft and the 300 hour bank run pilot is the arriving aircraft, you will not be going anywhere until a procedural (non radar) separation standard is achieved. It could possibly mean you are stuck on the ground until the other aircraft has landed. This may well mean a long delay with engines running. If there are any other IFR aircraft around, this will further complicate matters. The centre controller also may have to deal with the same situation simultaneously at other aerodromes within his sector. His workload is going to soar, and the delays will be longer.

Do you realise this!!!???

Will you (or others) be tempted to get airbourne in the false hope of getting a "pick-up", then being stuck at low levels, trying to maintain VMC, and possibly running out of terrain clearance??

What will YOU do then!!!?? Is this safer and more efficient??

By the way, I don't think there are many 300 hour bank runners, but there well might be a scud running VFRy out there with a dodgy transponder, not bothering to speak up.

CG

[Chris Higgins]

First of all, I would like to thank Dick Smith for calling me today on his own time and at his own expense while I was on the ground in Washington. As I sit here in Denver and have just contemplated the comparisons of Port Macquarie and the remote regions of the United States, I really do feel there is some room for improvement in the Australian system.

For those of you don't know, I grew up and started learning to fly in Port Macquarie in 1983. I have seen a lot of changes since then and in 1990 I came to America with an Australian ATPL and have since amassed over 8,500 hours, with much of it in turbine equipment.

Dick Smith's observations are very relevant, as are the concerns of an industry that has seen costs of operation spiralling out of control. We should all understand the end game here...to have a system that doesn't bankrupt all of our operators, yet maintains a modern standard of safety.

We need to talk some more...but Mr Smith, you paid me the respect of a gentleman and a concerned patriotic Australian, who shares a love of aviation.

At least we can all start there!

Sincerely,

Chris Higgins

[Chief galah]

Chris,

That's all nice and warm and fuzzy, but you fail to address the real issues of how controllers will efficiently administer IMC, low level, non radar E airspace. Controllers here will only be applying the rules given to them in MATS etc. The enroute separation standards can be very restrictive.
I think the same problems occur over there, but it doesn't seem to worry anyone.

I know the pushy queue jumpers here are not going to like it.

CG

[Icarus2001]

Chris Higgins any relation to Henry you say...

Dick Smith's observations are very relevant, as are the concerns of an industry that has seen costs of operation spiralling out of control. We should all understand the end game here...to have a system that doesn't bankrupt all of our operators, yet maintains a modern standard of safety.

Yes Mr Smiths observations are relevant but dos that mean he should be running aviation policy in this country? If he is as you and he seem to feel, emminently qualified to do this, then he should stand for parliament where he is accountable for his actions and decisions. Not play puppet master to the spineless John Anderson.

As to costs in Aviation. Yes they are high. Ever was it thus. Look at the direct operating costs for a typical GA aircraft and what are the big ones?

Maintenance Insurance & Fuel

I'm sorry but ATS charges hardly rate a mention for GA operations. Start talking regional airlines and bigger then sure en-route charges become an issue. So what kind of cost reduction at the ATS provider end would be required to even register as a cost saving on the aircraft? Much bigger than NAS could ever hope to deliver.

Then we had to suffer John & Martha King telling us that NAS will revitalise GA and FBOs will pop up around the country. Sorry we only have 20 million people, it aint going to happen.

Chris, how much has been wasted so far. Check the VoR thread, how about $75 million.

[P47]

Dick, with respect, what makes you so right, as a pilot who flys privately and not that often comparatively and thousands of professional airline aircrews who operate many sectors day in and day out in a professional sense, so wrong !
When will you understand THIS IS NOT THE U.S.,
THIS IS AUSTRALIA !
TOTALLY DIFFERENT ENVIRONMENT !
If we were similar to the U.S., I could possibly agree with you about NAS but we are not so I have to say I think you are not thinking rationally about the concepts operation here.
Please, Please listen to the professionals and take on board our concerns !

[ferris]

OK, Chris, you confirmed for us that Dick is a smooth talker, a great politician. Short on HOW this utopia will be achieved, but he has the VISION. Herein lies the problem.

[missy]

For example, it is commonsense that safety would be improved if fewer aircraft flew up the light aircraft lane (missing airline jets by 300 metres) and instead flew over the top of Sydney Airport

If Sydney operated 16 for arrivals and departures it may be possible for light aircraft to fly over the top of Sydney Airport and then coastal.

Why does the light aircraft lane fly via Hornsby anyway? You should be more worried about IFR aircraft flying at VFR levels when the "separation" is just 500ft vertical.

[Chris Higgins]

I do not stand on one side of this fence...or the other. I certainly see many failures in training, pilot labour groups, Air Traffic, governmental oversight of maintenance, flight times and duty rest requirements, educational standards of flight crews, placement of instrument approaches, and a lot of other things right here...right now in North America.

I am an Australian born in Hornsby, and raised in Australia. I know that some of Dick's proposals won't work in Australia. Why? Because I flew to ATPL standards in the Australian IFR system prior to any of these new changes. I also refueled out of drums stored in the desert, where there was no radar, no weather reporting and hardly any friggin' navaids, (before GPS) and did it all as a VFR commercial pilot with no instrument rating with WAC charts that were last fully surveyed in the the 1960's.

Chief Galah...yep! You're right! Without improved placement of radar, there might be delays in departing non-radar covered airports, no good, I agree. We either modify the existing system to improve upon it, or we place a radar near the top of Middle Brother Mountain that can serve Taree, Kempsey, Port Macquarie and even a few private strips as well. The cost...well, we have to measure that.

Icarus 2001, you stand in steadfast support of Voices of Reason, you may have your reasons. I personally would like to know more about VOR before I make anymore comparisons. I have looked at their numbers, perhaps they're close, maybe not.

Again, I am not friends with Dick Smith or any of you! I am an Australian who believes we need to cast aside the flagrant abuses of a system that is obviously not being administered properly and find a system and people who can run it properly.

I am personally very suspicious of 4711. He seems to know WAY too much to be a casual observer here!

Do you know that you have people working your airspace that are making money from the coffers of people struggling in general aviation who are having to pay excessive air service charges! This is nothing short of extortion. Is 4711, charged with the very administration of the sharing of these spoils?

Tell me why you can't have active flight following in radar coverage in Australia as you transit Capital City Airports? Is it because the collection of these fees would be more difficult if this were actively encouraged?

Don't tell me it's about workload- HOGWASH! Australia has one of the lowest air densities of airspace in the world.

We need to cut through this crap and do it now!

I have a multi-million dollar carrer as a pilot here in the United States, but out of a spirit of Australian patriotism, I would give it up if it meant that I could clean this mess up before we have bodies falling from the sky on fire over any of the Australian landscape.

I will not waste my time with any of it, if these efforts would be hijacked by corrupted government officials.

[ferris]

Chris, I think you need to go back and trawl thru the thousands of words on the tens of threads on this forum about NAS. All the answers you seek have already been given. You could even work out who is who in the zoo, if you try (and know a little about the aviation world personalities- even who VoR might be!).
But here's a startDon't tell me it's about workload- HOGWASH! Australia has one of the lowest air densities of airspace in the world. Australian ATC was recently rated by Eurocontrol as more efficient than both US ATC and Eurocontrol. Oz ATCs actually handle more movements per man than their US counterparts. (Link available on these forums). I should expand a little here- but it's all been said before. Because of the volume of users in the US, they can provide more service.
Tell me why you can't have active flight following in radar coverage in Australia Because Dick Smith thinks that he can save money by removing the ATC sectors (or the staff that run them)- see current threads. He also wants a culture of VFR exclusion- because it costs money to include VFR.
Is it because the collection of these fees would be more difficult if this were actively encouraged? Why would a fee be charged? Under the old system, you weren't charged for this (not exactly flight following- but it could have been). Whilst it is certainly true that AsA is little more than an arm of the tax office these days, that is the user-pays culture, and a product of moving away from being a public service- something Mr. Smith is very keen on. In the US, ATC is funded totally differently to oz. Another reason why you can't have 'the US System'. AsA is a "business" (a Govt Business Enterprise)!!! Even if a fee was charged, just having to staff for it flies in the face of Mr. Smith's NAS philosophy.
Do you know that you have people working your airspace that are making money from the coffers of people struggling in general aviation These sorts of generalisations are very Dick-like. It is very easy to shoot at 'fat-cats' in Canberra and blame all the problems on them. Rallies public support etc. but doesn't actually mean anything. Any organisation, business or whatever has dead wood in it, but spraying meaningless rhetoric is nothing more than politicking.
In short, Chris, your conversation with Dick may have converted you to his cult, but he needs more than a dream to help oz aviation.
Fix the charging system, not the airspace.

[Tank Tinker]

quote:
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For example, it is commonsense that safety would be improved if fewer aircraft flew up the light aircraft lane (missing airline jets by 300 metres) and instead flew over the top of Sydney Airport
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Dick,

You have argued for some time the benefits of VFR corridors (special flight rules areas - SFRAs) over major Australian terminal areas as an aspect of the NAS and the US architecture.

VFR corridors in the US are only established in Class B airspace (not Class C) and only at terminals where there are single or parallel runways (eg, LAX) and not over crossing runways (eg, JFK). Further, the FAA no longer includes "VFR corridors in the development or modification of Class B airspace" (see FAA AIM). In addition, those residual corridors through "a few of the first Class B airspace areas" attract the FAA caution: "because of their finite lateral and vertical limits, and volume of VFR aircraft using a corridor, extreme caution and vigilance must be exercised."

Sydney, Melbourne or Brisbane would ineligible in any US model as
1. they are class C airspace
2. they have Xing runways
3. in Sydney's case, the VFR traffic flow is North/south aligned with the parallel runways.

Dick, you remain the undisputed Master of the half truth.

[Frank Burden]

My father would never go on a ferris wheel. He said that it was only held together at the hob by one nut. And he didn't want to put his life in the hands of one nut.

Some seem to take faith in TCAS as a primary separation tool. Could this be the case of the one nut?

ACTION: Final rule.

SUMMARY: The FAA adopts a new airworthiness directive (AD) for certain GARMIN International Inc. GTX 330/GTX 330D Mode S transponders that are installed on aircraft. This AD requires you to install GTX 330/330D Software Upgrade Version 3.03, 3.04, or 3.05. This AD is the result of observations that the GTX 330 and GTX 330D may detect, from other aircraft, the S1 (suppression) interrogating pulse below the Minimum Trigger Level (MTL) and, in some circumstances, not reply. The GTX 330/330D should still reply even if it detects S1 interrogating pulses below the MTL. We are issuing this AD to prevent interrogating aircraft from possibly receiving inaccurate replies due to suppression from aircraft equipped with the GTX 330/330D Mode S Transponders when the pulses are below the MTL. The inaccurrate replies could result in reduced vertical separation or unsafe TCAS resolution advisories.

http://www.airweb.faa.gov/Regulatory_and_Guidance_Library/rgad.nsf/0/7B2DE441B778EB7286256E9B004BE073?OpenDocument

Frank Burden

The attainment of wisdom is a life long pursuit

[Dick Smith]

Tank Tinker, the obvious reason the US does not have corridors across Class C airspace is that their Class C airspace only goes to 5,000’ AGL – i.e. VFR can overfly at VFR levels from 5,500’ to 17,500’.

Even if it was Class B airspace in Australia and we did not have lanes, my experience in the USA is very different to Australia. For example, I have requested clearance VFR a number of times enroute across Class B airspace in the USA and I have never been refused or delayed.

Over the last 20 years I have occasionally heard VFR pilots ask for an enroute clearance over Sydney. I have never yet heard one given the clearance – they are all told to remain OCTA. Last time I requested a clearance from Terrey Hills to Wollongong at “any VFR level”, I was very courteously told that runway 34 was in use so clearance would not be available. Of course I flew down the Victor 1 lane using about 20% more fuel than I would have if I’d been able to go at a higher level. I’m fortunate – I can afford this – but if you added this up over the last 10 years the extra cost to general aviation would be many millions of dollars. As I’ve stated before, sometimes the difference between success and failure in a business is a very small amount of money.

[ferris]

So how many have you sent to the wall by wasting that $75 mil, Dick?

Keep dodging, ducking, avoiding..........people are getting the message:ok:

[Four Seven Eleven]

Chris Higgins
Again, I am not friends with Dick Smith or any of you! I am an Australian who believes we need to cast aside the flagrant abuses of a system that is obviously not being administered properly and find a system and people who can run it properly.
Hear, hear!!! I agree on every point and feel exactly the same way. I feel that we may differ on one point: I believe that Dick Smith is a major part of the problem.

I believe that his blatant political interference is holding back both the prosperity and safety of airspace reform in Australia. I used to give him the benefit of the doubt about his motives, but find it hard to believe that anyone with good motives would resort to a campaign of defamation, vilification and lies.

In most things, I believe that if right is on your side, then truth and consistency will eventually see things go the right way. My experience has been that people who resort to such tactics are afraid of the truth, usually for reasons other than the common good.
I am personally very suspicious of 4711. He seems to know WAY too much to be a casual observer here!
Why thank you Mr Higgins! I am not a casual observer. I am a line controller, who spends every working day at the console. Contrary to the lie communicated by Dick Smith (supposedly quoting a ‘reliable’ source), I am not a manager in Airservices. If you think I “know WAY too much”, all I can do is point out that everything I have said on PPRuNE has been as a result of research into public documents – largely via the internet – or as the result of personal experience as a controller. I have no vested interest in airspace reform except that my profession requires me to provide safe, orderly and expeditious services to air traffic. I am keen to continue to be an air traffic controller, paid a salary (with no bonuses, incentive etc) without that safety being compromised by politically motivated ‘reforms’.

Do you know that you have people working your airspace that are making money from the coffers of people struggling in general aviation who are having to pay excessive air service charges! This is nothing short of extortion.
As many, many, many people have tried to point out to Dick Smith – you are quite correct. There is a problem with ‘excessive air services charges’. Unfortunately, Dick Smith does not have any interest in addressing the issue. He believes that the only way to affect change is to reduce services, according to an untested experiment in airspace reform.
Is 4711, charged with the very administration of the sharing of these spoils?
No. I am a line controller, charged with the safe operation of air traffic services within a defined airspace.

[Chris Higgins]

Icarus, I responded to 4711 on another thread, so I'll respond to you on this one!

I come back to Australia quite often and I am in weekly contact with my first flying instructor and a great number of my former students. As a matter of fact, I first noticed a decline in the standards at the end of 1990 with all the McDonald's style flying schools that started up at the GAAP airports, (an ATPL and an order of fries with that?), yes it's now even worse.

Part of it has to do with the loss of sanctity of the Australian examination system, both the theory and practical. There are too many schools teaching answers to spot questions without teaching the reasons why and the ATO system was corrupt from day one.

If this offends you I'm sorry. Ask anyone you fly with who's been flying for the last fifteen or so years.

[Skyway]

Please Dick, Do not suggest that a 300 hour bank runner has no idea of the big picture and separation standards. You have no authority to pick on pilots in this matter. You got yourself involved in this, and it does seem you do not want to listen to anybody but yourself. But then the parliment is full of them. If John anderson can not deliver on the 8 year plan for the MEL/BNE highway, what friggin chance have we got that he could roll out something like this. And yes I hold him entirely responsible, after all he is the one with the power to override you, CASA, Airservices and listen to the expert people that use the friggin airspace every day.

I am sick of this baby match I am off to cook some biccies.

4711 Keep up the good work.

[Icarus2001]

Okay Chris thanks for the reply. This is off topic so i will be brief...
I come back to Australia quite often and I am in weekly contact with my first flying instructor and a great number of my former students.

That in no way validates your argument. To argue that standards are slipping you would have to fly with a cross section of students. How on earth does talking to your old students prove anything? They probably tell you how crap the new guys are compared to them? Okay so you talk to your first instructor. I am very pleased for you. Does he or she still instruct? At what level? How many CPL tests did he/she conduct in the last year? Was he/she testing 15 years ago?

Chris
If this offends you I'm sorry. Ask anyone you fly with who's been flying for the last fifteen or so years.

You have not offended me but you do yourself no favours by making sweeping statements like...
the ATO system was corrupt from day one.
where is you evidence? Ask anyone who has been flying for the last 15 years... Well I did my CPL in the late 1980's will I do?