"All you need is a plane"

[Horatio Leafblower]

I was watching ...I dunno, some crap on a commercial TV station... and came across this advert for the Sydney International Boat Show:

All you need is a Boat (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4hmqW_WEto)

Imagine if our industry associations were spending our money on adverts that grew our market and our public appeal, instead of throwing lavish gab-fests at the Crowne Plaza Hunter Valley.

GA is INVISIBLE to the general public until someone has a prang and dies :suspect:

There is a Federal election coming next year (or sooner) and there is no unified effort to make Aviation an issue or even raise its profile; you just have quiet words whispered in ears, deals done to favour one operator or another, or the whole industry ignored like the ALP used to do.

What do you say Dick Smith?

[Old Fella]

All you need is a plane, if you are a carpenter????

[Lead Balloon]

Alas, too many people in Australia with a vested interest in the mystique of aviation remaining impenetrably complex and scary. :(

If the population understood the objective risks (and their causes) and benefits of aviation compared with the risks and benefits of other forms of transport and recreation, there'd be a lot more GA and a lot fewer pages of regulations and people living off them in Australia.

[Horatio Leafblower]

Old Fella

If I were a carpenter, and you were a layman, you could carry my tool bag
...provided you were a member of the Federated Carpenter's and Woodworker's union.

Most laymen call that machine parked out the front a PLANE.

Let's win them over, THEN turn them into irritating pedants :ugh:

[IsDon]

Or is it a place in Spain where the rain mainly falls?

[Pinky the pilot]

Sorry Horatio, but I`m with Old Fella on this.:=

If that makes me IYHO an `irritating pedant` I`m willing to wear the epithet!:ooh::hmm::}

[Ascend Charlie]

Ahhh, shaddup and fly the plane!!

If it's good enough for John Wayne to call it a plane, then it's good enough to be written here on Proon without raising the uppityness of the thought police.

[Arm out the window]

As long as we don't start calling it an airplane!

[Horatio Leafblower]

Pinky,

So long as this doesn't deteriorate into a thread about wearing your epithets to the supermarket, I don't care what you wear :ok:

[The name is Porter]

All you need is a plane ???
All you need is a plane, if you are a carpenter????

Wankas :ugh:

Say 'Plane' in front of someone and what do you think they think of? An effing plane, because a carpenters plane doesn't friggin exist anymore (except in museums)

I've been flying them for 30 years & I call them a plane, I stopped using a plane about 15 years ago.

[rjtjrt]

Arm
Whilst "airplane" still sounds wrong to me, I find it hard to counter the argument that the yanks invented it, so they should get to name it airplane, and it is a bit rich for others to rename/change spelling.

[Global Aviator]

Now one can still use a plane, however now it's more like my electric plane.

Out of curiosity I just googled electric plane, seems Google don't mind referring to a plane as a plane as an airyplane...

Sheesh aircraft, plane, airplane, aero plane, same same but different to Jo public, or maybe even flying bus these days!

[Eastwest Loco]

I had a reproduction book of a very old aviation related book where they were referred to as aerodromes.

Smitty called them as aeroplanes, my father referred to them as aeroplanes.

That will do me.

Best all

EWL

[The Bullwinkle]

Seriously...........???
We are debating whether it's called a Plane, Airplane or Aeroplane???
Must be a slow day!
I'm pretty sure we were all calling them Planes when we were kids but somehow, now we've grown up, that's not good enough anymore?
And on a similar topic, I think I preferred being called a Pilot but nowadays the term appears to be Tech Crew.
I love walking through airport terminals and seeing the smiles on young kids faces when they see a Pilot and then hearing them tell their parents how they want to be a Tech Crew when they grow up! :rolleyes:

[sagan]

And the piffle about a name shows why this industry is screwed. Second post is about semantics. Inward looking, self important and weak crap. All this industry does well collectively is bend over, take it squealing and cry to each other. When someone suggests something to help ourselves we attack them.

[Arm out the window]

Fair point rjtjrt!

[Pinky the pilot]

So long as this doesn't deteriorate into a thread about wearing your epithets to the supermarket, I don't care what you wear

Good one Horatio!:ok::D

Ok, we`ve all had our fun, so now it`s back to the actual subject of the thread!:=

Imagine if our industry associations were spending our money on adverts that grew our market and our public appeal, instead of throwing lavish gab-fests at the Crowne Plaza Hunter Valley.

GA is INVISIBLE to the general public until someone has a prang and dies

There is a Federal election coming next year (or sooner) and there is no unified effort to make Aviation an issue or even raise its profile; you just have quiet words whispered in ears, deals done to favour one operator or another, or the whole industry ignored like the ALP used to do.

What do you say Dick Smith?

I second the above comment.

[IsDon]

I spent 16 years in the RAAF.

One way to annoy the ADGs during your annual SLR qual was to ask him which end of the "gun" you put the "bullets" in.

By all means use the term plane if you wish. You'd be wrong, but go ahead and prove your ignorance if you like.

I'm certain the term "tech crew" came from the touchy feely CRM world we now operate in. An attempt to raise the esteem of the bun chuckers by denigrating the pilots. Now look at the cabin crew mafia to realise what a mistake that was.

[Horatio Leafblower]

The point is this:

GA will continue to wither on the vine unless we get more of the General Public involved and interested. We need a nice, quiet TV campaign that highlights what GA does for Australia and what Australia will lose when GA disappears.

We need to focus on PEOPLE telling PEOPLE what GA delivers to their lives (think of the adverts every election with the average family asking Mr Abbott or Mr Howard how they are going to survive after his cuts to medicare)

TV Adverts aren't that hard or that expensive to make, and in many time slots (especially in rural and regional Australia) they are quite cheap to broadcast.

Unfortunately, Aviation seems to be made up of a large group of strokers who are offended they ae called "Tech Crew" not "Captain, Sir" and that "plane" is offensive because it infers they are a carpenter, not a sky god.

The layman refers to that machine out there as a PLANE.
When he looks up he sees a PLANE.
When he jumps on Jetstar he catches a PLANE.

When he comes to have a flying lesson in a PLANE and you tell him "actually no, it's an AEROPLANE", he'll say "Righto w*nker I'll go buy a JETSKI instead". :ugh:

Jesus christ. :mad:

[IsDon]

Hook, line, sinker. :D

[blueloo]

When he jumps on Jetstar he catches a PLANE.

So what you are saying is that you think Jetstar are *special* because they fly planes, and everyone else flies aeroplanes?


:}

[Ida down]

Wearing your slides to the supermarket? Are you kidding? Got caught once with a race to the vets with the dog, who had just eaten rat bait, just as I stupidly walked in door after many sectors. The hysterical wife throwing said dog at me, drive, she is yelling, and off I went still dressed like Napoleon. It slowly dawned on me, as I sat there covered in dog puke, with puking dog, I was overdressed for the occasion, only for the Vet ( a mate) to say, 'come in Admiral'. The dog survived after blowing my overtime money on treatment, and I never did get all the puke out of my ID.

[Air Ace]

There is a Federal election coming next year (or sooner) and there is no unified effort to make Aviation an issue or even raise its profile; you just have quiet words whispered in ears, deals done to favour one operator or another, or the whole industry ignored like the ALP used to do.

What do you say Dick Smith?

Every time Dick Smith advocates change in aviation, spending his own time and money, he gets criticised by many including you.

Now you're asking Dick to spend his own time and money advocating change in aviation, on behalf of your business and hobby?

:suspect: :suspect:

Not even Dick Smith can achieve lasting, beneficial, worthwhile and rational change and support for our Australian aviation industry, whilst we have a succession of deplorable, ill-informed, incompetent and disinterested Ministers for Transport including Anderson, Albanese and Truss and a succession of RAAF geriatric retirees running CASA and ASA who, to quote Dick Smith, "never paid a cent for their aviation".

[Pinky the pilot]

All Horatio asked IMHO, was for Dick Smith`s comment to his OP.

The thread then drifted briefly into irrelevance, yours truly being one of the offenders.:O However, I did then attempt to bring it back into the subject.

Gentlemen, (and Ladies) where applicable;

May I in the most strongly terms available, suggest that instead of attempting to criticise the OP for any percieved past misdemenours (sp?) that you support the original thrust of this thread and offer support and constructive suggestions as to what can be done to rescue Australian General Aviation from what really seems to be its impending Death!:ooh:

And to lobby the appropriate Federal Politicians ie your local member!

Someone far wiser than I will ever be once said words to the effect that

If we do not all hang together, we surely will all hang seperately!

And yes, I really do believe that there are some in `high places` who really don`t care if Aussie GA is destroyed!:ugh:

[Horatio Leafblower]

Now you're asking Dick to spend his own time and money advocating change in aviation, on behalf of your business and hobby?

Absolutely not.

I disagree with the direction of his criticisms and the sensationalism in his method.

I am proposing a different method, a different tone. I think it's a better way and you will observe it is the way other sectors (education, health) push their case for government funding or support.

Dick is free to criticise me as you have done and as I have criticised him.

You are 100% right about the level of interest shown by Transport ministers since Anderson, and a good public relations/public education campaign will help turn that around.

...mind you, Bronwyn Bishop's little helicopter ride might have killed off the last sector of GA Charter that was making any return:rolleyes: :ouch: so maybe we needn't bother.

[darkroomsource]

This thread epitomises the reasons that the regulations are so convoluted, and the reasons that the industry is declining.

If things must be so precise that aeroplane is acceptable but plane is not, then it's no wonder that there are thousands and thousands of regulations all attempting to clarify simple things like "keep the shiny side up".

[AEROMEDIC]

Seriously...........???
We are debating whether it's called a Plane, Airplane or Aeroplane???
Must be a slow day!


Real slowwww... _@v

[Aerodynamisist]

The concept is good need to be combined with an airshow to strike while the idea is fresh then you need to capture the consumer and tie them down because of all the options and distractions of the modern world will drain the cash out of them before you get the chance.

Many years ago American champion were selling aircraft with a pilot's licence thrown in, from memory it was aroun 120k for a Citabria. I always thought that was a good concept as well.

The Sporty's sweepstakes is also a good concept, this years prize was a nice little yellow cub replica.

A distributorship with the right brand and a small flying school with a setup with a finance company like esanda similar to what they do with cars would be all it could take.

[Old Fella]

Pinky, thank you. IsDon thanks also. EWL, pleased you listened to you Dad. My comment was not meant to generate the response it did. However I am pleased it gave some a chance to bleat about an old bugger like me. I was, in fact, simply recalling a comment made by an old instructor who once said to me when I called an aeroplane a 'plane "Lad, carpenters use planes and lawn mowers have cogs. These are aeroplanes and those cogs are gears"

By the Way, the term Tech Crew was around long before the whizkids thought up CRM.