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Old 24th Jun 2011, 07:17
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Place your efforts into writing to your local federal AND state members, the Ministers and Shadow Ministers for transport/aviation/infrastructure/whatever, the leaders of all major federal political entities; and express to them, as Aviation Professionals and experts, the importance of the expeditious and effective implementation of these simple, yet profound enhancements to the Australian aviation industry.
Done months ago.
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Old 24th Jun 2011, 07:19
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True Frank. I don't hold out much hope that 'Comrade Albanese' will come through.

Thats is why I'm suggesting the job isn't over. While it is a job well done by all so far, these recommendations simply mark the beginning. We all have much to do, and a responsibility to do it.
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Old 24th Jun 2011, 07:31
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Yet another example of solid management

Laughed out loud when I read this. Not only does BB contradict himself AGAIN but AGAIN show's a full lack of understanding of his ship.
Vote 1 CEO of the moment.



Airlines dismiss training warning

I especially love the comment that more experienced pilots are lesser standard than cadets. Coming from someone who just recently stated to the pilots he was in awe of their talent.. (even if it is at a lower standard than than more inexperienced 18-25 year old pilots) No offence Cadeties!
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Old 24th Jun 2011, 07:49
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Sandilands hitting nail on head yet again

My Italics and Bolds

Inconvenient Truths:


June 24, 2011 – 3:49 pm, by Ben Sandilands

In lay language, the Senate inquiry into pilot training and airline safety has made a set of recommendations that would put Australia on the same page as American lawmakers in resisting the dangerous things desperate airlines have been doing to cut corners.

It has shot down the preference of Jetstar for example for ‘geek pilots’ (my term for young, inexperienced and indebted recruits) who under current rules can be hired as Airbus A320 first officers with as little as 250 hours of actual hands on or ‘real’ flying.

That’s not enough hours to be safe flying a Cessna 172 in all conditions in the outback, never mind a 180 seat jet during a less than text book perfect flight dealing with a systems problem, an incapacitated captain or a rough weather approach to an Australian city.

It’s tolerance by CASA, and the airlines, and successive Ministers, has eroded the safety standards most Australians would believe to be world leading.

The inquiry, instigated by independent senator Nick Xenophon, and chaired by Bill Heffernan, has recommended a minimum of 1500 hours ‘real’ flight experience, as well as qualification to the highest standard of airline pilot licence, as the hiring prerequisite.

The members resisted a chorus of entrenched interests, not just in the airlines, CASA, the flying schools and Boeing, but even in the pilot unions, all of which argued against the 1500 hours rule, and came down on the side of excellence rather than the current legal minimums preferred by some carriers.

They have also recommended that the Australian authorities and airlines study the findings of the current inquiry into the Air France flight AF447 Airbus A330 disaster, in which pilot inexperience and poor training for dealing with emergencies in a highly automated cockpit has been implicated in a failure to recover from a high altitude stall and subsequent crash into the mid Atlantic in June 2009, killing all 228 people on board.

From the submissions and lengthy hearings conducted by the committee it is apparent that there is a serious contest going on in many airlines, not just in Australia, between the accountancy based desire for pilots to use autopilots as much as possible, and the reality that when automated systems fail or other emergencies strike, pilot experience and training are crucial to avoiding an Air France type of disaster.

Qantas would have lost an Airbus A330-300 near Learmonth in Western Australia in 2008, and an Airbus A380 near Singapore last November, had not experienced pilots effectively disregarded or selectively engaged their computerized flight control systems to deal with sudden emergencies, as they did in two recent 747 emergencies at Bangkok and in a forced landing in Manila.

Jetstar CEO Bruce Buchanan, has previously publicly insisted that inexperienced pilots were preferable to experienced recruits. He has been comprehensively rebuffed for such dangerous fantasies by the Senate inquiry. The disdain some low cost and legacy airline managements often have for pilot training standards pose a serious threat to flight safety world wide.

The Jetstar situation has to been carefully articulated by the Senate inquiry, and demands rectification.

The Senate committee has through its recommendations spoken out against cheapness and convenience in piloting, which is too often just seen as a labor supply issue by carrier managements.

The next test is whether or not the Minister for Transport, Anthony Albanese, turns these recommendations into urgently needed reforms.

This report first appeared in the Crikey Daily Mail subscriber bulletin
Pruners the moment of truth is upon us. "Experts" are needed apparently. You see, Uncle Joyce and Loosecannon have been whispering in Albanese's ear for months now. This Xenophon bloke is off the scene soon.

Experts would be people that don't have vested financial interests unlike Petteford, The Universities, Managers with KPI's, Flying Schools. Someone I might consider an expert is a line pilot that sits in the Left hand seat of a jet and has done so over a number of decades.

No Chairmans Club membership for you Sandilands!
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Old 24th Jun 2011, 08:26
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I'm tempted to start an appeal fund so Ben can enjoy all the benefits of the chairman's lounge (Grange, an iPad, whatever) paid for by the pilots of Australia.

Thanks again Mr Sandilands.
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Old 24th Jun 2011, 08:33
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The Report ~A link

Pilot training and airline safety including consideration of the Transport Safety Investigation Amendment (Incident Reports) Bill 2010
148 pages of light reading if you care to download it

Last edited by fishers.ghost; 24th Jun 2011 at 08:54.
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Old 24th Jun 2011, 08:55
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The other interesting thing to come out of today is the way the Senate recommendations feed in to the ATSB investigation regarding the near miss between Virgin and Cathay a couple of years ago.

Jets in near miss because of untrained air traffic officer | Plane Talking

Lack of experience, poor training, minimum standards (sorry I mean "World's Best Practice") and accountants running the place. Swap Airservices Australia for a carrier employing low hour cadet pilots and the latent organisational risks are identical.
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Old 24th Jun 2011, 09:06
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(sorry I mean "World's Best Practice")


This is truly "Worlds best practice"....
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Old 24th Jun 2011, 09:11
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A Legendary Myth or a Legendary Woman?

Very few verifiable details about the life of Mother Shipton are known. Even the time frame of her life and death can at best be approximated (often given as 1488-1561 based on historical references). Although many resources online and in book form claim to know authoritative facts about the intricacies of Mother Shipton's life, the origin of many of these "facts" are dubious in nature and have been called into question by historians.

Indeed many historians, even in Great Britain, are not convinced that Mother Shipton is any more than a legendary, mythical figure. Skeptics continue to rapidly and conclusively dismiss Mother Shipton as a "fraud" in the present day (and have done so in the past as well), but it is wise to be discerning regarding the logic, agenda and depth of some of those analyses and whether they take into account varying interpretations of the historical record.





It is important to steer clear of an "all or nothing" approach when analyzing the older resources on Mother Shipton. Many sources clearly contain unreliable, indeed even intentionally fraudulent information, particularly since they were created during the dubious days of notorious "witch hunts".

But there are also jewels of verifiable truth to be found in these very same sources. Just because a portion of an account is clearly embellished does not make the entire source a fraud. Too many people examining these sources completely throw the baby out with the bathwater, ignoring important clues.


My BOLD - Selah.
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Old 24th Jun 2011, 09:53
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Muppets!
All about "Affordable Safety" i.e. how much can they lower the bar and shift savings into their pockets (it's definately not going to the shareholders! Look at the downward trend since Irish-shonk took over!). Affordable Safety... all very well until one on their relatives is involved in an incident/accident/death, requiring the said Royal Commission.
The Aircrew Licenses and minimum experiences are there for a reason and many are set in blood from lessons learnt from the first day the Wright Brothers took flight. It's time these muppets did abit of History reading and also had a look around at all the accidents/incidents occurring right now in India/Asia/China/Sth America where such rubbish is in action. (rant over)
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Old 24th Jun 2011, 10:00
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Refresh your memories people

From The Australian

Pilots take controls of cockpit issue: access | The Australian

Steve Creedy, Aviation writer From: The Australian September 11, 2009 12:03AM

QANTAS pilots have caused a furore in federal parliament by successfully lobbying to get legislation restricting access to aircraft cockpits disallowed.

The Australian and International Pilots Association had been lobbying to get the legislation overturned because it placed the criminal responsibility for allowing access to the flight deck on the captain rather than the airline.

It also meant that off-duty pilots were no longer eligible to fly in the jump seat unless they were commuting to and from work.

The Howard government introduced regulations in 2005 that restricted access to cockpits but the Rudd government in February moved to tighten what it saw as a loophole in the rules and doubled the penalty for breaches.

While pilots recognised the need to restrict access to cockpits, they complained they were not consulted about the new rules and warned the changes would affect their safety culture.

They also argued the regulations were inconsistent with global best practice, a view that was supported by international and US pilot groups.

The disallowance was put forward by independent senator Nick Xenophon and supported by the opposition and the Greens.

AIPA president Barry Jackson said the Senate had disallowed a flawed piece of legislation about which pilots were not consulted.

He said the strict liability meant that a captain would be responsible if a flight attendant inadvertently left a cockpit door unlocked.

"All we wanted to do was to be able to discuss this," Captain Jackson said. "The criminal liability to me was the big thing and I think the Greens made a good comment about safety culture.

"If you know you are going to be criminally liable either financially or through jailable offence then you are not going to be so forthcoming with any information. So it's completely at odds with a just culture or a proper safety-management system."

Captain Jackson said the pilots supported prohibiting the families of airline staff and other passengers on flight decks but believed that allowing an off-duty pilot access enhanced safety.

He said pilots were happy to work with the government on the issue, which he believed needed "just a little rejigging".

A legal opinion by Bret Walker SC, suggested that existing Civil Aviation Regulations could be easily changed to oblige airlines to include cockpit-access instructions in operations manuals.

However, the disallowance was blasted in question time by Transport Minister Anthony Albanese.

Mr Albanese said there would now be no effective legal restrictions on who could enter a cockpit or penalties for unauthorised access. Other aviation regulations also had strict liability offences.

"It is completely unsatisfactory for such an important measure in such a vital security regime to rely on industry self-regulation," Mr Albanese said. "The rules on who can open hardened cockpit doors and enter the cockpit should be set by the parliament, not left to the discretion of pilots and their union."

Labelling the regulations bizarre, opposition transport spokesman Warren Truss said his party voted to disallow the rules after attempting to negotiate amendments with the government.

"Regulations should not turn pilots into flying doormen and force them into spending more time checking that the cockpit door is closed than flying the plane," he said.
A good read here:

http://www.aph.gov.au/hansard/senate...s/ds100909.pdf

Albanese got his pants pulled down on that one. He's now going to return the favour to AIPA and the Senators. Heffernan and Xenophon again going with a common sense approach.
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Old 24th Jun 2011, 10:03
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He's a menace to Safety. He wouldn't know the first thing about flying yet he's sprouting off like he knows ALL about it. He's as much a pilot as he is a male Armani catwalk model.
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Old 24th Jun 2011, 11:12
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Not true Mr Hat.

He knows a lot about P class under a blanket.

Has to qualify him for something....let me think.

Sorry you meant the tech side did you.
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Old 24th Jun 2011, 11:51
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Interesting that the minister doesn't want security self regulated
but its just fine for fatigue management......
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Old 24th Jun 2011, 11:52
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Qantas/Jetstar Reponse

JETSTAR has rejected a call by a senate committee to significantly increase the minimum number of hours of flight experience pilots need before they can become a first officer in bigger passenger jets such as the Airbus A320.

The committee stopped short of supporting calls for all regular public transport high-capacity jet pilots to be required to have flown 1500 hours in an aircraft.
But they recommended that they be required to hold an air transport pilots licence (ATPL) stipulating at least 1500 hours of flight time, which can include simulator time but requires at least 750 hours in a recognised aircraft type.
The probe was sparked in part by pilot concerns about a Jetstar cadet scheme which meant pilots with as little as 250 hours flying experience could work as first officers on Airbus A320 jets.
It followed a similar argument and a move to increase required flying hours to 1500 for regular public transport pilots in the US after the crash of a commuter plane was attributed to pilot inexperience.
Currently, first officers on jets like the 737 and Airbus A320 can hold a commercial pilots licence (CPL) requiring at least 150 hours flight time at in a commercial training course or 200 hours in general aviation.
Jetstar said yesterday it continued to support training based on pilot skill and competency rather than requirements for an arbitrary number of hours as safest from of training.
The committee recognised that the current minimum hours requirements are in accordance with international standards and are not considered by CASA to represent a threat to safety standards, it said. The committee did not come to the conclusion that the current minimum hours requirements equated to an unacceptably higher risk to Australian aviation.
But independent Senator Nick Xenophon, who lobbied for the inquiry, described the findings as a "huge wake-up call" for the aviation industry.
The South Australian Senator said the report confirmed the fears of pilots and cabin crew that aviation standards had been slipping.
It also raised concerns about the fear that pilots and cabin crew have in raising safety issues with management, he said.
"The findings of this inquiry are a huge wake-up call to the aviation industry,' Senator Xenophon said.
"The dozens of pilots and crew members I've spoken to in recent months have said they're worried about the apparent race to the bottom when it comes to safety."
The committee concluded that having co-pilots with experience closer to minimum requirements represented a reduction in safety compared to past practices where co-pilots would have flight experience significantly above entry level.
The inquiry also looked at the culture of incident reporting in the wake of incidents on Jetstar and Tiger Airways and the role of the Civil Aviation Safety Authority.
Its 22 recommendations cover a range of issues from pilot experience to regulator oversight of training and HECS fees for student pilots.
They include a call for a Productivity Commission review of the current and future supply of pilots, six-monthly reports to parliament on the pace of CASA regulatory reforms and review of funding to the regulator aimed at speeding up the reform process.
It also calls for improvements to way the aviation events are reported to the Australian Transport Safety Bureau as well as the implementation of a "just culture" to encourage open reporting of incidents and to ensure airline managers are trained in procedural fairness.
Other recommendations include changes to regulations to require risk management of cabin crew fatigue and requirements that flight attendants meet minimum English standards.
Senator Xenophon called on transport Minister Anthony Albanese to act urgently on the recommendations.
"There are very real issues here to do with aviation safety and this Inquiry has been useful to uncover many of these and to recommend crucial reforms," Senator Xenophon said.
The Australian and International Pilots Association said it was broadly supportive of the report but Qantas echoed Jestar's argument about competency and skill-based training.
"All Qantas Group airlines uphold the highest safety and pilot training standards and comply with strict regulatory requirements set by the Civil Aviation Safety Authority,'' a spokesman said.
"We cooperated fully with the Committee during its inquiry, providing a large volume of information through submissions and evidence, and we welcome the publication of its report. The government will now consider the report's recommendations and we will provide whatever assistance or is required as it does so."
The airline said it already had extensive fatigue-management processes and English standards for cabin crew.
The Civil Aviation Safety Authority said it was studying the report.
A spokesman for Transport Minister Anthony Albanese said the government noted the Senate Committee’s report and would take advice from aviation experts before responding in due course.

''Safety is the number one priority,'' he said. "That’s why last year we delivered an unprecedented 30 per cent increase to the budget of the nation’s independent aviation safety watchdog – the Civil Aviation Safety Authority "
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Old 24th Jun 2011, 12:42
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I don't get it...

Does BB really believe that he would have been a better manager the day after he finished his 'high quality' MBA than he is now? No?
So why would he argue that a pilot straight out of training would be better than one with equivalent training/experience and some additional time in the business?
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Old 24th Jun 2011, 23:52
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Hammer Albanese

Here's an idea! Albanese is on Q&A on Monday night so why don't we all collectively mass e-mail the Q&A site with questions for the good (read inept) Minister!

Questions like: Q.Given the strong anecdotal evidence given by expert and professional members of the aviation industry in this Inquiry, how long will it be before we see the 22 recommendations from the Senate Committee acted on by the government?
Web address:
Contact Us | Q&A | ABC TV

Then after the Q&A we follow up by bombarding his parliament house e-mail with a follow up to his response:
E-mail : [email protected]

Maybe we might jolt the fool into actually doing something, just an idea!

Also make sure you cc to the Shadow Minister (Warren Truss I think) and the good Senators Bill H & X (although Bill H has only one week to run).

Finally make sure you give the link to this thread.

Last edited by Sarcs; 25th Jun 2011 at 02:10.
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Old 25th Jun 2011, 00:17
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Sarcs
Top idea!
SN
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Old 25th Jun 2011, 00:31
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Or no minimum experience or age for a drivers licence, as long as the candidate can bluff their way through the test they get a full licence and are therefore as good as any other driver. (because we all know a car full of 16 year old boys is as safe as any, ask any insurance company about driver experience)
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Old 25th Jun 2011, 00:31
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Jetsbest; I'm sure he wasn't but that's not really the right comparison. The right comparison would be whether an MBA is better training to be CEO or 2 years managing a corner store in the Bungle Bungles.
After which you run the local grocer at Kununurra, then woolies in darwin, followed by the state, then the national chain.

It's called small steps.
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