Merged: Senate Inquiry

[004wercras]

CAsA Briefing Sep 2013 folly

Link below;

Civil Aviation Safety Authority - September 2013

Under the topic of social media there was no mention about CAsA's following on Pprune?

As usual, no mention of some of the bigger ticket items such as regulatory reform and the senate inquiry.

[Frank Arouet]

I know how to fly, but I don't "Tweet". At least I don't think so.

Obviously a flaw in my training and something that should be included in The Regulatory Review Process.

[aroa]

Lets wait.....!

004. After 6 years we will probably be able to read a like spiel put out by the next DOIT dolt.

Better things to do in life than waste time tweeting CAsA or logging into their Ar$eBook. (sh*te spoken here)

Is this 'social' media thing going to be mandatory with a manual, log book endo and an exam?? Weirder things have happened out of FF before.

After all (Non) Aviation house is the leading exponent in "make work" and "what shall we do this week " brigade.

[004wercras]

Borromean rings

Aroa, perhaps Fort Fumble will introduce a new reg for AOC and COA holders that says;
'An operator must have a system in place which captures CAsA's most up to date media postings. Acceptable means of compliance includes the use of electronic systems including Twatter, Facetake or Poohtube. Failure to comply with this regulation will incur a 50 point penalty and a NCN'. (I imagine some sneaky operators will try to use PPRune, 4 Corners, Q&A, Willyleaks, Crikey or Pro Aviation as a means to ascertain true accurate reports, however this is considered a non acceptable means of compliance).

CAsA, ASA and ATSBeaker are really much like Borromean rings. Linked, but yet they aren't!
And all three put out glossy statements and have tarted up their websites but alas, it is all a distraction. Just another coat of glitter on top of the turd.

P.S
I also hear that the very questionable sentinel I.T program, which was introduced by a friend of one of the GWM Don's, is a complete and dismal failure! Slow, clunky, and full of more holes than what is in Professor Reasons block of Swiss cheese! The amount of time spent trying to accurately use the system has resulted in several months of work backlog including audits and surveillance tasks. No risk in that is there?

[Sarcs]

Out standing QON 93 CAsA 03 29/05/2013

004:

I also hear that the very questionable sentinel I.T program, which was introduced by a friend of one of the GWM Don's, is a complete and dismal failure! Slow, clunky, and full of more holes than what is in Professor Reasons block of Swiss cheese! The amount of time spent trying to accurately use the system has resulted in several months of work backlog including audits and surveillance tasks. No risk in that is there?

Hmm very interesting rumour 004! So this was the system instigated on mate's rates.."I'll scratch your back if you scratch mine fellow trough dweller!"...that had drawn the interest of one Senator Fawcett at the last Senate Estimates and still has an outstanding QON (no surprises there!!) some 4 months later:

Senator FAWCETT:I will swap to yoursurveillance manual. You are obviously aware we have been taking an increased interestin surveillance activities. As part of my background reading for that, inlooking at your surveillance manual, in the introduction section it talks aboutSky Sentinel, the approved IT surveillance management tool. I have done someresearch over Google to try and find out who provided that to CASA and theredoes not appear to be a commercial provider. Can you tell the committee wherethat system has come from?

Mr McCormick: Yes. That system was developed in-house by one of our inspectors in Perth and at the time it wasbased around the issues of Perth and operators. By putting in information and background on operators it allows us to have a risk-rating on organisations, giving us more insight into organisations that are higher risk than would perhaps be seen by a manual search, given the large number of certificates that people hold. It is one of the first systems rolled out in the world. There may be others. We have trialled it for many months, if not a year, in Perth. We have now refined that. We own the IP to it and now every inspector has on their desk an IT based system which gives them indications of what the risk-ratings are of the various organisations that they are overseeing. Coupled with that, of course, we have moved into the certificate management team approach which was to put together our safety systems inspectors, our airworthiness inspectors and our flying operations inspectors in teams so that they could better use that data.

Senator FAWCETT:You said that you own theIP. I take it that was developed by CASA staff in CASA time?

Mr McCormick: In fact, I think it was developed in the person's own time, but on the IP issues there are other systems that are similar in the world and we took legal advice on the IP issues.

Senator FAWCETT:Was that person recognised or rewarded in some way for their contribution?

Mr McCormick: They were the employee of the month, from memory.

Senator FAWCETT:So no other recognition or award given to them? No payment?

Mr McCormick: We did have to buy the IP off them. That is correct.

Senator FAWCETT:How much did that cost?

Mr McCormick: If I can confirm that, it was somewhere between $25,000 and $37,000.

Senator FAWCETT:I am assuming that you have then rolled that out across the organisation. Do you have a quality assurance IT department that looked at that? What was their advice about a home-grown system across the whole department?

Mr McCormick: What we had to do with the system was to address that very issue. We had to take the IP from the person and the system and then, in the parlance, cut it into professional code so that it is supportable by modern systems and of course to take out some of theprogramming issues which may have been loops or things to put it on a professional basis. So the system we use now has been done by our professional IT department and we do have QA. We are, in fact, at this stage rolling out quality assurance across all our flight operations to ensure we have standardisation. That is being done by a very senior CASA manager who has previously been the regional manager for southern region.

Senator FAWCETT:Were there any concerns expressed by your IT department about that approach?

& further on in Hansard

Senator FAWCETT:Mr McCormick, when the decision was first taken to proceed with this, what was the expected expenditure that would be required from CASA to roll out this system?

Mr McCormick: When we originally looked at getting to a risk based IT system we were looking at projects which we had had running for some time which were addressing this very issue. They had previously had budgets of varying amounts, so the actual purchase of this software and this system was not undertaken until we had an idea of the costs involved.

Senator FAWCETT:My question was: when it was first approved what was the capital expenditure that was approved for the project?

Mr McCormick: The capital expenditure was a very small amount of money. It was a case of how much it was going to cost. It was costing somewhere at a maximum of $37,000 to purchase it. It is not a large amount of cost in total, even capital or op-ex to roll that out in the organisation.

Senator FAWCETT:So since that initial decision have there been cost overruns where subsequent allocations of funding have been required to enable the implementation to occur?

Mr McCormick: I am not too sure that we can break it down that way. I will ask my chief financial officer. We do not have that breakdown, I am sorry.

Senator FAWCETT:Can you tell me the final overall cost of the system as of this budget?

Mr McCormick: For the CASA IT tool SkySentinel business and technical implementation, development implementation and the new CASA surveillance manuals from March 2011 to June 2013, the total cost was $2,419,157, but we do not have the breakdown of the Sky Sentinel out of that at this stage.

SenatorFAWCETT:Can you come back to the committee today, if you can, or tomorrow with that figure? I would be interested to know how much that was.

And now the rumour is that this surveillance IT tool is a clusterf*#k and has potentially circumvented several slices of swiss cheese on the safety risk matrix...hmm how potentially embarrassing for the FF GWM contingent and (as Gobbles once said) TICK..TOCK!

ps While contemplating the Sky Sentinel rumour the Jeff Boyd article on Pro Aviation is worth a read:

A Bridge Too Far

[004wercras]

Return of The Matrix?

Sarcs, an interesting tale indeed! Why would it take CAsA more than 4 months to still not respond to a relatively simple question from Sen Fawcett in relation to an even more basic task of purchasing some I.T??
I think the Senator is having the pi#s taken out of him by these clowns who see fit not to show an ounce of accountability to anybody. But seeing that CAsA are taking so long to respond, perhaps Sen Fawcett can build upon his request and request additional information, evidence and answers to these points;

• Was this I.T system risk assessed prior to purchase and implementation?
• Has the system been reassessed post implementation to ensure it delivers the required outcomes and assurances it is meant to do?
• The CAsA Inspector who sold them the system, who is he and what is his relationship, background or history with the person(s) who signed off on the purchase?
• For the Inspector to sell this system for a tidy sum of $37k to CAsA, how was he paid? Does he have an ABN, a separately registered business? And if so, does this business he is involved in in any way provide services to industry, which could be construed as a conflict of interest considering he works for the Regulator? Has he declared his business to CAsA? After all they do make you sign paperwork in which you must declare business interests in areas that could raise the question of conflict of interests?
• It would be rumoured that the SkySentinel system has been raised before, even on PPRune, and CAsA immediately tried to have the comments removed. Why?
• If Fort Fumble were chasing a new I.T system of sorts, why wasn't a tender initiated? Or do you only have to tender up to a certain amount?

Of interest are Mr McComicks answers to the Senators questions in which he deflects to all and sundry such as explaining what Sentinel does, he dribbles on about its use etc etc, but he doesn't like to directly answer the good Senators question does he

It's funny, a Sentinel is a robotic device from the Matrix. A number of CAsA's people could be described as robotic.
But even better, a Sentinel is a small wooden steamboat associated with the Puget Sound Mosquito Fleet! Now I could be mistaken, but I believe the latest addition to Styx Houseboat enterprises is in fact a Sentinel......spooky.

[thorn bird]

And it would seem there are those who deny CAsA is corrupt.
Incompetent for sure, but corrupt?
Oh for sure.
Where are our watchdogs????????? Politicians????? anyone!!??????

[Up-into-the-air]

Watch, the Watcher's watcher

We are here casa

Watching, taking note reporting and we will have you!!

[halfmanhalfbiscuit]

The senate report appears to be becoming shelf ware collecting dust or am I mistaken?

[Jinglie]

Reg action

Next time your AOC or licence gets hassled by CASA, use the words of Albo, "if you haven't noticed we're in caretaker mode". What's good for the goose.... !

[Lookleft]

The senate report appears to be becoming shelf ware collecting dust or am I
mistaken?

I think you are right on the money! Not only is it sitting on the shelf gathering dust in the National Archives but there won't be the companion volume of the required government response. Someone with more knowledge of the process could confirm but I don't think the new government is obliged to respond to a Senate report that was conducted during the tenure of the previous government.

[Sarcs]

More ammo for Nick’s FRMS & CAO 48.1 disallowance motion!!

Remember this (and Creamy’s education on Senate ‘Disallowance Motions’)??

DMCAO 48.1


Well apparently EASA have similar issues to FF on new proposed rules (from Aviation-Safety NET article):

BALPA claims half of pilots have fallen asleep while flying
27 September 2013

The British Airline Pilots Association (BALPA) released findings of survey, claiming half of pilots have fallen asleep while flying.

On September 30 the European Parliament’s transport committee will vote on a European Commission proposal to tighten and standardise flight time limits for pilots across the European Union. This proposal has been under fire from European pilots unions for several months.

On September 26, the British Airline Pilots Association (BALPA), released the findings of a survey on flight time limits. Of the 500 commercial pilots that participated, 56% say they have fallen asleep on the flight deck and of those who admitted this, nearly 1 in 3 (29%) said they woke to find the other pilot asleep.

Also, 31% don’t believe their airline has a culture that lends itself to reporting tiredness concerns with a half (51%) saying they believed their airline Chief Executive would back them if they refused to fly because of tiredness.

Jim McAuslan, General Secretary of BALPA, said about these findings: “Tiredness is already a major challenge for pilots who are deeply concerned that unscientific new EU rules will cut UK standards and lead to increased levels of tiredness, which has been shown to be a major contributory factor in air accidents.”

EASA has previoulsy issued a statement on the concerns voiced by the European Cockpit Association, stating amongst others: “More than 50 scientific studies were analysed, with a particular focus on the effects of disruptive schedule, while all concerned stakeholder groups including flight and cabin crew organisations, airlines, and Member State representatives were consulted throughout the process.”

More information:

• Draft Commission regulation
• BALPA Press release ’half of pilots have fallen asleep while flying’
• EASA press release ‘EASA strongly opposes disinformation campaign on Flight Time Limitations’

Perhaps more fuel to the fire that the Senators, ably led by Nick, have already lit and another potential headache for the DAS and his GWM cronies??

004:

Why would it take CAsA more than 4 months to still not respond to a relatively simple question from Sen Fawcett in relation to an even more basic task of purchasing some I.T??

I think the Senator is having the pi#s taken out of him by these clowns who see fit not to show an ounce of accountability to anybody.

To be fair to the DAS, FF are not on their Pat Malone when it comes to being unresponsive to outstanding QONs from Senate Estimates. In fact if you take a look at Kingcrat's whole remit you will see none have responded...

RRAT AQONs

A quick flick through other Government Departments response to Estimate QONs makes the above webpage link extremely embarrassing for the DoIT Crats. Here is a couple of examples:

Defence
&
Parliamentary Depts

ps Slight thread drift..interesting article by Ben on the possible safety advantages of inflight WIFI use. Which was on the back of upcoming recommendations on the relaxing of restrictions on the use of PEDs (in flight) by the FAA.

Comet's comment makes common sense(there's a rhyme!):

comet
Lots of things don’t make sense.
1. Why aren’t electronic components on flights shielded from electromagnetic radiation such as Wi-Fi? It’s not that hard to shield against. Mobile phones have been in common use since the mid-1980s. Why haven’t they done it?
2. Although car radio broadcasts in road tunnels can be interrupted to play emergency messages, I can’t see any way for that to happen over Wi-Fi, as computer users aren’t watching an incoming audio/video stream that can be interrupted.
3. Why is the FAA thinking of regulating what activity you can do with your Wi-Fi on a plane (NYTimes reports that watching podcasts and videos on takeoff will be allowed, but sending emails will be banned… huh?)
4. How on earth do false collision alarms get triggered by passenger Wi-Fi? They’re not on the same frequency. The passenger Wi-Fi is very week at that distance. Sounds like a scapegoat.
5. Pilots themselves use their mobile phones on landing, as we saw with Jetstar in Singapore.
On a recent Emirates flight over the Indian Ocean, I held my tablet computer in the vicinity of a window, and it registered a GPS location, which I was sharing with other people around the world. My tablet actually sent its location out via the inflight Wi-Fi system. If that had been Air France AF447, I would not be writing this post, but they would have found the wreckage a lot quicker than what they did!

Hmm..wonder how long it will take FF to catch up with the good old 'US of A', maybe a while given the comments from CAsA's mouthpiece:

Australia's Civil Aviation Safety Authority will watch the US administration's recommendations and subsequent decision closely. ''We need to wait and see what the advisory panel recommends and then what the FAA decides to do and when,'' CASA spokesman Peter Gibson said. ''It is likely to take some time for the FAA to make changes.''
But because the Australian agency hadn't yet seen the recommendations, it was ''a way off yet'' before changes, if any, would be implemented in Australia.
It is understood some Australian airlines have already approached the agency to change the rules, but their requests were rejected. The authority has a number of concerns about devices becoming distractions during safety briefings, or turning into projectiles.

"Take some time"...err "wait and see" (try sometime in the next decade!) being the operative words . But the last paragraph (in bold) perhaps takes the cake for how out of touch and in the dark ages is our beloved third world regulator!

[Sarcs]

CAsA take note!

Addendum to my previous post

Looks like it is back to the drawing board for the EU parliament on proposed flight duty changes..

Breakthrough for aviation safety: EU Parliament rejects flawed flight time rules

CAsA beware Nick, Senator Rhiannon & co will soon be back on the warpath and they may be garnering more support for Nick's CAO 48.1 disallowance motion

Senator Xenophon:

Senator XENOPHON: Further to that, there is widespread concern amongst pilots about the flight-time duty regulations, the relatively recent regulations, and the risk they pose to aviation safety.

I understand that these concerns have been put to you, but the reports I have had back are that CASA, and you in particular, have been I think the word is dismissive of them. Why is it the case that the pilots I have spoken to, some very senior pilots with many thousands of hours of experience, have expressed to me that they are at the coalface, and they say that there is a real issue in terms of these new regulations?

For instance, I am told that in certain circumstances under the new regulations CASA allows two pilots to be on duty for 14 hours and to be at the controls for 10 hours. I am told that the science indicates 12 to 13 hours maximum duty in ideal conditions and that fatigue risk increases substantially beyond 16 hours awake. If there is a delay in the flight through weather or whatever—many pilots I have spoken to, including representatives of pilots groups, are incredibly concerned about the new flight-time limitation rules.

Senator Rhiannon:

Senator RHIANNON: Can you or any of your colleagues share some information? You have signed off on CAO 48. It is your first point in 1.12 of a document that I imagine you have put considerable work into, and it has there 'after 16 hours awake'.
Surely somebody could give us some background to this, please.

And Senator Rhiannon's, yet to be answered QONs, pages 36-38 of index: RRAT Senate Estimates QONs index

Hmm..god forbid if the DAS and his cronies have yet another flawed regulation dragged through the parliament for review..."mea culpa after mea culpa"...comes to mind! {Senator Edwards your a gem }

[Wunwing]

If "Albo" gets to be the new Labor top dog does anyone believe that the Libs won't throw anything including this at him?
I think that its far from dead.
Wunwing

[Sarcs]

Lessons still to be learnt from AF447!

Ben's article yesterday perhaps highlights the biggest outstanding human factor safety risk in the modern day airline environment:

AF447disaster pilots not emergency trained-Coroner

A Coronial inquest into the deaths of two UK nationals who were on Air France AF447 when it crashed into the mid Atlantic ocean in 2009 has brought some critical issues in air safety into the public arena.

While this BBC report doesn’t add to what air safety observers have already learned about the disaster, it does talk in lay terms about pilot training, and growing concerns that cockpit automation raises issues not properly addressed by many airlines.

This is important. In the course of Senate committee discussions in this country, as well as in various safety forums and statements made by safety agencies abroad, there is concern about an airline management tendency to believe that pilots should be required to do as little hands on flying as possible, and leave as much of the control of flight function as possible to computer aided automation.

What numerous incidents in both Airbus and Boeing types have demonstrated, as recently as the Asiana crash at San Francisco, ‘hands off’ can end badly if anything abnormal occurs that requires pilot skills to identify and rectify or recover from.

In Qantas there has been a long and admirable emphasis on ‘recovery upset’ in pilot training. It has saved the airline from the terrible potential consequences of an A380 engine disintegration (QF32) near Singapore in 2010 as well as a control incident with an A330 that forced an emergency landing at Learmonth in 2008, and an electrical crisis in a Boeing 747 fortunately while close to Bangkok Airport in 2008. Among others!

How traditional, and highly successful skills in upset recovery can be maintained in contemporary airliner operations is a much argued or discussed issue for airlines, air safety regulators, certifying authorities and the manufacturers.
This relevance has been underlined by incidents in which the most modern of airliners, with safety records arguably underpinned by automation, have been challenged, sometimes disastrously, by events for which the pilots were inadequately prepared.

While we are in this limbo before the parliamentary schedule etc is being sorted out and fires up again... ...perhaps now is a good time to rehash a recommendation from the Senate 'Pilot Training and Airline Safety' inquiry that promised a review of the findings of the tragic AF447 crash investigation:

Recommendation 9
2.299 The committee recommends that the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA), the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) and Australian aviation operators review the final findings of France's Bureau of Investigation and Analysis into Air France 447, including consideration of how it may apply in the Australian context. Subject to those findings, the committee may seek the approval of the Senate to conduct a further hearing in relation to the matter.

IMO it would be an indictment on the new government to ignore this recommendation and continued to obfuscate the matter like the previous government...the AF 447 (although tragic) findings and subsequent commentary, provide a very real warning shot that the worldwide aviation industry cannot afford to ignore!

Excellent article and essential reading from Flight Global on AF447 & LOC-1: Upsetting convention

..and PT follow up to AF447 article: Contest of the Control Freaks grows louder after AF447

[Lookleft]

The fact that LOC-I has developed as a phenomenon proves the industry has a fundamental training problem. UPRT is only the sticking plaster. The industry needs to treat the disease.

The FAA has already come to the view that hours in the logbook is one way to fix the problem. I think the evidence is clear that MPLs, 250 hour jet pilots with more time in the simulator does not create a more competent pilot, it creates a pilot with a skill set that is suited to normal operations and nothing more. The Inquiry into pilot training also recommended that jet F/O's have a minimum of 1500hours but this was dismissed by Albo and friends.

[LeadSled]

The FAA has already come to the view that hours in the logbook is one way to fix the problem. I think the evidence is clear that MPLs, 250 hour jet pilots with more time in the simulator does not create a more competent pilot, it creates a pilot with a skill set that is suited to normal operations and nothing more. The Inquiry into pilot training also recommended that jet F/O's have a minimum of 1500hours but this was dismissed by Albo and friends.

Lookleft,

Almost 60 years of statistics are against you, very decisively so.

None of the pilots in recent highly publicised loss of control accidents were low hour pilots --- and I hope you are not suggesting that learning stops at the conclusion of an ab nitio training course.
Quite frankly, for civil pilots who have only light GA backgrounds, pre-airline hours have little relevance, except in the area of unlearning bad habits all too common in GA.
Tootle pip!!

PS: Albo and friends: the friends included most of the bigger Australian operators.

[Capn Bloggs]

Originally Posted by Ludslud

None of the pilots in recent highly publicised loss of control accidents were low hour pilots

So I suppose you reckon the AF FOs, with 4,000+ hours, were quite OK? That 4,000 probably translated into what, 10 hours real stick time, actual eyeballs going everywhere "IF" time? Give me a 2000hr Braz pilot any day. Don't worry, I'll beat those bad GA habits out of him quick smart.

[Lookleft]

Leady the last 10 years certainly does suggest there is something seriously wrong with the skill set airline pilots have if otherwise serviceable aircraft are literally falling out of the sky. If you look at the experience of the F/O who was controlling the aircraft it is most likely that he came from an ab ignitio program. As I mentioned a lot of the cadet programs and PAYG schemes that are prevalent do not produce a more competent pilot outside of normal operations. As evidence of this day in and day out thousands of flights are conducted that arrive safely. The concern is for those flights that end up outside the normal operation. It's not just me saying this it's many aviation blogs and articles that are starting to question current training practices. It has been my experience that civil pilots from GA backgrounds develop a lot of non- technical skills that cannot be taught in a simulator. Things like SOPs and airline culture come after induction and 100+ hours of line training.

[A37575]

As I mentioned a lot of the cadet programs and PAYG schemes that are prevalent do not produce a more competent pilot outside of normal operations. As evidence of this day in and day out thousands of flights are conducted that arrive safely

Agree. When ATSB recently produced their favourable report on low hour pilot competency it was based upon a compilation of proficiency checks in simulators and line training garnered from three major Australian operators. No prize for guessing which three.

The result was unsurprising as arguably 90% of these assessments conducted by the airlines on themselves was on automatic pilot. Of course there was no conflict of interest either. No way would the airlines concerned express concern on the standard of the low hour pilots in their own airline since it would reflect adversely on their selection process.