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On completion of Peter’s presentation Bill Hamilton responded, stating he was speaking on behalf of the members of AOPA, AUF, ASAC and RFAC, and advised that they all support NAS Stage 2B.....

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Bill Hamilton, AOPA, requested Bernie Smith, CEO Airservices, to review the privacy policy, in reference to this particular situation, in order for COR holders to become immediately aware of an incident report involving their aircraft.

Len Yates, CASA, explained that the ESIR’s received by CASA are reviewed before the decision is made to notify the pilot. This review process by CASA can contribute to the delay in notifying pilots as there is a lack of resources to quickly process the information. He explained however that not all ESIR’s upon review require notification by CASA to the pilot.

Therefore having all notifications sent directly to the COR holder may infer that an incident is being investigated by CASA, when in fact they may have decided not to proceed further.

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I was previously asked about a “VRA proposition in E areas above terminal areas.” I stated correctly that I did not know what this was referring to. I now understand that VRA stands for “VHF Reporting Area” which is a unique Airservices/Qantas proposal that brings back full position reporting from the 1950s as a mandatory requirement in the Class E airspace to FL180 above Class D towers.

If this is what you refer to as the “Industry Option”, I can assure you that I do not support it. I have had no involvement at all other than a number of incredulous people telling me what was proposed and allegedly supported by Chris Manning of Qantas.

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And let us not forget, during all this, The Missing in Action Minister remained silent - and still does in any practical sense.

So I am sorry, but to suggest that:

quote:
It is achievable, and can still be called NAS to appease Canberra

is even possible.....? With the current personalities involved, I don't honestly think it is.

Why try and patch up a bad idea? Why not do it right like it should have been done from the start?

Strong Leadership does mean listening and consulting widely. It doesn't mean caving to in every demand from every lobby group. But equally it doesnt mean working behind industry/communities backs.

This hasn't happened with this go, and the goodwill for this has gone. New blood is needed, and it needs to be managed by people who need to know how to 'listen' in the first instance.

Some of the incumbents have already had too many chances at doing this abd failed.

(personally I say bugger appeasing Canberra - if Anderson had shown some real leadership this situation wouldn;t have been permiited to happen - again)

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I'm always IFR, in fact, our company doesn't allow VFR outside of 50 Nm anymore!

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It must be frustrating for you as a professional to see the ridiculous unique changes that are being proposed. I can understand your view on the radar in Tasmania. Once again, it is obvious that there is a total lack of leadership. It is very sad for Australia and for our aviation industry.

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Ken, I understand that this ARM document is flawed.

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I have recently been told ...

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I also understand that this flawed document has been unknowingly accepted by ICAO as the basis for airspace risk modelling

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I have spoken to US airspace experts

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Voices of Reason, by the way, this is my last post on this thread. I have to get on with my other life! I have intentionally provided all of the information so there is a contemporary and open account of the decisions in which I was involved. This will be of assistance to any future inquiries.

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For example, it was agreed over 18 months ago that Airservices would upgrade the Class G airspace above FL145 to Class E right across Australia. This is a major safety improvement, requires no extra training for controllers and no extra facilities or equipment, yet Airservices has once again delayed the introduction. Initially the Class E upgrade was to come in by June 2004. Airservices then insisted that the upgrade needed to be put off until November 2004. At recent meetings they have claimed that they can do nothing in November and it needs to be postponed again

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Voices of Reason edited by Woomera, you don’t seem to understand that I, nor anyone on the ARG, had responsibility for the introduction of the NAS system.

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8.1. ARG The ARG is responsible for the implementation of the NAS and in project management terms is the Executive Steering Group.

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Kakorrhaphiophobia is your motivator, and your downfall.

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I wonder if the people who are doing this are looking at it with an Australian “culture”.

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There are huge areas of Class E airspace in many countries in the world without radar coverage

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It is obvious that you and others at Airservices must believe that it is safe for the airlines to provide their own separation in IMC in Class G (i.e. the present airspace below FL180) but such a separation standard used by air traffic controllers would not be acceptably safe.

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What you are saying is if we classify it Class E it will not work satisfactorily.

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That can only mean that the separation standard which is used by the airlines at the present time when in IMC in Class G does not provide an acceptable safety level.

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If that is not so it must mean that the standard air traffic controllers need to apply for separation in Class E is too onerous. Do you see what I am getting at?

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The United States has a vast amount of Class E airspace without VHF radio coverage. Much of this is in the terminal area, where radio for separation is even more important.

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What you are in fact saying is that we cannot have a bit of extra safer Class E airspace between FL180 and FL145 without spending more money. I do not agree. I believe you should get some Canadian controllers down here and they will very quickly show you how the system can work very satisfactorily in low density airspace – which we have.

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Yes, when IMC exists it is one aircraft at one location at one altitude, however as I have stated in other threads, that is what any prudent pilot would normally insist on when in IMC in Class G airspace.

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I think those who are looking at this safety improvement (the Class E to FL145) have fixed in their minds that “controlled airspace” will only work where there are VHF coms. This is simply not true.

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Most importantly, LAMP brought the Class E down to FL125 and the LAMP proponents at Airservices were convinced that this was OK. Can I ask what is the difference? LAMP is OK to FL125, however NAS is not OK to FL145.

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Guide to sceptics
From: DOwens6683 <[email protected]>
This is a nice article on the tricks some sceptics get up to to discredit their opponents.
Ever get into an argument with a skeptic only to end up exasperated and feeling you've been bamboozled? Skeptics are often highly skilled at tying up opponents in clever verbal knots. Most skeptics are, of course, ordinary, more-or-less honest people who, like the rest of us, are just trying to make the best sense they can of a complicated and often confusing world. Others, however, are merely glib sophists who use specious reasoning to defend their prejudices or attack the ideas and beliefs of others, and even an honest skeptic can innocently fall into the mistake of employing bad reasoning.

In reading, listening to and sometimes debating skeptics over the years, I've found certain tricks, ploys and gimmicks which they tend to use over and over again. Here are some of 'em. Perhaps if you keep them in mind when arguing with a skeptic, you'll feel better when the debate is over. Shucks, you might even score a point or two.

1 RAISING THE BAR (Or IMPOSSIBLE PERFECTION):
This trick consists of demanding a new, higher and more difficult standard of evidence whenever it looks as if a skeptic's opponent is going to satisfy an old one. Often the skeptic doesn't make it clear exactly what the standards are in the first place. This can be especially effective if the skeptic can keep his opponent from noticing that he is continually changing his standard of evidence. That way, his opponent will eventually give up in exasperation or disgust. Perhaps best of all, if his opponent complains, the skeptic can tag him as a whiner or a sore loser.

Skeptic: I am willing to consider the psi hypothesis if you will only show me some sound evidence.
Opponent: There are many thousands of documented reports of incidents that seem to involve psi.
S: That is only anecdotal evidence. You must give me laboratory evidence.
0: Researchers A-Z have conducted experiments that produced results which favor the psi hypothesis.
S: Those experiments are not acceptable because of flaws X,Y and Z.
0: Researchers B-H and T-W have conducted experiments producing positive results which did not have flaws X,Y and Z.
S: The positive results are not far enough above chance levels to be truly interesting.
0: Researchers C-F and U-V produced results well above chance levels.
S: Their results were achieved through meta-analysis, which is a highly questionable technique.
O: Meta-analysis is a well-accepted method commonly used in psychology and sociology.
S: Psychology and sociology are social sciences, and their methods can't be considered as reliable as those of hard sciences such as physics and chemistry.
Etc., etc. ad nauseum.
……………………………..
4 STUPID, CRAZY LIARS:
This trick consists of simple slander. Anyone who reports anything which displeases the skeptic will be accused of incompetence, mental illness or dishonesty, or some combination of the three without a single shred of fact to support the accusations. When Charles Honorton's Ganzfeld experiments produced impressive results in favor of the psi hypothesis, skeptics accused him of suppressing or not publishing the results of failed experiments. No definite facts supporting the charge ever emerged. Moreover, the experiments were extremely time consuming, and the number of failed, unpublished experiments necessary to make the number of successful, published experiments significant would have been quite high, so it is extremely unlikely that Honorton's results could be due to selective reporting. Yet skeptics still sometimes repeat this accusation.
……………………..
6 SHIFTING THE BURDEN OF EVIDENCE:
The skeptic insists that he doesn't have to provide evidence and arguments to support his side of the argument because he isn't asserting a claim, he is merely denying or doubting yours. His mistake consists of assuming that a negative claim (asserting that something doesn't exist) is fundamentally different from a positive claim. It isn't. Any definite claim, positive or negative, requires definite support. Merely refuting or arguing against an opponent's position is not enough to establish one's own position.. In other words, you can't win by default.
As arch-skeptic Carl Sagan himself said, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. If someone wants to rule out vistations by extra-terrestrial aliens, it would not be enough to point out that all the evidence presented so far is either seriously flawed or not very strong. It would be necessary to state definite reasons which would make ET visitations either impossible or highly unlikely. (He might, for example, point out that our best understanding of physics pretty much rules out any kind of effective faster-than-light drive.)
The only person exempt from providing definite support is the person who takes a strict "I don't know" position or the agnostic position. If someone takes the position that the evidence in favor of ET visitations is inadequate but goes no farther, he is exempt from further argument (provided, of course, he gives adequate reasons for rejecting the evidence). However, if he wants to go farther and insist that it is impossible or highly unlikely that ET's are visiting or have ever visited the Earth, it becomes necessary for him to provide definite reasons for his position. He is no longer entitled merely to argue against his opponent's position.
There is the question of honesty. Someone who claims to take the agnostic position but really takes the position of definite disbelief is, of course, misrepresenting his views. For example, a skeptic who insists that he merely believes the psi hypothesis is inadequately supported when in fact he believes that the human mind can only acquire information through the physical senses is simply not being honest.
………………
8 THE BIG LIE:
The skeptic knows that most people will not have the time or inclination to check every claim he makes, so he knows it's a fairly small risk to tell a whopper. He might, for example, insist that none of the laboratory evidence for psi stands up to close scrutiny, or he might insist there have been no cases of UFO's being spotted by reliable observers such as trained military personnel when in fact there are well-documented cases. The average person isn't going to scamper right down to the library to verify this, so the skeptic knows a lot of people are going to accept his statement at face value. This ploy works best when the Big Lie is repeated often and loudly in a confident tone.
9 DOUBT CASTING:
This trick consists of dwelling on minor or trivial flaws in the evidence, or presenting speculations as to how the evidence might be flawed as though mere speculation is somehow as damning as actual facts. The assumption here is that any flaw, trivial or even merely speculative, is necessarily fatal and provides sufficient grounds for throwing out the evidence. The skeptic often justifies this with the "extraordinary evidence" ploy.
In the real world, of course, the evidence for anything is seldom 100% flawless and foolproof. It is almost always possible to find some small shortcoming which can be used as an excuse for tossing out the evidence. If a definite problem can't be found, then the skeptic may simply speculate as to how the evidence *might* be flawed and use his speculations as an excuse to discard the information. For example, the skeptic might point out that the safeguards or controls during one part of a psi experiment weren't quite as tight as they might have been and then insist, without any supporting facts, that the subject(s) and/or the researcher(s) probably cheated because this is the "simplest" explanation for the results (see "Sock 'em with Occam" and "Extraordinary Claims"; "Raising the Bar" is also relevant).
10 THE SNEER:
This gimmick is an inversion of "Stupid, Crazy Liars." In "Stupid, Crazy Liars," the skeptic attacks the character of those advocationg certain ideas or presenting information in the hope of discrediting the information. In "THE SNEER," the skeptic attempts to attach a stigma to some idea or claim and implies that anyone advocating that position must have something terribly wrong with him. "Anyone who believes we've been visited by extraterresrial aliens must be a lunatic, a fool, or a con man. If you believe this, you must a maniac, a simpleton or a fraud." The object here is to scare others away from a certain position without having to discuss facts.* * *


To be fair, some of these tricks or tactics (such as "The Big Lie," "Doubtcasting" and "The Sneer") are often used by believers as well as skeptics. Scientific Creationists and Holocaust Revisionists, for example, are particularly prone to use "Doubtcasting." Others ploys, however, such as "Sock 'em with Occam" and "Extraordinary Claims," are generally used by skeptics and seldom by others. Unfortunately, effective debating tactics often involve bad logic, e.g. attacking an opponent's character, appeals to emotion, mockery and facetiousness, loaded definitions, etc. And certainly skeptics are not the only ones who are ever guilty of using manipulative and deceptive debating tactics. Even so, skeptics are just as likely as anyone else to twist their language, logic and facts to win an argument, and keeping these tricks in mind when dealing with skeptics may very well keep you from being bamboozled.

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As for the rest of you anti NASers who actually have serious points of view, I bet 90% of you are either ATC or high capacity RPT jockeys

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