RFDS and the PC-12....
Once upon time at Essendon, it was a dark windy wet night.
As the dashing young handsome Capt Wally drives into work he notices the city lights reflecting in the low cloud and as he steps from the car he fills the cold biting southerly breeze drifting across the rain lashed airfield.
As he checks the forecast he notices most of the southern Victorian aerodromes are covered in low cloud and heavy rain, and the only reasonable places are on the other side of the ranges such as Mangalore.
The TAF for Essendon is showing a overcast cloud base of 500 feet and 3000m in heavy rain, the TTF for Melbourne shows a southerly gusting to 30 knots, broken at 400, ovc at 600 and visibilty of 4000 metres. The ARFOR shows a strong southerly starting at 30 knots at 2000' increasing to 100 kts at 18500.
As the good Capt Wally digests all this information, and ponders whether he should have a crapp, followed by a coffee and then think about preflighting either the trusty old B200 or this new fangled PC-12, the air ambulance flight dispatcher rings and says, "Wally your off to King Island, you know place where they have that really nice cheese, and which arcraft you takin?". Capt Wally thinks great middle of Bass Strait, winters night, low freezing level, **** that water will be cold!
Now the slick salesman said no worries this single engine job, she glide for miles, don't worry your pretty head about engine failures, its a turbine they don't fail. The guy that did the endorsement said the same thing, he certainly showed that it would glide and did everything by the numbers, but then it was a fine day.
Capt Wallly starts working the numbers, EFATO in the PC-12, probably struggle to get back round onto the Essendon ILS or some sort of cloud break procedure , what about engine falure in the cruise at say at FL210 will it be able to glide back for an ILS into Avalon, what about an EFATO out of King Island?
In the end Wally walks over to the old trusty B200, and light the fires and taxi's for rwy 17.
As the dashing young handsome Capt Wally drives into work he notices the city lights reflecting in the low cloud and as he steps from the car he fills the cold biting southerly breeze drifting across the rain lashed airfield.
As he checks the forecast he notices most of the southern Victorian aerodromes are covered in low cloud and heavy rain, and the only reasonable places are on the other side of the ranges such as Mangalore.
The TAF for Essendon is showing a overcast cloud base of 500 feet and 3000m in heavy rain, the TTF for Melbourne shows a southerly gusting to 30 knots, broken at 400, ovc at 600 and visibilty of 4000 metres. The ARFOR shows a strong southerly starting at 30 knots at 2000' increasing to 100 kts at 18500.
As the good Capt Wally digests all this information, and ponders whether he should have a crapp, followed by a coffee and then think about preflighting either the trusty old B200 or this new fangled PC-12, the air ambulance flight dispatcher rings and says, "Wally your off to King Island, you know place where they have that really nice cheese, and which arcraft you takin?". Capt Wally thinks great middle of Bass Strait, winters night, low freezing level, **** that water will be cold!
Now the slick salesman said no worries this single engine job, she glide for miles, don't worry your pretty head about engine failures, its a turbine they don't fail. The guy that did the endorsement said the same thing, he certainly showed that it would glide and did everything by the numbers, but then it was a fine day.
Capt Wallly starts working the numbers, EFATO in the PC-12, probably struggle to get back round onto the Essendon ILS or some sort of cloud break procedure , what about engine falure in the cruise at say at FL210 will it be able to glide back for an ILS into Avalon, what about an EFATO out of King Island?
In the end Wally walks over to the old trusty B200, and light the fires and taxi's for rwy 17.
Join Date: Jul 2009
Location: In the middle
Posts: 51
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Ha ha can't believe this argument still persists 
. Comparing apples to oranges it is. Or maybe its just down to plane ol' dollars. Business plans dominate everything now. Aviation is a sport where risks are managed and balance sheets are....balanced. Give a choice to any aviator which craft would you prefer to dominate....Kingair or PC12? Kingair will win everytime. Ego? Safety? Performance? Pecker size? Plane commen sense? No c'mon we gotta pay for this extravagance through tax! Plus we gotta pay for the arts and craft fairs that us pollies get our votes from!!! What of them if we waste the excess on safety? But hey the performance is comparable..of course it is..just listen to the reason here.
<rant over>
. Comparing apples to oranges it is. Or maybe its just down to plane ol' dollars. Business plans dominate everything now. Aviation is a sport where risks are managed and balance sheets are....balanced. Give a choice to any aviator which craft would you prefer to dominate....Kingair or PC12? Kingair will win everytime. Ego? Safety? Performance? Pecker size? Plane commen sense? No c'mon we gotta pay for this extravagance through tax! Plus we gotta pay for the arts and craft fairs that us pollies get our votes from!!! What of them if we waste the excess on safety? But hey the performance is comparable..of course it is..just listen to the reason here.<rant over>
Join Date: Dec 2003
Location: The cloud
Posts: 409
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
I agree , why the continued arguments?
This thread is rfds pc12 and the verdicts in-
western ops have signed it off no more pc12's for them... Southeast won't have em... Qld well ... Just central to have an "incident" and it's all finished for them and their rfds relationship...
Great machine by all accounts just not a comfortable place "if" it goes pear shaped...
This thread is rfds pc12 and the verdicts in-
western ops have signed it off no more pc12's for them... Southeast won't have em... Qld well ... Just central to have an "incident" and it's all finished for them and their rfds relationship...
Great machine by all accounts just not a comfortable place "if" it goes pear shaped...
Seasonally Adjusted
western ops have signed it off no more pc12's for them
Give a choice to any aviator which craft would you prefer to dominate....Kingair or PC12? Kingair will win everytime
The other thing too is not all Aeromed flying with RFDS is ALL Med 1 work in the middle of the night in crap weather. A lot of the work they do out of places like Mt Isa, Charleville and Cairns are clinics - in the day and of course mostly in perfect weather. A lot of this work used to be done in clapped out PA31s and the like.
RFDS QLD has C208s - they aren't using them for Med 1s in the middle of the night, but clinics and other non urgent work - as is the PC12 in CNS and mostly the ISA based a/c, this now keeps all the clinic work in-house and they don't have to farm it out to GA operators.
Again you want the arguement of if a Dr is safer in a brand new C208 or a PA31 with 16,000 + hours operated by perhaps a dodgy GA operator ?
RFDS does fantastic work - I think their choice of a/c provides a very safe platform for the wide variety of work that they do, money sadly is not unlimited - and some of the locations served are not 1500m bitumen strips either !
RFDS QLD has C208s - they aren't using them for Med 1s in the middle of the night, but clinics and other non urgent work - as is the PC12 in CNS and mostly the ISA based a/c, this now keeps all the clinic work in-house and they don't have to farm it out to GA operators.
Again you want the arguement of if a Dr is safer in a brand new C208 or a PA31 with 16,000 + hours operated by perhaps a dodgy GA operator ?
RFDS does fantastic work - I think their choice of a/c provides a very safe platform for the wide variety of work that they do, money sadly is not unlimited - and some of the locations served are not 1500m bitumen strips either !
Too right Puff, imagine the costs if all those clinics were done in B200's!
And CNS no longer has a PC-12, just the C208's and B200's now. Isa has 2 PC-12's and 3 B200's.
morno
And CNS no longer has a PC-12, just the C208's and B200's now. Isa has 2 PC-12's and 3 B200's.
morno
Join Date: Dec 2008
Location: melb
Posts: 2,162
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
'S8' ............you bin peeking over da fence watching me sometime ago? That's almost an exact rendition of what was played out many a time except the PC would have been a bad dream if it had actually been in the mix there
Still loved the story though & it brought back many a fond memory
KI can be a nasty place wx wise, no place for a SE plane that's fore sure & even worse FLI, ooohh ahhhh me shudders at the thought of only one fan flying in & out of those places:-)
One of the places that you would never catch me in a SE in IMC was AY. Those hills where alive with the sound of TWIN engines day & night in some pretty ordinary wx
Some say this is an argument, not so it's healthy debate which is always a good thing.
What this 'argument' does however show is that it boils down to $$$$ If the Beech & the PC cost the same to buy/run I think it would be clear cut as to which airframe would be sitting out there on the flight line.
Govt contracts are funny things. I recall many years ago flying the pollies around they only ever went on twin eng craft & mostly 2 crew, that's for obvious reasons, safety. But give those same pollies a choice re SE or twin for a Govt contract where they don't have to fly in them & they would be crying out for the SE frames!
Anyway the PC am sure is a great machine, ultra reliable, cheap to run(compared to the old hack B200 design) have many great features over the old clunker Beech & from a bottom line aspect unbeatable...............BUT
Thanks 'S8' for the little chuckle here, 10 yrs not having to worry about an engine failure has left me spoilt I guess but now I look down on my RUFDUS friends from above & still hear the MW's (with a tear in my eye) as they ply that safe sky in the dying days of a once great operation:-) Best of luck to all my mates as they say goodbye to one of the best jobs around
Wmk2
Still loved the story though & it brought back many a fond memory KI can be a nasty place wx wise, no place for a SE plane that's fore sure & even worse FLI, ooohh ahhhh me shudders at the thought of only one fan flying in & out of those places:-)One of the places that you would never catch me in a SE in IMC was AY. Those hills where alive with the sound of TWIN engines day & night in some pretty ordinary wx
Some say this is an argument, not so it's healthy debate which is always a good thing.
What this 'argument' does however show is that it boils down to $$$$ If the Beech & the PC cost the same to buy/run I think it would be clear cut as to which airframe would be sitting out there on the flight line.
Govt contracts are funny things. I recall many years ago flying the pollies around they only ever went on twin eng craft & mostly 2 crew, that's for obvious reasons, safety. But give those same pollies a choice re SE or twin for a Govt contract where they don't have to fly in them & they would be crying out for the SE frames!
Anyway the PC am sure is a great machine, ultra reliable, cheap to run(compared to the old hack B200 design) have many great features over the old clunker Beech & from a bottom line aspect unbeatable...............BUT
Thanks 'S8' for the little chuckle here, 10 yrs not having to worry about an engine failure has left me spoilt I guess but now I look down on my RUFDUS friends from above & still hear the MW's (with a tear in my eye) as they ply that safe sky in the dying days of a once great operation:-) Best of luck to all my mates as they say goodbye to one of the best jobs around
Wmk2
More likely a clapped out old Datsun 120Y,speeds down Nomad Drive does a handbrake turn into the car spot normally allocated for the RFDS Chief Pilot, a fine figure with a mullet steps out of the vehicle turns off the 8 track stereo, stubs out the Marlboro cigarette, grabs his flying scarf, and walks purposely into the RFDS nerve centre and says, "Nets team to Cooma in the PC-12, no wucken furries, I am ready willing and able!"
*Nets Team, a doctor, a nurse and a cot. Generally the nurse will weigh about the same as the neo-natal cot which is about 200kgs. She will generally hate the male species at all costs. Do not get between her and food, remember the movie Jaws. These flight's normally come in in the wee small hours of the morning and involve a trip up country, where you the pilot will sit and wait!
*Nets Team, a doctor, a nurse and a cot. Generally the nurse will weigh about the same as the neo-natal cot which is about 200kgs. She will generally hate the male species at all costs. Do not get between her and food, remember the movie Jaws. These flight's normally come in in the wee small hours of the morning and involve a trip up country, where you the pilot will sit and wait!
More likely a clapped out old Datsun 120Y,speeds down Nomad Drive at 9pm does a handbrake turn into the car spot normally allocated for the RFDS Chief Pilot, a fine figure with a mullet steps out of the vehicle turns off the 8 track stereo, stubs out the Marlboro cigarette, grabs his flying scarf, and walks purposely into the RFDS nerve centre and says, "Nets team to Cooma in the PC-12, no wucken furries, I am ready willing and able!"
*Nets Team, a doctor, a nurse and a cot. Generally the nurse will weigh about the same as the neo-natal cot which is about 200kgs. She will generally hate the male species at all costs. Do not get between her and food, remember the movie Jaws. These flight's normally come in in the wee small hours of the morning and involve a trip up country, where you the pilot will sit and wait!
*Nets Team, a doctor, a nurse and a cot. Generally the nurse will weigh about the same as the neo-natal cot which is about 200kgs. She will generally hate the male species at all costs. Do not get between her and food, remember the movie Jaws. These flight's normally come in in the wee small hours of the morning and involve a trip up country, where you the pilot will sit and wait!
Last edited by CharlieLimaX-Ray; 29th Apr 2011 at 01:55.
