VH-YTM final report
To say that AF is just like any other private category flight is like saying Uber is just like getting a lift from a stranger. The fact that it is a charity does not absolve it from a responsibility to the "patients" for want of a better word. If there is no direct oversight then have mentor pilots to the low experience PPLs. who they can call on to help come to a reasoned decision to fly or not. The statement that the PIC can simply say no is as pointless as simply stating don't fly from VMC into IMC. It ignores all sorts of self-imposed pressures that a single pilot low time VFR pilot might place upon themselves. Rammel is asking the questions that the patients and there families would probably ask if they knew their pilot did not have much flying experience.
And guess what happens when the Angel Flight passenger/s arrive at their destination? They get in a car driven by a stranger. Perhaps Angel Flight are “responsible” for monitoring road conditions and asking for an alcohol and drug test of the volunteer driver and a copy of a recent roadworthiness certificate for the car before each volunteer helps out?
If the accidents that triggered the rule change were caused by the inexperience of the individual pilots involved, why weren’t the rules changed so as to preclude pilots with their level experience from now being community service flight pilots?
Something like the question posed in post 97 (2) was suggested to Angel Flight back in March when the CASA was putting their new rules on CSF in place.
Angel Flight replied that "We tried to institute a ‘duty pilot’ concept (CHIEF Pilot/CASA examiner etc) but could not because no insurer would cover that role"
Couldn't really see why a mentor could be an insurance problem. Maybe there is a CASA rule about mentors!!
Gliding Clubs have duty pilots and they are private OPS!
Angel Flight replied that "We tried to institute a ‘duty pilot’ concept (CHIEF Pilot/CASA examiner etc) but could not because no insurer would cover that role"
Couldn't really see why a mentor could be an insurance problem. Maybe there is a CASA rule about mentors!!
Gliding Clubs have duty pilots and they are private OPS!
So how many accidents in AF road vehicles have resulted in the fatality of the patient and their accompanying family members? Maybe they have a better safety record than the air component. You have been arguing that there should be no change as it is simply a private operation and that no regulation will make it safer. So every time there is a fatal accident you are suggesting that everyone just has a collective shrug of the shoulders and move on. The rules aren't perfect and neither is AF but improvements can always be made.
No I’m not suggesting that at all, LL.
What I’m suggesting is that the response mitigate the actual cause of the accidents, rather than be the usual knee jerk rule change. Whilst it may seem a surprise to many Australians - and especially the complicators in CASA - the real solution to many problems is not more laws and more restrictions.
CASA has a safety promotion function. The risk of VFR flight into IMC, in breach of the law, is well known. The problem of ‘gethereitis’ is well known. Perhaps CASA should do its safety promotion job better.
Perhaps it should be less complicated to get IFR qualifications.
Perhaps it should be easier for private VFR pilots with thousands of hours in the logbook to get instructor ratings.
I talked about this earlier in the thread.
How many accidents have there been in community service road vehicles? You tell me! That’s part of the chronic problem of aviation ‘standards’ setting.
What I’m suggesting is that the response mitigate the actual cause of the accidents, rather than be the usual knee jerk rule change. Whilst it may seem a surprise to many Australians - and especially the complicators in CASA - the real solution to many problems is not more laws and more restrictions.
CASA has a safety promotion function. The risk of VFR flight into IMC, in breach of the law, is well known. The problem of ‘gethereitis’ is well known. Perhaps CASA should do its safety promotion job better.
Perhaps it should be less complicated to get IFR qualifications.
Perhaps it should be easier for private VFR pilots with thousands of hours in the logbook to get instructor ratings.
I talked about this earlier in the thread.
How many accidents have there been in community service road vehicles? You tell me! That’s part of the chronic problem of aviation ‘standards’ setting.
So how many accidents in AF road vehicles have resulted in the fatality of the patient and their accompanying family members? Maybe they have a better safety record than the air component. You have been arguing that there should be no change as it is simply a private operation and that no regulation will make it safer. So every time there is a fatal accident you are suggesting that everyone just has a collective shrug of the shoulders and move on. The rules aren't perfect and neither is AF but improvements can always be made
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Then argue that point but when this is directed at them and this then my statement is valid. I don't agree with FRT's assessment of AF but the point he is making is that the Government should be funding better regional health services so that people in regional areas should only have to drive into town to get 1st class medical and mental health treatment
I've been involved in a few industries during my almost 50 year working life & aviation has the worst of them all!
4 innocent people lost their lives leaving untold misery for those left behind (and some are bitching here!), they had zero choice, 2 did have a choice, who's next? That's the ugly reality of all this!
How many accidents have there been in community service road vehicles? You tell me! That’s part of the chronic problem of aviation ‘standards’ setting.
YPJT by your post you sound like someone who is always looking at ways to improve your craft. I hope AF is able to facilitate that process.
A flight authorisation style process with an experienced qualified pilot would have prevented this.
How?
The pilots involved were “experienced” and “qualified”.
The pilots involved were “experienced” and “qualified”.
All a bit hypothetical isnt it.? A newly minted and some not so recent CPLs do go out and do stupid things , make bad decisions and kill people ...just like a PPL or a AF PPL, who according to ATSB, is SEVEN times more likely., ? Que ?
Some people are brash, some folk are timid, some are Darwinian and exit the gene pool and others survive.
Tragic tho it is for the AF pax, the deaths of pax in CHTR and other PVT flight are also of equal import. RIP the lot.
Some people are brash, some folk are timid, some are Darwinian and exit the gene pool and others survive.
Tragic tho it is for the AF pax, the deaths of pax in CHTR and other PVT flight are also of equal import. RIP the lot.
The report notes that Angel Flight pay the pilot’s expenses, including fuel, and that on the day that the crash occurred there were commercial flights available which would have cost Angel Flight less had they simply booked seats on the commercial flights. Would that not have saved a few lives here?
If you presume that all assertions of fact in ATSB reports are completely true, I’d urge you to test that presumption.
Even if the availability of an alternative RPT flight were true for one day, lots of people with recurring treatment/testing requirements have schedules that don’t neatly map a constant 5 day RPT schedule.
Even if the availability of an alternative RPT flight were true for one day, lots of people with recurring treatment/testing requirements have schedules that don’t neatly map a constant 5 day RPT schedule.
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They didn't just analyze 2 flights, they compared 13,389 angel flights with 2 fatal accidents and 3,527,079 private flights with 72 fatal accidents. If you want to argue statistical significance the numbers are there - do the maths or consult a statistician and tell us what you come up with.
If you want to argue statistical significance, you also need to decide what confidence you are looking for. Statistical significance is a measure of how likely the result is to have occurred by chance, versus having occurred due to a real difference.
If you are asking whether Angel Flight need to improve safety, you might settle for a lower level of confidence than if you e.g. were introducing a new medical treatment.
How sure would you need to be that Angel Flight has a higher accident rate before you tried to improve safety?
80% sure? 90%? 95%? 95% is a common level to be considered significant but it's probably low if you are evaluating medical treatment and probably too high if you are worried about a safety problem.
You’ve really got to laugh at the mentality of people in this country sometimes. The point I’m trying to make is that this operation simply should not exist. We pay massively high income tax rates in this country, so why do these poor people with health issues need to wait for some VFR pilot to come blasting through IMC conditions to take them to medical appointments. This is what we pay our taxes for. Rather than supporting this sort of cowboy operation (missions and heros at the ATSB pointed out) we should be attacking our local members for not providing appropriate services to our sick population.
Yet of course, in true Australian tall poppy syndrome, people attack me and my RN wife who give away huge amounts of money in tax to support the population. Of course, as we work our arses off to pay taxes, we are the problem.
Yet of course, in true Australian tall poppy syndrome, people attack me and my RN wife who give away huge amounts of money in tax to support the population. Of course, as we work our arses off to pay taxes, we are the problem.
Many of those using AF are more concerned how they will pay the next power bill and groceries. Spent many years in the bush and know what many go through. Suspect you have zero idea of life in the bush if you think regional RPT is easy or affordable. Hint here, AF does not only fly from Mt Gambier. How about Windorah or Winton in Qld. Great RPT there.
I will agree we could be a much more compassionate country and support those who are less well off but that will never happen while we have governments elected by greed and self interest, so AF etc is the result and only silver lining for many.
Can it be better, of course. we cannot have pilots deliberately flying into IFR when VFR rated doing AF. Akin to murder in my mind. What is the vetting system? Who actually knows those who take these stupid risks but say nothing?
The report notes that Angel Flight pay the pilot’s expenses, including fuel, and that on the day that the crash occurred there were commercial flights available which would have cost Angel Flight less had they simply booked seats on the commercial flights. Would that not have saved a few lives here?
Firstly, Angel Flights primarily exist because Australia has run down our regional health system to the point that most people with serious chronic disease must travel to capital cities. If we had a health system that treated the regions better, Angel flight would not exist.
Secondly, Angel flight does not pay any pilot expenses. Angel flight pays an amount for fuel which may or may not cover the entire cost (depending on aircraft). The airports waive landing fees and AsA waives airnav charges. The pilot bears the operating cost of the aircraft his / her time and any incidental expenses. In my case, this sometimes includes staying somewhere the night before at my expense to be ready for an early flight.
Thirdly, Angel Flight helps people by providing transport:
a) when they cant afford it (remember some people travel monthly or occasionally more often to medical review)
b) Angel flight provides transport not only for the person with the medical condition, but also support people. For kids this is typically 2 other people - the equivalent airline cost starts to climb!
c) Angel flight provides transport for people (eg young kids) who require more baggage than is welcome on RPT. This can include prams, car seats, & multiple bags, crutches, wheel chairs etc. Typically GA flights allow the ground transport to get very close to the aircraft minimising walking distance,
d) For patients who are immuno suppressed (eg Chemotherapy) travelling in crowded RPT aircraft cabins can be a significant risk of infection. For these people, a GA aircraft on their own is a much lower risk of infection.
What would have saved lives here was an instrument rated pilot ( why is Australia's rate of instrument pilots so low? Why does CASA make it so difficult / expensive?) or a VFR pilot with better weather judgement.
The VH-YTM accident investigation should be treated as just that and not a persecution of Angel Flight. The accident is no more or less tragic with Angel Flight passengers than if it was friends of the pilot. It can just be whipped into a more emotional event by those wanting to politically point-score.
Lets look at what is going wrong that these types of accidents are still occurring after 50 years or more of "education" by CASA and its predecessors.
Actually I do live in the real Australia. If you have an issue, speak to your MP and have your taxes redirected to where they are needed. These people should not need to suffer because there is no genuine public service to support them. I spent my 18th May handing out how to vote cards to support an increase in government funded services. Outsourcing these services to an unregulated “charity” is not the answer.
I will happily say that I do not support “charities” circumventing regulations to put peoples lives at risk. Innocent people have been killed because a “charity” sent a VFR pilot to operate into fog so severe that the RPT Service held on the ground.
AF do not order any pilot to exceed their rating or even their comfort zone.
In ny experience AF actively encourage the pilot NOT to push his / her comfort zone
You keep saying that, but they did find it was statistically significant. There are about 40 pages of analysis in the report. For better or worse, someone picked out one easily understandable number to put in the media release rather than the 40 pages of analysis.
They didn't just analyze 2 flights, they compared 13,389 angel flights with 2 fatal accidents and 3,527,079 private flights with 72 fatal accidents. If you want to argue statistical significance the numbers are there - do the maths or consult a statistician and tell us what you come up with.
If you want to argue statistical significance, you also need to decide what confidence you are looking for. Statistical significance is a measure of how likely the result is to have occurred by chance, versus having occurred due to a real difference.
If you are asking whether Angel Flight need to improve safety, you might settle for a lower level of confidence than if you e.g. were introducing a new medical treatment.
How sure would you need to be that Angel Flight has a higher accident rate before you tried to improve safety?
80% sure? 90%? 95%? 95% is a common level to be considered significant but it's probably low if you are evaluating medical treatment and probably too high if you are worried about a safety problem.
They didn't just analyze 2 flights, they compared 13,389 angel flights with 2 fatal accidents and 3,527,079 private flights with 72 fatal accidents. If you want to argue statistical significance the numbers are there - do the maths or consult a statistician and tell us what you come up with.
If you want to argue statistical significance, you also need to decide what confidence you are looking for. Statistical significance is a measure of how likely the result is to have occurred by chance, versus having occurred due to a real difference.
If you are asking whether Angel Flight need to improve safety, you might settle for a lower level of confidence than if you e.g. were introducing a new medical treatment.
How sure would you need to be that Angel Flight has a higher accident rate before you tried to improve safety?
80% sure? 90%? 95%? 95% is a common level to be considered significant but it's probably low if you are evaluating medical treatment and probably too high if you are worried about a safety problem.
AndrewR, there is only one statistic that counts. The rate of VFR into IMC accidents per thousand hours flying or per cycle of Angel Flight vs. private ops and charter and airlines. That statistic didn’t show Angel Flight was anymore or less dangerous than normal GA ops.
......So ATSB invented a new one: the alleged rate of safety “occurrences” which did - making the startling claim AF was seven times more dangerous, which is utter lying, cheating bull****.
To put it another way, it’s as if you stated that all Volvo drivers were dangerous compared to others because they had a higher rate of parking fines.
......So ATSB invented a new one: the alleged rate of safety “occurrences” which did - making the startling claim AF was seven times more dangerous, which is utter lying, cheating bull****.
To put it another way, it’s as if you stated that all Volvo drivers were dangerous compared to others because they had a higher rate of parking fines.
Come now, Sunfish.
You know perfectly well that birds know when an aircraft is engaged in a community service flight. Birds deliberately flock to pose a risk specific to those flights.
But both ATSB and CASA failed to identify the most important and telling statistic: The pilots of nearly 100% of the community service flight aircraft involved in an ‘occurrence’ were male!
You know perfectly well that birds know when an aircraft is engaged in a community service flight. Birds deliberately flock to pose a risk specific to those flights.
But both ATSB and CASA failed to identify the most important and telling statistic: The pilots of nearly 100% of the community service flight aircraft involved in an ‘occurrence’ were male!