Hear, Hear, AOTW.


But Dick is a 'National Treasure' to the majority out there in 2GB land. For they cannot see that he is forever furthering his own agenda.


I'm glad that you can see it. Few others here apparently can.

Personally, I would like to see more BoM weather radars installed around the country. As a West Australian, central WA i.e. Meekatharra, would be a reasonable start...

Regards.

VH-MLE

Just because Airservices is the only approved source does not mean pilots are prohibited from taking into consideration relevant and available information from unapproved sources.

To suggest that I'm prohibited from looking at a Webcam at my intended location, or ringing my mate in the area and asking him whether he can see the radio mast on Mount Dangerous, as well as consider the relevant ARFOR, TAF (and METAR etc if available), seems to me to be a pretty stupid suggestion.

To suggest that I'm "safe" if I make decisions taking into account only Airservices-sourced information that turns out to be inaccurate, but "unsafe" if I make decisions taking into account other information that turns out to be accurate, seems to me to be an equally stupid suggestion.

(Dick: You wrote to the wrong people. Try writing to the people in charge.)

Lead Balloon,

Your first paragraph is contradicted by the regulations a pilot must only use approved sources and no others. Its ridiculous and is a classic of example of where the rules lead to less safe outcomes.

I agree with what you say, ringing a friend to ask about the clouds at your destination is a prudent thing to do however the regulations specifically prohibit it.

Arm out the window

You appear to be complaining about my provocative headline which states, “Weather CAMS – CASA has no interest?”

You talk about “spin,” well yes, my headline was to try and influence people into making a change.

Here’s the letter I originally sent on Wednesday 10th March 2011

http://rosiereunion.com/file/DS10MARCH2011.jpg

Some 2 years later, I chased my letter as I’d received no answer and then I received the following from John McCormick – note this was dated 20th May 2013, that is over 2 years since my original letter.

http://rosiereunion.com/file/CASA20MAY2013.jpg

As you can see, it’s a typical copout so CASA does not have to be involved, even though I understood the whole reason of being was to enhance aviation safety in Australia.

Gerry111

You state as a criticism of me, “For they cannot see that he is forever furthering his own agenda.”

Yes, that’s absolutely true, my agenda is to try and improve safety and participation levels in Australian Aviation – especially General Aviation.

This seems to worry you that I put my name to these things in a public way.

It looks to me as if you have a chip on your shoulder and it’s interesting how you make your claims anonymously.

Why not give me a ring and have a discussion? We may be able to get together and bring in some changes which can improve the situation here in Australia.

Thanks for the elaboration, Dick.

McCormick's reply was very non-committal, which is disappointing, but it appears he was a shifty bastard so it's not surprising. I believe Mark Skidmore is much more trustworthy, although whether he and the organisation would act on your useful suggestion is another thing.

Yes, I do have objections to your style of spin, as I believe I've said previously somewhere here. I personally respond far better to honest exposition and argument than hyped up sensationalist type stuff, but I guess it gets you maximum bang per written word with a lot of people so good luck to you.

Weather cams are an excellent suggestion to enhance aviation safety.
It also would have a very high bang for your buck ratio.
Hopefully CASA/Airservices can't take a simple thing and complicate it/make it needlesly bureaucratically more complicated and expensive than it need be.
This could be a way for CASA/Airservices to show they are changed and more responsive organisations.

AOTW, McCormick signed the letter, he is unlikely to be its author or responsible for its content. while McCormick may be shifty, the answer to Dicks letter was created in the bowels of CASA.

I did notice, not so long ago, that during a planned NAIPS outage of several hours, the NOTAM specifically instructed pilots to obtain MET briefings from the BOM website.

That's no doubt true, although I'd like to think anything that came out under someone's signature would at least have been perused by that someone.

Further on Dick's point, though, rather than being 'Weather Cams - CASA has no interest?', with its tricky and suggestive little question mark, it would be more accurate and honest to say 'I suggested Weather Cams to CASA and they said they'd keep an eye on developments in the area' ...

Not much of a headline though!

Come on. There is nothing tricky about the question mark.

The heading is to attract people to read my post and then start discussing this important safety issue.

One day I will prepare a list of the successful changes I have been involved in. Then again I will be accused of bragging. And yes. I was responsible for removing the incredibly expensive RFFS from the secondary airports. Saving our GA industry over $100 m since then.

Not to mention the removal of the unique mandatory full position reporting for all VFR that flew more than 50nm or above 5000'. Close to $1 billion of complete waste saved since then without one attributable extra fatality.

You pilots outside the SEQ area e.g. Victoria might have to start a website and pay for this yourselves or see Ben Quinn at the Australian Weathercam Network.

Up until mid 2014, this website was mostly privately funded and run by him when he could get away from his day job. By then the site was in some disrepair with many cameras not working.

In August 2014, he started a fundraising drive with Kickstarter for $10,000 by advertising on his website and using local contacts like myself. By October 2014, such was the popularity of this site, he had his $10,000 including my small contribution.

The result was many new HD camera sites and the repair of the old ones. Nearly 18 months later, the site has many faulty cameras again and I fear Ben will need another $10,000 again soon.

Why not do something about this today and contact him via the email link on his website at probably one of the most valuable flight planning tools for SEQ flyers, the view of Cunningham's Gap from the small town of Kalbar near Boonah: Australian Weathercam Network - Kalbar (Boonah) Webcam

I wonder what CASA would do if the Australian weather Cam Network applied for CASA sponsorship via the "Safety Promotion Sponsorship Program"

https://www.casa.gov.au/about-casa/s...ship-program-1

How quaintly but typically Australian CAR 120 is.

I'm confident CAR 120 is honoured more in the breach than the observance. :ok:

Re: Safety Promotion Sponsorship Program

A nice idea no one. It seems that this is all about promoting themselves with complete and absolute control and nothing to do with something as mundane as actual flying.

Another scenario could be this:

CASA wants branding and signage. All these cameras go offline occasionally, even the reliable ones. Would they want displayed a blank picture frame or an out-of-date image with a caption like, "This camera provided and the image proudly brought to you by the Civil Aviation Safety Authority?"

There certainly is, combined with the wording.

'CASA has no interest?' suggests they don't. 'CASA - are they interested?' would be neutral and more honest. Anyway, that's nit picky points.

P1: In no circumstances would the cameras be provided by CASA. CASA doesn't 'do' aviation infrastructure.

CASA's only involvement would be to consider whether to recommend amendments to the regulations so as to allow pilots to take into consideration information sourced from webcams (which practice is presently a heinously dangerous and criminal sin apparently). Who installs and maintains the webcams is a secondary question.

That just means you have to plan according to official sources. It doesn't mean you can't expect or observe different. You plan to be unable to land but personally observe you can.

I will also venture the perhaps controversial opinion that you're not prohibited from looking at webcams or getting your mate to look out the window when thinking about your upcoming flight, you're just not allowed to make operational decisions based on non-approved sources.

However, as long as you do have all the appropriate forecasts that say you can go (with alternate if needed) then other unofficial sources are a bonus.

Also, a look at a webcam is a (non-approved) observation, and as we know obs and forecasts are very different things. I bet, though, if the bom had access to handy webcams in clag-prone areas they'd use them to help with the forecasting, so maybe it could be a goer. That would also bypass the 'approved observer / source' problem.

Otherwise, they'd be no different to the rain radar pictures they put up now, bloody handy but not to be used in lieu of 'proper' forecasts.

I won't defend the rule, its ridiculous and if I were the casa dictator for a day it would be one of the first things that gets the red pen through it to strike it out. How crazy is it to have a rule that reduces safety.

But the wording of the rule is pretty clear, you can't legally make use of unapproved sources of information for the planning or "conduct" of the flight. It would have to be a miserable CASA inspector who pinged you for it but unfortunately there appears to be a few of those.