New Fuel Rules! Land in a "field" what a joke!
 

https://www.casa.gov.au/publications...alian-aircraft


My bolding

You have to be joking? Who in their right mind is going to call a MAYDAY if they believe they might be 5 or 10 minutes short on their planned fixed reserve? And just who is going to risk their aircraft by landing in a field just short of their destination?

A quick check of the ATSB stats show that the majority of fuel incidents relate to fuel starvation (fuel mismanagement) rather than exhaustion (empty tanks).

Obviously there are people in CASA that believe this is a safety issue. What is the problem they are trying to fix?

When planning to crash, ensure your Fixed Fuel Reserve remains at the end of your crash sequence.
Then, if you are capable of moving, make all efforts to stop your Fixed Fuel Reserve escaping from any breached fuel tank. :}

Is your post a wind up?

Say you figure out you are 5 minutes short on your fixed reserve at your ultimate destination being an aerodrome with a 2km 30 metre wide asphalt runway with refuelling facilities, you are going to land in a farmers paddock 5 minutes short of your destination and potentially kill yourself running in to power lines or risk bursting into flames with all the useful fuel still in your aircraft when you hit unseen small obstacles when on the ground?

Suit yourself....

The CASA information sheet is quite clear that it is in line with ICAO, and the OP highlighting the 'land in a field' option seems to have overlooked that helicopters are aircraft and quite capable of landing in paddocks, car parks and hotel gardens :D


Although I do think that declaring an emergency (Mayday) rather than a PAN leads to a diminution of the effectiveness of Mayday calls overall and seems to overlook that a reserve is just that; fuel to rely upon if the planned flight runs into an unexpected delay or increased fuel burn.




From one who came through a system where we kept very, very quiet until the gauge read 12 minutes remaining in a single engine helicopter hovering alongside the carrier ;)

The requirement to declare MINIMUM FUEL and MAYDAY FUEL has been in the Jepps for a while. It applies to the big planes as well as the little ones. So statements such as:
are once again put out by the more hysterical amongst us. Even the term "litigation reserve" is more hyperbole. Thats what your 45 minutes is for in the first instance. If as a PPL you can't organise yourself and flight plan properly that you are not going to arrive at your destination with the FR reserve intact then go and get some professional advise. As the OP stated there have been a lot of fuel starvation fuel exhaustion accidents over the past few years. Clearly fuel management is an issue.

Thats why you have so many fuel exhaustion accidents. At all points along the flight you must have your reserve and any holding be it traffic or weather available. In your example you would have needed to divert at this point:

Its called command decision making.

This whole thing reminds me of dealing with thick airline storemen as in: Me: "Give me the spare Thronomister!". zzstoreman: "But if I give it to you, I won't have a spare!".

i can see the necessity of the CASA procedure for any aircraft in controlled airspace since scheduling and prioritization is obviously an issue.

But to apply it as a blanket measure to light aircraft operating into uncontrolled airports is overkill.

Folks,
The BIG PICTURE of the "why" of a 30 minute fixed final reserve is ---- that you actually have some fuel left in tanks on landing.

What too many of you seem to not understand or want to understand is that various errors can be cumulative, so that a calculated/indicated fixed final reserve may or may not actually be in the tanks.

You may or may not, in the real world, have 30 minutes endurance remaining.

ICAO didn't pull this one out of thin air, it is the result of a serious of fuel exhaustion or near exhaustion accidents/incidents over many years.

Without the need for "regulation", most major airlines adopted a FFR of 30 minutes thirty or more years ago.

If you want to criticize on this one, criticize CASA for:

(1) Taking this long (thirty years or more) to catch up, and;
(2) Making little or no effective attempt to explain, by effective education (assuming anybody in CASA understands the rational for the ICAO requirement) why the concept of 30 minutes FFR makes a serious contribution to air safety.

Tootle pip!!

If the forecast or the traffic holding requires x amount of fuel and you have put that on board then there is no problem. If you only carried x and the requirement is now x+y then you need to have x+y fuel on board. If you don't have x+y then you go find somewhere to land that doesn't require x+y and put more fuel on. If you continue to your destination and ignore the new requirement and end up landing with 10 minutes of fuel in your tank then that is a decision that you will have to justify. If you have decided to arrive at your destination with only the FR and your destination is now closed due to a disabled aircraft then you are required to declare MAYDAY FUEL and do whatever is required to ensure the safety of yourself and your passengers. If you had a possible alternate that is 10 minutes away you still have to declare a mayday if you will arrive with less than 45 minutes. If you stooged around waiting because ATC or whoever said it will be cleared up in 35 minutes then had to divert and arrived with only fuel vapours then once again you would have to justify that decision.

I got down to about 300ft under rainy scuddy weather with very low viz on a cross country as a new ppl. I landed in a field. It was grouse. I’d highly recommend it to anyone. The farmer gave me a smoke and I was on my way an hour later :)

Lookleft,
Wonderful post, completely ignoring the fact that, with such small amounts of physical fuel remaining, you have absolutely no idea of endurance remaining, thirty minutes calculated/indicate might be forty minutes, or it might be as good as nothing, it might even be nothing, that is the whole point of FFR, the final order of accuracy safety buffer.
Tootle pip!!

PS: Framer, a smart move.

LS what are you actually commenting on? You are either planning for 30 minutes or you are not. If it is such a small amount of fuel and indeterminate then I would be adding an additional amount for the possible discrepancy. On the one hand you are saying it is difficult to know how much fuel 30 minutes then straight away you are saying thats why there is a FFR. Are your meds up to date?