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Avcharges Evasion?

VFR aircraft settles at an IFR level and requests “Flight Following”.
Is this fair enough? To absolve responsibility of “see and avoid”?
Thoughts? Clever?

The responsibility to see and avoid as a VFR will always be there. Day, night, 500', 10,000'+, flight following or no flight following.

Are you trying to gain IFR 'protection' without paying for it? Is this what you mean?

Flight following for VFR is strictly on a workload permitting basis. That’s why it is free.

A pilot would risk CASA enforcement action if operating VFR at an IFR level.

Quote:

A pilot would risk CASA enforcement action if operating VFR at an IFR level.

Not in my experience.

Operating VFR at an IFR level AND in IMC, definitely.

Idiotic.

I don’t want (and I presume my passengers agree) to have a mid air collision in my RPT Turboprop with something like a Cirrus who has climbed up to and “settled” at my level and is trying to get out a radio call asking for flight following.

It’s not a hypothetical. It happened this week, and I thought “What’s going on here?”

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Originally Posted by TwoFiftyBelowTen (Post 10243064)

It’s not a hypothetical. It happened this week, and I thought “What’s going on here?”

Folks,
I like to keep it simple.

I thought the law was clear, VFR aeroplanes fly at VFR levels and IFR aircraft fly at IFR levels.

A VFR aircraft does not have the option of using an IFR level.

It's not "just in the AIP", it has a legal head of power, going right back to ICAO Annex II.

Tootle pip!!

Are we talking class G or E here or both?

Have heard it done and have done it plenty of times in C and E, but of course we know there are requirements that make it safe(r) in both of those, in particular E. It doesn’t always suit to be at a certain level, mainly due weather naturally.

When you say you have heard and done “it” plenty of times, is the “it” a VFR aircraft cruising at IFR levels? That would be illegal...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lead Balloon (Post 10243871)

When you say you have heard and done “it” done plenty of times, is the “it” a VFR aircraft cruising at IFR levels? That would be illegal...

In which class of airspace?

That would be all classes of airspace.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lead Balloon (Post 10243948)

That would be all classes of airspace.

At or above 5000' IIRC, whenever practicable below 5000. Kind of worrying that people are unaware of this basic rule.

Indeed. Just goes to show that despite a couple of decades of ‘reform’ and ‘simplification’, fundamental rules that have been in place for half a century (with a slight hiccup from quandrantal to hemisphical in Australia) seem to escape some of the people produced by this wonderfully ‘safe’ ‘system’.

I think the rot started to set in from the early 1990's.

That was around the time the briefing offices @ the then GAAP aerodromes started to close. Many pilots including students and instructors used to wander in to the briefing office and ask questions of ATC & FS staff, who in those briefing roles and locations really knew their stuff. Along with the MET man, of course.

That availability of face to face knowledge base disappeared, people were left to their own interpretations and what they'd been taught, and here we are.

A while ago I was shooting the breeze with a private pilot who was scratching his head about an interaction he’d had in the air with a QantasLink pilot about the ‘transition layer’. I had to explain what the transition layer is and why he wasn’t supposed to have cruised in it...

I don’t think it’s about the absence of briefing offices, CM. I think it’s more about the slow mediocritization of the instructing system. And the ever-increasing level of regulatory complexity means there’s far more trivial regulatory chaff distracting from the airmanship wheat.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lead Balloon (Post 10243948)

That would be all classes of airspace.

Not quite.

ATC regularly give IFR cruising levels for VFR in class C. Are you saying that ATC are “breaking the law?”

AIP ENR 1.7-5 (my bolding):

Quote:

3. CRUISING LEVELS

3.1 Selection of Levels

3.1.1 Flights must be planned in accordance with levels selected from the tables at Section 5. Any part of a flight that will take place south of 80°S must be planned in accordance with levels selected from the tables at Section 6.

3.1.2 Within controlled airspace, ATC may assign and pilots may request a level that does not accord with the tables in Section 5.

3.1.2.1 Pilots must only request a level not conforming to the table of cruising levels when it is determined by the pilot in command to be essential to the safety of the flight and its occupants. In such circumstances, the phrase "DUE OPERATIONAL REQUIREMENT" must be included with the level change request.

3.1.3 ATC will only assign cruising level s not conforming to these tables when traffic or other operational circumstances require.

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I don’t think it’s about the absence of briefing offices,

LB I think it was a factor, contributing to

Quote:

the slow mediocritization of the instructing system

Pilots - in particular new instructors - were largely left to themselves to interpret requirements. They passed their understanding onto students, some of whom then became instructors themselves, who promulgated the same interpretations on to their students etc. etc.

Something like the old "Send reinforcements, we're going to advance" >> "Send three and four pence, we're going to a dance".

Thanks CaptainMidnight, a nice and informative post that clears up the logic behind the point I made.

I also note the use of the “must plan” terminology which gives an out when it comes time to the actual flight.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Squawk7700 (Post 10244034)

You’re confusing the secondary source of the flexibility that ATC has to allow departure from the legal requirement in controlled airspace, for the primary legal requirement. Here’s the primary legal requirement from the CARs 1988, replicating the equivalent previous ANR:

Quote:

173 Cruising level to be appropriate to magnetic track

(1)When a V.F.R. flight is conducted at a height of 5,000 feet or more above mean sea level, the pilot in command must, subject to any contrary air traffic control instructions, ensure that the cruising level of the aircraft is appropriate to its magnetic track.

Penalty: 25 penalty units.

(2)When a V.F.R. flight is conducted at a height less than 5,000 feet above mean sea level, the pilot in command must, subject to any contrary air traffic control instructions, ensure that the cruising level of the aircraft is, whenever practicable, appropriate to its magnetic track.

Penalty: 25 penalty units.

(2A) CASA must notify in AIP or NOTAMS the cruising levels appropriate to an aircraft’s magnetic track.

Ain’t no “planning” crap in there, and ain’t no ATC instructions to VFRs in E or G.

You cruise at an IFR level when operating VFR in E or G: You’re operating illegally unless you’re below 5,000’ AGL and it’s not practicable for you to operate at a VFR level. In controlled airspace you have to plan to cruise at a VFR level if operating to the VFR, but ATC can - obviously - direct otherwise. Note: E is not controlled airspace for VFR aircraft.

Please learn the basic rules and comply with them.

I feel as though you must fly in Qld or somewhere where there are always blue skies and no mountains, or you don’t fly much.