Kimberley crash 26th August 2014
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Kimberley crash 26th August 2014
"Close Call" story time. I know too well because I've been in the situation of trying to land after dark but without having been trained to do do.
It was exactly last light when I reached my landing site, which was a reasonably well-lighted open space in the middle of a city. At that time I was not yet NVFR rated and, as I came in to land, started to focus on the lighted part at the bottom of the landing beam. It was the classic tunnel vision / black hole as the surrounding terrain turned dark to the eye due to contrast. I tried hard to spot the pad but everything else turned pitch black except for the landing beam. I had lost all peripheral visual references. It was a scary moment, never to be repeated again. I hope fellow pilots can also learn from my experience and survive.
Next time, if I don't like what I see, I'd switch off the lights.
It was exactly last light when I reached my landing site, which was a reasonably well-lighted open space in the middle of a city. At that time I was not yet NVFR rated and, as I came in to land, started to focus on the lighted part at the bottom of the landing beam. It was the classic tunnel vision / black hole as the surrounding terrain turned dark to the eye due to contrast. I tried hard to spot the pad but everything else turned pitch black except for the landing beam. I had lost all peripheral visual references. It was a scary moment, never to be repeated again. I hope fellow pilots can also learn from my experience and survive.
Next time, if I don't like what I see, I'd switch off the lights.
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Crab, your questions are spot on.
From what I can recall most if not all of the accidents relate to private operations, even though they may be of more than a 2 or 3 machine operation. That is not to say that all commercial ops are blemish free.
Our FOI's are very very thin on the ground and their CASA resources so tight it is despicable. Further they are saddled with trying to come to terms with a new set of regulations which are mostly in limbo, that is we are going from old to new, the gate is shut behind us but there is no way with the new as yet do much of our C&T.
It is a space worth watching as our previous CASA CEO has been mooted to pick up the top job in ICAO, I do not envy all of you the potential outcomes over there when one looks at the mess left behind him here.
Like his predecessor he was well referenced speaking in aviation experience but came from a military background mostly where the nuances of making for user friendly rules in a corporate and thus practical sense are foreign to him. One could say. just a fly by might contractor looking for a few more kudos, not, a real professional aviator.
Mostly it is very difficult to audit these sorts of flights when you envisage one or two active FOI in the whole bush area which is from Geraldton WA right around to Rockhampton Qld and north of a straight line between those points, trying to do something about that and also the routine day ops where people endemically under record and just genuinely operate like cowboys, particularly WRT conducting illegal commercial ops..
It is a culture problem, a massive one. These blokes are taught the Air Leg well enough "to pass an exam" full well in the knowledge they won't be tested on it ever again, until -- that dark night.
Unless we can successfully migrate to the new CSAR Part 61 and other parts some of which are still being written and we have as mooted, more C&T types who operate as sub ATO / FOI type people we will never have the resources.
As in illustration under my AOC we do Ag day only, but there is only one Ag Rated C&T person under the new regs in the whole country to check out those pilots. We are still grappling with whether the pilots need to be checked out in all types the pilots do ag in or just for the ag rating to cover all types. I don't know whether that person is night ag rated which if not leaves that sector in limbo.
I don't think this one person is rated an all ag types used here. This conundrum has existed since September when the new Part 61 was enacted so there is only eight months for those pilots to become recurrently checked under the 12 months requirement.
We cannot write out mustering endorsements at the moment I believe and most of us will spend the entire wet season reading the new regs trying work our way through them and also supposedly rewriting our Ops Manuals every time a new CSAR part relative to our operations becomes enacted. This I have been told by my FOI might occur once a year for each of the next 4 or 5 years. A rewrite comes out at between 3 to $4,000,00 a hit not to mention the time it takes us.
It is a great impost on those of use who try to follow the rules and once again a great promotion for easy street for our far less cost hindered illegal opposition, which provides for more illegality etc., etc., etc..
From what I can recall most if not all of the accidents relate to private operations, even though they may be of more than a 2 or 3 machine operation. That is not to say that all commercial ops are blemish free.
Our FOI's are very very thin on the ground and their CASA resources so tight it is despicable. Further they are saddled with trying to come to terms with a new set of regulations which are mostly in limbo, that is we are going from old to new, the gate is shut behind us but there is no way with the new as yet do much of our C&T.
It is a space worth watching as our previous CASA CEO has been mooted to pick up the top job in ICAO, I do not envy all of you the potential outcomes over there when one looks at the mess left behind him here.
Like his predecessor he was well referenced speaking in aviation experience but came from a military background mostly where the nuances of making for user friendly rules in a corporate and thus practical sense are foreign to him. One could say. just a fly by might contractor looking for a few more kudos, not, a real professional aviator.
Mostly it is very difficult to audit these sorts of flights when you envisage one or two active FOI in the whole bush area which is from Geraldton WA right around to Rockhampton Qld and north of a straight line between those points, trying to do something about that and also the routine day ops where people endemically under record and just genuinely operate like cowboys, particularly WRT conducting illegal commercial ops..
It is a culture problem, a massive one. These blokes are taught the Air Leg well enough "to pass an exam" full well in the knowledge they won't be tested on it ever again, until -- that dark night.
Unless we can successfully migrate to the new CSAR Part 61 and other parts some of which are still being written and we have as mooted, more C&T types who operate as sub ATO / FOI type people we will never have the resources.
As in illustration under my AOC we do Ag day only, but there is only one Ag Rated C&T person under the new regs in the whole country to check out those pilots. We are still grappling with whether the pilots need to be checked out in all types the pilots do ag in or just for the ag rating to cover all types. I don't know whether that person is night ag rated which if not leaves that sector in limbo.
I don't think this one person is rated an all ag types used here. This conundrum has existed since September when the new Part 61 was enacted so there is only eight months for those pilots to become recurrently checked under the 12 months requirement.
We cannot write out mustering endorsements at the moment I believe and most of us will spend the entire wet season reading the new regs trying work our way through them and also supposedly rewriting our Ops Manuals every time a new CSAR part relative to our operations becomes enacted. This I have been told by my FOI might occur once a year for each of the next 4 or 5 years. A rewrite comes out at between 3 to $4,000,00 a hit not to mention the time it takes us.
It is a great impost on those of use who try to follow the rules and once again a great promotion for easy street for our far less cost hindered illegal opposition, which provides for more illegality etc., etc., etc..
Purveyor of Egg Liqueur to Lucifer
We've had the gogs for at least 2 years now MG
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Cough ,hahahahahahaha , cough ****in cough
Johnny,tet so your a legend ag man now ? ......Really
Isn't this like the 1 who points the finger at someone always has 3 fingers pointing back at them !!
As for going on about these mustering no idea no airmanship just past the exam that will do blah blah blah , how many of these work / do / everything that you mentioned in your very well written self absorbed (let's **** on everyone else and for God sake don't look at me ) approach about? , at a guess I think it was around 40 working for your 'ag "😳😃😃aoc
And 1 actually doing ag for himself , the rest exactly what your talking about .
You never let yourself down mate keep it up .
Isn't this like the 1 who points the finger at someone always has 3 fingers pointing back at them !!
As for going on about these mustering no idea no airmanship just past the exam that will do blah blah blah , how many of these work / do / everything that you mentioned in your very well written self absorbed (let's **** on everyone else and for God sake don't look at me ) approach about? , at a guess I think it was around 40 working for your 'ag "😳😃😃aoc
And 1 actually doing ag for himself , the rest exactly what your talking about .
You never let yourself down mate keep it up .
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hi nathan, i think it was only ever yourself and gossip munger turkeys like you who ever propogated the stories of 40, or more. whoever it was i heard they or you, raised casa's curiosity, so i got a request. i went in with six guns blazing, straight to the SA boss, gave them the list and asked him directly to in future please call me first if they have problem instead of listening to hearsay. no we only have five ag rated pilots which is five more than the outfit you used to work for,, although i see where they advertise AG, furthermore we are fully certified to legallly do it in the NT.
seeing as you are so full of advice why don't you suggest a few ideas to stop this carnage?
seeing as you are so full of advice why don't you suggest a few ideas to stop this carnage?
