406 ELT's Mandated In Canada? US planes Banned?
 

406 ELT's Mandated In Canada? Per AvWeb article:

January 31, 2008, By Glenn Pew

The Canadian Owners and Pilots Association (COPA) is warning pilots they should be concerned that revisions to a regulation's wording could mean mandatory installation of 406 ELTs in all Canadian aircraft -- and transient aircraft, too. In a letter from Kevin Psutka, president and CEO, Canadian Owners and Pilots Association, Psutka states that "low-cost alternatives to ELTs have all but been ruled out for our sector of aviation." Because the U.S. does not mandate 406 ELTs, "thousands of U.S. aircraft will be banned from Canada," posing a particular problem for aircraft transiting to and from Alaska.

I'm hope he's wrong about this, but I spoke with a former Nav Canada employee yesterday who said that it's Nav Canada's goal to eliminate all 'small aircraft' from the air in Canada.

Nav Canada is a privately held non-profit corporation for managing Canada's airspace. They have been given a monopoly by the Canadian Government, and their board of directors are primarily airline representatives.

Transport Canada (part of the government) is responsible for the ELT decisions, but they have no love for general aviation either. In fact, they want more and more of the administration of GA to be farmed out to various letter groups. For example the MDRA in Canada is responsible for amateur built aircraft. Most people I've dealty with at Transport are very nice and helpful, but they have a limited budget and it shows.

The reason that Transport and other groups want the 406 ELT has little to do with pilot safety. In fact, they hate false alarms and the cost of dealing with them. 406 ELTs will allow them to positively identify the aircraft and owner when triggered, so they can make a phone call rather than send a Buffalo out to search for a downed aircraft (or false alarm). They think that individual pilots spending $1000 to $2000 to install a 406 ELT is a prudent budget decision (for them), and they don't care about the cost for owner/pilots.

Those of you fighting for your freedom to fly in the USA and the issue of user fees... keep up the fight. We are losing this battle in Canada and I predict that in my lifetime, it will be either illegal to fly aircraft for pleasure in Canada, or will be taxed to the point that it will destroy the industry.

I would like to add my comments regarding NavCanada. I do not care for user fees any more than the next guy but so far they have been more of an annoyance than any real barrier to flight. I spend more on one tank of fuel than I do on all my yearly aviation fees combined! Last fall, as a representative of the RAA, Recreation aircraft association of Canada, I was at a meeting hosted by Nav Canada to discuss airspace considerations in the Toronto area. All players were inivited and many came. I found that Nav Canada was much more open to suggestion than Transport Canada has ever been. In fact over the last few years the service that I recieve from NavCanada in regard to weather briefings flight plans has been getting better and much more user friendly.
Having more control in the MDRA system has greatly benefited builders in Canada vs dealing with the limited resources that Transport Canada has. Change is not always a bad thing.

Our regional COPA director commented on this at a meeting last night . He said that it is the Canadian military that is behind it. They feel they are spending too much searching for false alarms, and the new ELTs will take care of that. He thinks the best way to fight this is to get behind COPA and make as much noise as we can to fight the decision. He also felt that we could use as much support from the US as we could get.

Guys, picture this:

crash site, you and two buddies, one with a broken back from launching out the side of the 182 into the strut.

Scenario 1. Alert occurs, sartechs load and go, drop into your site directly.

Scenario 2. Alert occurs, search is mobilized, and folks start looking based on a pretty large set of error bars. When a likely target is identified, sartechs load and go, and probably do a bit more position refinement of their own.

Now, what's the first impact on survival rate? They taught us that it's time to medical aid.

For me, a one time cost is not even an issue - I'd rather not spend any money, but it seems to me that you get a much better technical product, and a higher chance of survival in an exposure post-crash. I'll spend far more than this costs on flowers and chocolate for my wife, so that I can complete the kit.

If I'm wrong, please clarify it for me.

Howard,Your point about the golden hour for medical intervention is very valid. As an Aircraft Rescue Firefighter I've been to 8 fatal aircraft crashes. These were incidents that happened within two miles of the airports I've worked at.We were on scene in a short period of time. The sad fact is that you almost have to be right on top of the scene to make much of a difference. In the event of a high impact crash it usually doesen't make any difference in the outcome.

SAR responded to one fatal crash that I responded to (whole other story). The aircraft was at an airport, the SAR base was located approx 50 miles by air from the site. It was over an hour before they arrived on scene.

I may be a little jaded, but my feeling is that at the end of the day these new ELTs are not going to make a huge difference in survival when compared to the existing ones. Having said that, if I were hanging upside down in my straps in the woods I might be singing a different tune.

There are two sides of the coin
 

May be not we shall see. The big differnce is in saving millions of dollars on faults alarms and SAR wasting time, sometimes even losing their life in the effort of chasing these faults signals. The registered aspect of 406 is the key. Technically they 406 is way better. The spec is more ridged in every way, and of course accuracy or search area is smaller. As for senerios, for every example of "they could not be saved even if they crashed in the hospital parking lot", there are many cases where people die from exposure 24 or 48 hours later. In one famous case (the one that got the original ELT law going), a plane crashed in the Sierra Nevada mountains. A mother and daughter survived for a MONTH! They looked and looked for them but did not find them in time. The diary they left spoke of airliner's flying over head many times a day, every day. We can go on about ELB or ELT saving lives at sea or military as well. The idea of surviving a crash, only to die a few days later from exposure or shock, just does not sound good to me.

Vernon,

You are always welcome to come on down. The weather's fine, and we still have room for freedom loving folks down here. At $4 AMU for the ELT with GPS Interface, and $0.4 AMU for a new battery, I'll count on a PLB for the pinpoint rescue effort. Choice. The cost and advantage of freedom. Enjoy it while it lasts...

406 ELT
 

There are some big problems here in the great white North. Last spring I was looking for a ELT for the RV-7A, Artex ME406 looked reasonable. ARTEX is located right behind Vans so I dropped in for a chat. Yes, they said, the ME406 is approved in USA and Europe but not Canada. Canada has these cold temperatures and has mandated impossible batteries to cope.

I just have the single heat muff so maybe I could live with placarding my aircraft - "not to be operated when surface temperatures are forecast to be lower than (-fill in number) in the proposed operating area during the following week."

Anyway if anyone knows of a Canadian approved 406 aircraft ELT in the +- $1000 range let me know!

Hey George, I have a brochure in my hangar for the (soon to be approved) 406 ELT that Maxcraft sells. I'll pick up a few more for tomorrow's seminar at the RAA meeting as well.

Vern