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  #141  
Old 04-13-2011, 07:58 PM
David-aviator David-aviator is offline
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by B25Flyer View Post
Whiskey Mike,

If you think the AB crowd is under assault, come visit the Warbird World... The FAA is actively pursuing the Warbird community...

One of the areas where they are really turning up the heat is operating limitations. Anyone certifying a new Exp/Exhibition Warbird going forward will have some draconian operating limitations. These new operating limitations preclude landing at airports in congested areas... To land at an airport in a congested area requires a special operating limitation issued by the local FSDO and in some cases has been a one way in, one way out with no pattern procedure....

I predict this is one of the ways they will come after the A/B community. Anything we can do to keep our freinds alive will also make ourselves a smaller target and demonstrate some efforts to improve our situation will give EAA ammunition when they are fighting our cause in DC.

Tailwinds,
Doug Rozendaal
Safety of flight - they won't rest until everything is locked up tight like flying for an airline. What an incredibly boring prospect!

There was a noticeable absence of war birds at the SW Florida Charlotte County air show in March this year. I've been there several times in previous years with a friend, now near 90, who flew 51's in WWII. Last year he even managed to talk his way into sitting in one for a few pictures. He was most disappointed this year - none were present. I wonder if "special operating limitations" kept them away.

At the gathering I observed this jet zipping around the airport. It looked like a mini F-15 and put on quite a show and then it occurred to me, it was a drone. This went on and on for at least an hour with a number of airplanes, all drones. I saw them later, some were quite large. Great performance by RC guys, but is this what air shows are coming to? If this is what the future holds - no pilots or real airplanes - count me out. I'm going fishing. We paid $18 each to mill around with a hoard of people who came to eat hot dogs, the air show part was not up past standards.

We are most fortunate to do what we do with apparent FAA endorsement to this point. It is possible AOPA has planted like minded individuals in the FAA to whittle away at those privileges. Government and big business can be very devious and with a smile, like we are here to help you (save yourself). I had thought EAA and AOPA had some sort of raport going on but that may be window dressing. Most successful leaders today are smooth and pleasant but can have a secret agenda not in our best interest.

We do need to fly safer, that would take the heat off.

I am glad guys like Van are on these committees to report what it going on.
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  #142  
Old 04-13-2011, 08:07 PM
B25Flyer B25Flyer is offline
 
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The Ops would not have been the problem at your airshow. The limitations only apply to newly certified airplanes for now, so if you have op limits there is no change, but make any change and you will end up with the new ones and be screwed.....

Tailwinds,
Doug Rozendaal
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  #143  
Old 04-13-2011, 08:10 PM
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dmaib dmaib is offline
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by WhiskeyMike View Post
Let?s not forget that the FAA is asserting specific statistics as a justification to indict the A/B community and threaten its existence!
I am not buying the notion that the FAA has an agenda to threaten the existence of the A/B community. A genuine concern about bringing down the accident rate is one thing, a conspiracy to shut us down is quite another thing, and seems very unlikely to me. Are there individuals out there that would argue that "home made" airplanes, jet skis, motorcycles, SUV's, flight schools, etc., etc., etc., should be "outlawed"? Sure there are.
I think the A/B community is held in higher esteem now than at any time in it's history, but we must work together to address this issue, whether we think it is a real issue or not. Perception tends to become "reality" in the minds of people.
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  #144  
Old 04-13-2011, 08:46 PM
Peterk Peterk is offline
 
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Default You're right

I am not buying the notion that the FAA has an agenda to threaten the existence of the A/B community.

No, I'm not either. The FAA agenda is like every other government agency, it is driven by professional lobbyists. AOPA/GAMA has an agenda to push (believe it) and the EAA/VAN's, etc have an agenda as well. Fortunately for us this is not the EAA's first rodeo. And if you don't believe this to be true, tell me who Roy LaHood and Randy Babbitt will be working for when their terms expire. It won't be as PR director of the Warbirds Society.
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  #145  
Old 04-13-2011, 08:57 PM
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Buggsy2 Buggsy2 is offline
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by John Clark View Post
The fixation on stats by some concerns me. Yes, we need to gather information to help understand the issue, but they will never tell the whole story. I really get the feeling that there are people that are in denial and/or think that they can get off the hook by "proving" that it doesn't apply to them.
As a proponent of "stats" in this thread let me explain why I think they are crucial. First, "stats" are a mathematical technique of examining data to determine patterns, insights, and what-not. I do not propose they we calculate statistics and then stop there. The point of statistics is to use them as a tool to gain insight into the underlying phenomena: in this case, why is the OBAM accident rate several times higher than the certificated aircraft accident rate?

First, stats can tell you if there is a problem at all. Maybe the apparent large different in accident rates is nothing more than a problem with the data. Second, stats can point out non-intuitive causes of the difference. Time and again as a hydraulic computer modeling engineer I've seen intuition fail, and real causes only be understood with measurement, not speculation.

Assuming the accident rate for OBAM aircraft is 6-8 times greater than certificated, I find it hard to believe that the explanation is we are simply composed of 6-8 times the number of yahoos, idiots, and reckless fools. As many posts in this thread have pointed out, we probably can't reach the fools anyway. OK, but I still want to know the causes of the increased accident rate because in a few years I will be flying my OBAM airplane--God willing--and want to know how to reduce my chances of an accident.
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  #146  
Old 04-13-2011, 09:14 PM
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Buggsy2 Buggsy2 is offline
 
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I can't let this by...but please don't interpret my comments as personal attacks on anybody.
Quote:
Originally Posted by WhiskeyMike View Post
Let?s not forget that the FAA is asserting specific statistics as a justification to indict the A/B community and threaten its existence!
The FAA has a legitimate role as cop, if someone in the greater aviation community is getting reckless. Statistically, that would be us now.
Quote:
Is this the FAA?s sole motivation? Perhaps - although Van seems to couch this reasoning with a ?probably?.
Because Van doesn't really know, and as the careful engineer he is, he won't definitely state something as true or false, until he definitely knows.

Quote:
Just a couple of years ago the FAA aggressively sought to limit A/B by altering the 51% rules in draconian fashion.
I saw that as the FAA trying to limit the fraudulent building activities...10 days to taxi, or whatever it's called. I and others welcomed the FAA's actions because the fraudsters were threatening all of us.

Quote:
the dramatic growth of A/B over the last 20+ years has come at a painful expense to certified aircraft sales. If A/B activities and influence decline, would theirs not surely rise?
Very unlikely, IMO. New aircraft are several times the cost of kitbuilt aircraft, and often less performance. If A/B (OBAM) aircraft were outlawed tomorrow I wouldn't rush out and buy a new airplane, or even another used airplane.
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  #147  
Old 04-13-2011, 09:18 PM
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John Clark John Clark is offline
 
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Default Data Collection

Two issues, first, I said "Yes, we need to gather information to help understand the issue, but they will never tell the whole story". My point being that we need to go after this in several ways simultaneously. Stats are good, but I really got the impression from some people that we should not do anything until all the stats were in and collated. We can accomplish a lot while the number crunching is in process. My second concern is that if you had every report ever filed on E-AB incidents/accidents, you still wouldn't have the complete picture. Plenty of "events" involving scary situations and/or damage that were never reported to anyone.

John Clark ATP, CFI
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  #148  
Old 04-13-2011, 10:01 PM
RV8R999 RV8R999 is offline
 
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so what is the limit of acceptable loss? What if we only had 1 AB accident each year - Would this be considered an acceptable loss rate given the inherent risks? If we say it is not acceptable then we are unrealistic. If we agree 1 accident is acceptable then the next question becomes - what about 2?

What is the number of AB fatalities as a function of active AB pilots? I'd bet it is a very, very low %. What is the acceptable limit? Who cares if it is more than some other group. Too many variables to compare fairly.

I say allow easier access to qualified instructors, continue to beat the drum in every venue possible, visibly show the FAA we are active and concerned, be committed enough to police ourselves and the guy next to us and if after all that a very low % of folks still end up a lawn dart - chalk it up to fate, bad luck, or a cleansing of the gene pool and move on.

If we truly want dramatically reduced accidents then the answer is well known and have been in place for a long, long time as has been mentioned several times. The airlines and the military do it very well. You do not want to have the imposition to your freedoms these organizations require to keep their safety numbers so good. In my squadron of 46 pilots, they are each required to attend 2 hours of training every Friday morning, attend 4 hour long Safety Stand-Down Seminars once each qtr, they have mandatory emergency procedure training every 180 days, a 100 question open book test and 80 question closed book test annually in which they must score at least an 85% or greater. They have tactics check-rides, annual standardization check rides, annual instrument training and check-rides (which includes 1 day of instrument ground school). Every single flight is a graded event with a 2-3 hour pre-flight briefing, at least a 1 hour debrief, followed by at least 30 minutes of logging the data. We have very stringent currency and periodicity requirements for flying at night, landing on the ship, flying formation, shooting weapons, flying on NVGs, flying specific tactics..when these lapse a check pilot is required to get them back up to speed which includes a very thorough briefing with tons of questions. Now try to imagine waking up on a beautiful Saturday morning ready to take your RV-X for a spin and realizing you haven't flown your required 20 hours in the last month and are now required to prepare a two hour brief, answer a bunch of hard questions, get grilled by an instructor, fly, 2 hour debrief and sign a strongly worded grade sheet - if you (we) are not ready for that kind of scrutiny then I suggest we find ways to accept some of what happens when we fly with the freedoms we do. Vent over...sorry

I worry more about driving to and from work...now this is scary!
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  #149  
Old 04-13-2011, 10:12 PM
Captain Avgas Captain Avgas is offline
 
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Default Close to the edge

If you'd like to see the MOST AMAZING example of flying with "attitude" (a word used often in this thread) then this video of wingsuit flying is a must see. It's a high quality video and the scenes of flying through narrow ravines at high speed will just blow you away.

This is pure flying in it's simplest form for adventurous young folk....fast, energetic, exhilarating, and very close to the edge (literally). In fact some may describe it as (dare I say it)...totally unsafe.

Is it relevant to this thread....probably. But if not, it sure provides some light relief in the middle of a heavyweight topic.

http://biggeekdad.com/2011/03/wingsuit-flying/
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Last edited by Captain Avgas : 04-14-2011 at 03:45 AM.
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  #150  
Old 04-14-2011, 12:42 AM
Jack Tyler Jack Tyler is offline
 
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A brief segway: Those who find this thread useful reading will want to read Van's 'next installment'. It's at: http://www.facebook.com/notes/vans-a...15423255134721 It's also good to see him ID several more topics on this same theme that he'll address later. (Am I the only one who wonders how a guy so good at being a designer, engineer and businessman can also be such a thoughtful, lean and crisply clear author? Quite a rare combo...)

One overarching theme here is 'Oh, what to do...!?' For all the well-written posts and thoughtful debate between stats, anecdotal events and confessions, there's actually very little action planning evident. If we were sitting around a table in a Community Center or a corporate meeting room, I'd bet well before now in the discussion someone would dare to approach the white board and ask the group to sketch out the beginnings of an action plan.

It occurs to me there's a lot that can be done. Here are a few statements I'd like to see written on the white board:
-- Stats chewing and debating aside, we seem to have a consensus that there are weak pilots flying RVs, A/B aircraft and GA planes in general. What can we do about it? That goes at the top of the white board.
-- In the past, it has struck me as hypocritical that Vans (I mean the biz, not just the owner) would be espousing safety at the same that there is such a paucity of mfgr. endorsed transition training instructor pilots being promoted, let alone a formal programmatic approach to this issue. A formal approach would include a suggested syllabus, an effort at assembling an inventory of (at the least, regional) instructors familiar with RVs, and a mechanism for keeping that instructor group informed (occasional email link?) on pertinent issues. It's reassuring to see that Vans (the man, not the biz) is now headed in that direction - see earlier link.
-- I notice an implied assumption in many of these posts that the 'unconscious incompetent' pilot population consists solely or mostly of thick-skinned, uncaring pilots in self-denial - a group of 'horse refusing to drink' pilots. I think that group is much more heterogeneous than that. And based on my limited experience, this assumption tends to hide one of the unconscious incompetent pilot groups that offers the most opportunity for reducing accident rates: the non-current or barely current pilot. As an example (to go back to Paul's reference to the Wings program), in my area (St. Pete, FL) those programs would draw large crowds every time. And among the attendees I knew, it was easy for me to recognize the '1 hr/month renter' pilots from my field (SPG). I wonder what would happen if a simple, one calendar year, 'basics only' syllabus was offered to everyone (but intended for the low-time and low hours/month pilots) as a training benchmark. What would happen if one of the local CFI's would do a quarterly chalk talk on that syllabus, and how its tasks tie into accident rates.
-- Similarly, I wonder what the impact would be if the suggested syllabus for instructor pilots that Vans is drafting became a defacto RV syllabus, in the sense that it was published, referenced in discussions, discussed at fly-ins, etc. among this VAF community. How could that not establish a bit of a benchmark related to currency? And to an extent, to competency?

I've used up a lot of space (and your time here), the main reason being that I believe this group could fill out (and then act on) a fairly full white board. This isn't just about insurmountable challenges like 'changing attitudes' or slicing stats to everyone's common agreement. It's about small, incremental steps towards agreed upon goals. Lots of low-hanging fruit out there...

Jack
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