68volksy

And the relevance of that is? I don't see why we need to make this personal. I'm simply discussing the current state of play with the facts as they stand. Let's call me simply an invested observer for the sake of this discussion.

The minimums are there for a reason and no doubt in my mind there are some instructors out there who were capable of getting there in the minimum hours. There are also schools offering the instructors rating for a fixed fee with the minimum hours. I know for a fact that graduation is often guaranteed from some of them once you pay the funds. That's a whole other argument though...

You forgot to mention that the integrated CPL courses (the ones that allow CPL in 150 hours) are the integrated courses run only by the larger flying schools and universities. In many of them after 3 years of flying and theory you also walk away with a Degree. I don't see why the premise that a GA instructor has to have had more training than an RA instructor is hard to accept? The facts are really quite clear. The facts also support the whole rationale behind RA's self-governing culture which is a good thing. I'm not saying RA should have any more training so no need to get worried about extra study - I'm just pointing out that there is really not as much of a gap between an instructor and a pilot as many believe. The gap is even less in RA was why i mentioned the GA hours. The saddest part of it all is that the gap between a pilot and a good instructor is even harder to spot as the student pilot is generally swept off their feet by the first instructor they meet.... Lastly - please do not try to to make it sound as though doing an instructor course (RA or GA) is all that difficult. For RA you only have to apply yourself to reading or classrooms for anything from 20 to 60 hours worth of theory and get the 20 hours of flying in. The major difficulty comes from trying to juggle it in between a full-time job and family. If you're capable of getting a licence to begin with then you can be pretty sure you'll get through. And don't get me started on bloody epaulet stripes!

Looks like people's opinion of what makes an instructor is a long, long way from the truth! RA-Aus Instructors only need 75 hours and to have passed a simple instructors course in order to instruct. That's probably a lot less than most people would consider "experienced". Any kid of 18 with 75 hours flying time can instruct RA-Aus. GA is a bit different as they need their 150-200 hours and a CPL prior to getting the instructors rating. What you mention is actually what is occurring in RA-Aus.

I wouldn't think that insurance is necessarily voided by breaking a law? I'd be checking the policy wording very carefully. There would however be some sort of disclosure agreement whereby you would certify to the insurer that the aircraft was airworthy prior to taking out insurance. This might be where things could get hung up and the whole policy could be null and void - especially in the RA-Aus world where everything really comes down to self-assessment. If you have a LAME signing off then you're good to sue if something's not right. I think you'd be mad to step into any aircraft that's exceeded the max crosswind at any time though. Evektor may have a good checklist of items that he may be able to go through every time the crosswind max is exceeded but failing this you'd be stepping into a one-off experimental each time you get into it. For some reason I often get the impression that many "pilots" see the max crosswind figure as more of a guide rather than a hard and fast rule? If you run an engine at 9000 rpm when redline is 8000 rpm everyone would all expect it to fail catastrophically but for some reason not many seem to feel the same way about the max crosswind figure? It's funny because engine failures we'd all have some chance to deal with but structural failures really don't leave you with many choices...

Council has wiped their hands of it entirely. Sounds like the solution for most landholders out there is to continue to keep their doors shut. Vast majority of the haven't opened their doors in the last two years so they will most likely continue as sarcophagi to the decomposing aircraft within. The smallest hanger out there has been told they have to pay $2,600 per annum if they want to step over their threshold onto the taxiway. The largest hanger owner has been asked for $54,000 per annum! Then there are the parking and landing fees on top of that and a main runway that's so full of loose gravel and weeds it's avoided whenever possible. Everyone's trying to avoid a legal stoush due to the costs involved and i'm not sure there would be enough takers to make a class action affordable. Goulburn aviation will continue to plod along in some form so long as people still want to fly.

Well the deal is finally done. New owner of the airport is now going to start "kicking arse" (to take his words to the local paper in the post above) in regards to collecting fees and charges that have been levied by him to landowners. My feeling is it's going to get very messy indeed if the law suits start flying. Not one landowner has paid his "neighborhood tax" as they believe (and I must say I agree) that no-one has a right to charge their neighbors a tax simply for being their neighbor. No matter where their properties are located. It certainly sounds and feels like the hostility is going to worsen even further...

Welcome Bucky!

Another motorcyclist died coming up the Clyde on the weekend and the media could hardly bother wasting their breath in reporting it...

Why on earth did you guys all bother with that going through CASA stuff? Isn't the whole point of RA-Aus to be able to fly an aircraft with an utter disregard to whether you're fit and able? Crikey there's hundreds of guys in those situations who took the easy route and went and got their RA ticket...

If you have conditions that require special attention or considerations then flying as pilot in charge of anything is most likely not for you!

Welcome to the area Tomo! Feel free to drop in to see us sometime at Goulburn. There's always a few happy aviators coming and going, eating Teraya's bikkies and drinking her tea in the Goulburn Aviation "observation lounge". She also puts on a BBQ first Saturday of every month about midday - all are welcome!

Does anyone know where the RA-Aus medical requirements are documented? There's a niggling little thought in my mind that they require the holder of a Pilot Certificate to be fit to drive a motor vehicle also? Just wondering if the legislation also infers that they need to be able to pass a drivers licence medical? Personally I wouldn't be surprised to see the RA-Aus requirements change as if a person is not fit to drive a motor vehicle then they're not really fit to take control of an aircraft are they? It just seems to be a rather obvious loophole with extremely severe consequences... Edit: Just found this document on the old RA-Aus website http://flysafe.raa.asn.au/students/AFTDrive.pdf

Big savings to be had over PPL. The endorsements are found in Civil Aviation Legislation Amendment Regulation 2013 (No. 1): 61.485 Kinds of recreational pilot licence endorsements The following are recreational pilot licence endorsements: (a) a controlled aerodrome endorsement; (b) a controlled airspace endorsement; © a flight radio endorsement; (d) a recreational navigation endorsement. You can get one or all of the endorsements. Cross-country endorsement is 5 hours same as RA-Aus. I know a school at Bankstown is already looking to put online a GA registered Jabiru, Tecnam or Sportstar to take full advantage of the RPL. Anyone with a GA licence will simply be able to "fall back" to the RPL at any time without undergoing any additional training or tests. For many an hour or two in a Sportstar will be enough and they'll be off and flying!

Maybe we should cut this whole discussion straight to the point: Hands up who has a known serious heart, physical or psychological condition and still flies their aircraft?

From where I sit RA-Aus were the ones who saw a sneaky little way to push into the GA spectrum whilst ignoring the 100 years of aviation knowledge that developed CASA and all the legislative requirements that now exist. CASA pushing RA-Aus back towards the people it was created to cater for can be only a good thing. The HGFA never tried to invent superlight carbon-fibre machines to fit through a loophole in an attempt to sabotage the GA market. If all RA-Aus has to cater for is a few hundred rag-n-tube pilots then I think they'll find life a lot easier to manage. Leave the development and maintenance of all the complicated training and safety management systems to CASA and those that wish to fly under her umbrella. Let those that fly purely for fun who are more than happy to stay out of the way of the heavy machines and the general public enjoy themselves!

Sounds like the maintenance could be a bit lax. It's a very big problem in RA training in my view and can happen when the people maintaining the aircraft are the same people hiring and training in the aircraft. If these kind of issues happened in a GA school the CFI would generally be tearing the LAME a new one but in an RA school where they are often the same person this doesn't happen. I'd be watching the instructors approach to maintenance and if you get the feeling they're blowing smoke up your skirt then change schools. If you'd like more information from them on the issues then ask. They should be going to great lengths to talk to you about any issues, explain properly how they occurred and what they'll do to make sure it doesn't happen again or explain why it is not a concern. If you're not comfortable with the aircraft then do not fly it!

They are a good bunch of controllers down there. Not a big bunch of them so it's easy to get to know them all by name. Try to avoid flying in between 7:30am and 9am or 5pm and 7pm (when most of the heavies are coming and going) and they'll have plenty of time to help.

Well regardless of what he was telling the papers last nights news stated that the lessee came up with the money and that he and Council have signed the sale contract. The lessee's flying school has lost its GA training privileges. The other school that used to be 5 days a week in Goulburn might keep plugging away with 1 day a week but they're certainly feeling the strain of the hostile environment. So unless you're a skydiver or want to pay a minimum of $2,400 to open your hanger doors it looks like it's all over for Goulburn.

You contacted the flying school? The school put a big colour copy of them in the Aero Club building also but that's a little hard to photocopy... I've got some copies that the school hands out. The PDF files are pretty big but if you could get me an email address i'll get them to you. Otherwise email [email protected] and i'm sure they'd be happy to send a copy out. Every school has different boundaries in their AOC. I think it's more to do with them telling CASA "This is as far as we will let student pilots go". It's also why the instructors make the "we're 5 mile south of xxx airfield conducting aerial work above 4500 for next 10 minutes" radio calls.

Current lessee has the option to buy it for $2.5 million. Every other offer up until that one was around the $1mill to $1.5mill mark. You could build the entire facility for around $1.2 million so that seems to be a fair price to me. We've been trying to put forward the idea of Council leasing it to a non-profit for 5 years with another 5 year option to start with. Give the non-profit a very strict mandate in the lease agreement of what it can do (maintenance only etc.) to remove a lot of the possibility of things getting political. Basically leave the non-profit with "which contractor do we choose to do the mowing?" and "when does the runway need resurfacing?" as its only decisions. This seems to have most people's support in some form although there are a lot that still want to control the whole thing themselves.

No contract was signed - the lessee simply was given an option to buy the airport. Rumour has it no money was paid for this option but rather he gave them a mortgage over his hanger site. Fees for the flying school have been $20 per "full stop". Landing fees for everyone else differ according to how friendly you are with the lessee. All the land access fees (roughly $125,000 worth per annum) that he charged to the hanger owners have not been paid as it seems he has no legal right to charge them. Neither has anyone paid the "sewer access" charges that he levied.

And you all probably though this saga was over! Well after two years the option to purchase the airport is to expire on Monday the 2nd of September. Many of the agreed works have not been completed - many have not even been started... The lessee has now asked Council for an extension of time. Two years ago he did not have the money (or did not want to pay) to purchase the airport and now (this is the really funny part!) two years later he does not have the funds (or want to pay) for the airport!!

I keep preaching "Fly the aircraft you actually want to fly". If you just simply want to get in the air fly RA but if you want to take passengers, fly in controlled airspace or fly heavier machines then go GA all the way. Then once you've truly mastered the one aircraft you can move on to another aircraft. Another great option coming up is the GA RPL which has similar hours and medical requirements to RA, allows for controlled airspace and heavier aircraft but limits you to one passenger. Best of both worlds unless you're keen to maintain your own aircraft in my view. I'm hoping we'll see a lot of Schools stepping up to the mark with GA registered Jabs and Tecnams and a resurgence in popularity of the $30,000 Cessna 150's and Piper 140's. I know for me the RPL with cross country endorsement would be perfect. No interest in maintaining my own aircraft and limited need for controlled airspace (although i'd probably add it anyway).

I think that's all very harsh. The airport has been great to the flying school. The Club guys are a great bunch who are dealing with the situation as best they can. Getting a clubhouse for free can't be sneezed at - let alone the Gate 3 facility free of charge. There are always pilots coming and going from the Gate 3 facility and since the school's put in tea and coffee facilities they're hanging around a lot more. Plus there's students coming and going 7 days a week who are always a happy lot. Downside is paying for parking and waiting to be let in by the bouncer but i see no reason why more people aren't hanging around on a regular basis. If more people hung around then I think there's more chance of some more being done to accommodate them. Mind you coming from Goulburn where the school was paying $16,000 per annum for two aircraft, the public loo has been locked for two years and the place has turned into a ghost town could have some influence on my feelings about Canberra...