Class E airspace

The risk is low (when god made the sky he made lots of it, as they say) but it isn’t zero, and traffic density can be much higher in the US, due to GA being bigger, having a lot more utility value, and a lot more people having an IR and thus able to fly IAPs.

I suggest flying around the S.E. UK with a TAS605 and see whether the muscles around your rear end are stronger, or weaker

If one is to make evidence based policy, I don’t think IAP protection is a big fish to fry, due to zero evidence. But the same argument could be made for CAS infringements…

Peter wrote:

My understanding of US Class E is that it exists primarily to render illegal anybody flying in IMC without an IFR flight plan and IFR clearance, with a specific objective of protecting instrument approaches that exist in Class E (and Class D where they extend out to Class E).

I would state it differently. Class E permits both VFR and IFR. IFR requires a flight plan and a clearance, irrespective of conditions. VFR requires VMC, which in class E below 10,000 MSL is 3 SM visibility and cloud separation of 2000 feet laterally, 500 feet below, and 1000 feet above. IFR does not require radar or surveillance. VFR does not require radio or a clearance. Both VFR and IFR don’t require a transponder, mode C, or ADS-B Out.

Ibra wrote:

As actual risk? or rare terrible scenario for which you can do nothing?

Quite right. When controlled airspace (now class E) was invented, at least two things were different:

• we thought see and avoid was very effective
• we didn’t have electronic conspicuity

In VMC, where see-and avoid was thought to be effective, it was allowed to be the risk mitigation against collisions. In IMC, where it was not effective, the risk was mitigated by mandating an ATC service. It’s logical if you believe the risk of having a collision in IMC without ATC is much higher than the risk of having a collision in VMC without ATC. And if you fly in an environment like the US where ATC is, in practice, required in IMC, it’s difficult to challenge that assumption.

But the evidence is rather different. A4A looked at 43 years of mid-air collision data in the UK in class G, where flight in IMC is allowed without ATC. There were 43 fatal mid-air collisions (easy math!). All 43 of them occurred in VMC. The conclusion is, I think, obvious. If the risk of flight in IMC without ATC is so high, where are all the bodies?

If that was true over the last 43 years, what about the future? Well, the difference is electronic conspicuity (i.e. in flight cockpit traffic information on collision risks). That works as effectively as a risk mitigation in both VMC and IMC. It can only reduce the need to differentiate, for the purpose of reducing MAC risk, between flight in IMC and flight in VMC.

Which leads to a simple conclusion: class E is, in 2020, a solution to the wrong problem.

bookworm wrote:

That works as effectively as a risk mitigation in both VMC and IMC

I think this is nonsense. It cannot possibly work without everybody flying in a predictable manner. You have to know the intentions of other pilots, not only position, or the only result is 100x more airspace requirement. If you already know the intentions of others, then 99% of the risk is already mitigated.

As I have understood by now, in the UK people don’t use radio because they all want their intentions to be a secret. Then, the only effect electronic conspicuity will have is everybody will fly in circles, waiting for the path to clear. It will never clear, when everybody is flying in circles.

You have to know the intentions of other pilots, not only position, or the only result is 100x more airspace requirement.

Tell that to the aircraft and helicopter occupants who recently died in the Alps because they were blissfully unaware of each others’ existence, let alone position.

I was commenting on the specific phrase

You have to know the intentions of other pilots, not only position, or the only result is 100x more airspace requirement.

(now inserted).

Knowing somebody is there is hugely valuable.

Those who fly a lot in GA, especially with TAS/TCAS, have known since for ever that the Mk 1 eyeball is virtually useless.

But this doesn’t help because most (maybe all) of the regs / regulatory attitudes / whatever you want to call it that we are facing are addressing emotional concerns. For example people are “happy” to rely on see and avoid in VMC (which is mostly russian roulette, albeit with a very very large diameter barrel)

but aren’t happy with the same idea in IMC even though it is practically the same thing.

The reason for zero midairs in IMC (in the UK Class G) is simply because there is much less traffic in IMC than in VMC. The reasons are e.g.

• by choice, pilots prefer VMC
• at least 99% of UK GA are recreational flyers who fly only on nice days
• strategically, given the lack of IAPs to most airfields (which itself is stuck deep in politics, WW1 CAA attitudes, ATC funding, etc), the best way to fly around the UK and be assured of a safe landing is by flying below the cloud, even if it means virtually scud running
• UK airspace system makes long distance enroute IMC flight hard to do because much of it would be in Class A
• to be IMC in Class A you need an IR which almost nobody in the UK has
• you almost never can get into UK Class A on an ad hoc basis
• if you do get into Class A, it will probably be VMC on top because London Control tosses in the bin flight plans for “trivial levels” like below FL080
• if you do get into Class A it will almost certainly be on a Eurocontrol flight plan and only a tiny % of pilots have the IR and the aircraft to do that, and they fly in the FL100-FL250 range which is almost totally empty
• etc

So quite a lot of things, not just Class E, are a solution to the wrong problem

In VMC, all I need to know is the following “how many aircraft exits 6nm around me”, I really, don’t give a hoot about their intentions, I will be able to spot them and avoid, more so when their intention is to kill me

Unlike ATC, I don’t think pilots want to manage the traffic, predict collisions and maintain separation…just don’t hit anyone ahead while looking at your tablet

In IMC, I am only interested in the high density traffic that fly VMC near clouds or those in the circuit, those flying inside clouds I just don’t care (as long as IMC traffic density stays low, I am happy to bet my life on this ) and with new gadgets one can make some avoidance (but don’t kill yourself trying and you are not better off going down to VMC to be able to see them )

bookworm wrote:

But the evidence is rather different. A4A looked at 43 years of mid-air collision data in the UK in class G, where flight in IMC is allowed without ATC. There were 43 fatal mid-air collisions (easy math!). All 43 of them occurred in VMC. The conclusion is, I think, obvious. If the risk of flight in IMC without ATC is so high, where are all the bodies?

The reason this works is that CAT don’t fly in class G unless they have to — essentially for take-off and landing on airports without controlled airspace — and relatively few PPLs have IR/IMC.

Which leads to a simple conclusion: class E is, in 2020, a solution to the wrong problem.

I don’t think so. Class E means that you can increase the volume of traffic in IMC without increasing the collision risk but at the same time VFR traffic has free access.