Not only is it nuts its at the point the vfr across the country is effectively impossible for many. Go ahead plan a route from end to end and you will soon realise just how complicated it has become. GA is no longer a viable means under the current policy of transport.
Of course the reality is that those behind this policy dont fly anywhere of consequence and have no idea what they are doing if they did, which is why we are in the state we are in and GASCo are so confused about their role in all this that they cant even manage to string together a coherent policy statement.
Neither can AOPA.
AOPA – not get me started, what a useless organisation this has become. It is long overdue that Martin should stand down. How can any organisation of this type have the same CEO for as long as he has been in chair, however good or bad he may be? What is it – a cosy job for life?
Fuji_Abound wrote:
How can any organisation of this type have the same CEO for as long as he has been in chair, however good or bad he may be?
Because its members keep voting for him? I looked at their website and their latest published AGM minutes (2018) showed 15 members in attendance. Maybe that’s the problem? OTOH that means that would be very easy for a small group of members to oust the current regime, if they cared, which apparently they do not.
Airborne_Again wrote:
Because its members keep voting for him? I looked at their website and their latest published AGM minutes (2018) showed 15 members in attendance. Maybe that’s the problem? OTOH that means that would be very easy for a small group of members to oust the current regime, if they cared, which apparently they do not.
Yes, exactly.
I do wonder why so few show up and there is so much apathy for anyone else be voted in (or perhaps putting themselves forward). After all unlike most posts like this it is paid well enough. I suppose he must have his followers, as with any election, would be turned out as required. The usual carry on.
Unfortunatley the consequence is some one who has been in post for far too long, so even if he were doing a good job, there should be new blood with new ideas every so often. How you could turn up and go through the motions of dong that job year after year is totally beyond me.
I keep on saying the desperate state of GA has all of us to blame.
Malibuflyer wrote:
If 1% of airspace infringements would actually lead to accidents, flying like we know it would simply be impossible.But what you say is true for all traffic rules: Speeding, crossing red lights, etc. – everything is safe and free of consequences until it isn’t.
Well, how many actual and real accidents have happened due to airspace infringements? In all of Europe? There are differences though. When flying under the TMA, no contact with the appropriate/adjacent ATC, no transponder, and you bust the airspace, this is bad. You are an unknown factor, a danger to everyone in the controlled airspace you are busting. If you are transponding and you are in contact with ATC, then busting is no issue at all. You are simply told to change heading or alt, if necessary to avoid any sort of conflict. You are no longer an unknown factor.
LeSving wrote:
If you are transponding and you are in contact with ATC, then busting is no issue at all.
Sorry, that’s BS.
Thats like saying: “If you want to speed through the city just call the police before so that they can take actions if they want to block the roads for pedestrians”. And yes: Obviously it is even worse to turn of transponder (and thus braking another law). But that is like: If I drive drunk I should not also turn of the headlights although it is more likely that someone notices that I drive wobbly when my headlights are on.
An infringement is an infringement. And even if ATC “knows you” it still is an infringement. Yes, there are very few situations where it is actually tricky to not infringe (because e.g. a traffic pattern is extremely close to airspace you must not enter). But in the majority of cases it is simply pilots not taking enough care or not taking it seriously.
Why do you think it is so many more pilots infringing airspaces than crashing into mountains? Exactly! It is because they take granite walls seriously and airspace walls not. As said before: In most cases it would be extremely easy to not infringe by just keeping 5 NM lateral distance instead of “scratching the line” on the GPS.
Malibuflyer wrote:
But in the majority of cases it is simply pilots not taking enough care or not taking it seriously.
This is a big statement, is there any way to verify this?
Malibuflyer wrote:
An infringement is an infringement
Yes 
Analogies to traffic lights and whatnot, does not work though. It only distracts and confuse the matter. Speeding is illegal because speeding is fatally dangerous, proved over and over by statistics, not because “speeding is speeding”. On the other hand, speeding is indeed legal if you do tell the police and close the roads etc. It’s called Rally. Besides, granite is a whole lot more fatal to a pilot than an airspace “wall”
What is boils down to is the capability of ATC to maintain proper separation margins between IFR and VFR in controlled airspace and prevent upsets in the traffic flow, nothing more. How pedantic certain groups of “airspace police” want to be about airspaces, is not something I can do anything about. What I can do is to say: You are just being pedantic. That’s the reality here.
Granite also differs from airspace in terms of being readily visible.
