UK still going after 100ft into CAS. This is from a recent MOR listing
How much time do ATC waste on reporting this, and then the CAA action?
UK still going after 100ft into CAS.
Who has a transponder even that accurate? AFAIK, VFR airworthiness requires the XPDR to be within +/- 125ft at the ground on avionics inspection (which, if I recall correctly was the reason behind the 500ft separation limits in the first place). Add temperature movements and other systemic shifts not compensated by the baro measurement equipment and you have no chance to see that precision in the typical GA cockpit (and yes, GPS measurements are a different animal as they refer usually to WGS84 and not AGL).
Reminds me of the famous Bonn-Hangelar EDKB ‘high precision VFR traffic pattern’ authorities disaster.
It’s been a long standing criticism of the UK CAA that they make no allowance for equipment errors.
In theory you could have CAT just 500ft above the base of CAS so in theory they don’t have much of a margin. In reality, as anyone flying on an airline with a phone or a handheld GPS will know, nearly all CAT is thousands of feet above the CAS base.
But the real issue is UK’s completely bizzare 5000ft add-on which is applied to infringing traffic. Much previous discussion e.g. here and which guarantees that your CAS bust will be “super serious” every time…
We have many ATCOs here on EuroGA but for work-political reasons they don’t participate here in these topics 
We’ve had loads of UK ATC (and CAA) people here, under various personas, and they are usually really obvious from their posting manner. I have spoken privately to various ATCOs outside the UK and basically no other country does anything like this stupid 5000ft add-on. Belgium has a system which is perhaps closest to it but they don’t operate it in such an aggressive way.
And nobody wants to use equipment tolerance as a defence because then they can bust you for flying an unairworthy aircraft 
In cases where this is claimed by a renter (i.e. someone who “can’t get busted” for lack of airworthiness) the CAA wants a report by a “licensed engineer” – see data here – and then your maintenance company won’t be happy with you dropping them in the sh*it
Hence the UK CAA saying you should keep away from CAS by 2nm laterally and 200ft vertically.
MichaLSA wrote:
Who has a transponder even that accurate? AFAIK, VFR airworthiness requires the XPDR to be within +/- 125ft at the ground on avionics inspection (which, if I recall correctly was the reason behind the 500ft separation limits in the first place). Add temperature movements and other systemic shifts not compensated by the baro measurement equipment and you have no chance to see that precision in the typical GA cockpit (and yes, GPS measurements are a different animal as they refer usually to WGS84 and not AGL).
I think what CAA and DfT are saying is that you either accept all the punishment under the Infringement Process (and no margin) and likely to have a (fairly) mild punishment (apparently, worst is a license suspension). Or you could refuse to engage and move it to a criminal process and then all margins and everything kick-in, THEY would have to prove everything, but if you are found guilty, if will be very expensive and you might end up with criminal conviction(s).
This thread’s been around a long time. What ever became of the chap who was preparing to take the CAA to Court over their mis-use of authority?
AIUI the CAA doesn’t have the necessary authority to arbitrarily suspend a licence since there’s no redress in the Courts.
Do you mean that Dutch lawyer?
I don’t know what happened to him. I know the CAA tried all sorts of diffusion tactics e.g. saying he’s not a real lawyer because he was not a registered UK barrister or whatever (but he is from NL not UK).
Unfortunately he also got made a fool of by some pilots who kicked up a massive fuss over the CAA acting “illegally” without understanding how barometric altimetry works, that a transponder returns pressure altitude and not GPS altitude, etc.
We have the 2022 numbers from here
They don’t give details (if you have a contact who passes you the “confidential” MOR forms – I have – you could identify some of them) but it’s known that busting an ATZ is classed same as busting Class A in terms of punishment. The main difference is that with busting CAS they create that fake cylinder around you (+5000ft above, -5000ft below, 2.5nm or 5nm radius) and then you are deemed to be 5000ft higher so you create much more havoc, which helps to inflate the numbers and keeps the whole “team” nicely busy.
Punishments:
The Advisory Letter colums is mostly the result of publicity here on EuroGA (which various CAA people tried to suppress, joining up under nicknames). Sad they are still using that online test, with the bogus questions. And the GASCO “charity” is doing well out of the courses which now run on zoom so are very cheap to do.
The provisional suspensions are permanent suspensions until you comply with unpublished CAA requirements.
2% of infringements result in provisional suspensions!
That seems awfully high to me.
@Peter, what is “CAS-T”?
Temporary Controlled Airspace (Delta), usually, it was called “Pink Airway” when Lizzie (RIP) flew I am sure the guy who busted that in Jan22 was wrapped by secret services on his landing well before NATS/CAA send their letter
There are no references to CAS-T in Cap493 (Manual of Air Traffic Services Part 1), maybe it’s in Part2 & Part3? or in separate documents?
