I found it thoroughly entertaining being required to do a site check, in order to fly my own glider, despite having just flown myself into that site in a powered aircraft.
I was for a while a member of Ziggy and Marta's 'Just Soaring' club while I was doing the competition circuit without a real base. They kindly waived the 5$/yr membership dues in exchange for putting my flights on the OLC in their club name. I never actually went to their site. Unfortunately no longer operating(?) I was also confused as to who exactly Noel was referring to as not being qualified to fly in exactly what airspace. Do we actually have more privileges currently than RAAUS & RPL's? We can (occasionally) get clearances into controlled airspace, which I believe RAAUS & RPL's can't do without special additional endorsement? Not that they've ever given me my requests, but perhaps asking for FL180 through a 4500ft CTA step was a bridge too far.... On Sun, Feb 5, 2017 at 7:46 PM, Mark Newton <[email protected]> wrote: > On 5 Feb 2017, at 3:35 PM, Richard Frawley <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > It is well know that the biggest resistance by far to the current GPC > change (which was a good step forward) was by instructors and especially > CFI’S and RTO’s > > > > I would be more than happy to help champion the issuance of GPC as > equivalent to Level 2 Independent ops, but I can tell you now it will the > CFI’s and Panels that will resist the most > > Needs to be equivalent to CASA RPL (plus or minus a short transition > training course). > > GPC should be the bridge between disciplines. In the same way that a > qualified RAAus pilot can fill out a form and do a checkride to get an RPL, > a qualified GFA pilot should be able to do likewise. > > (If the GPC and RPL are equivalent, and a keen pilot can’t organize a > crew, at they can go to their local GA or RAAus school and rent a Eurofox > or something instead) > > > > Given however the small number of self launchers, this requirements is > still moot. > > As long as you still need others (tugs, wing runners, ropes) there is no > true independence and their in lies the root cause. > > The issue isn’t whether a pilot can be independent from anyone at all; > it’s whether they can be independent of a club. > > There are regularly aircraft listed in the classifieds section of Gliding > Australia for less than $30k. Three mates should be able to tip in $10,000 > each, and own an aircraft cheaper than a jet-ski. Having bought it, there > should be no reason why they need to get involved in any gliding clubs > anymore, if they don’t want to. > > In the same way that getting a launch at a comp is a simple commercial > transaction, there should be no reason why syndicate pilots can’t front-up > at any random gliding operation and say, “Here’s ten bucks, can you squeeze > me into your winch launch queue?” without also submitting to club bylaws > and the judgement of an instructor. > > You don’t need to be a club member to operate a GA or RAAus aircraft out > of Gawler. Why should you need to be a club member to operate a glider off > the same runway? > > (Some clubs insist on “site checks” before someone can soar there — Why? > GA pilots don’t need site checks, why should glider pilots? Shouldn’t > unique aspects of a site be documented in its ERSA entry, and shouldn’t a > pilot's training and airmanship be adequate for them to judge their own > operational risks? If a site’s complexities are treated as some kind of > secret data that can only be disclosed during a site check, the system is > failing) > > > - mark > > > _______________________________________________ > Aus-soaring mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.base64.com.au/listinfo/aus-soaring >
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