The graphic (website) version of this newsletter can be accessed at:
http://pages.prodigy.net/rockaway/newsletter398.htm
Quote of the Week: "This makes general aviation, with 16 deaths per 1
million hours, roughly 20 times as dangerous per hour than driving." from
aviation safety web site article by Philip Greenspun
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Aviation Conspiracy Newsletter
#398.........................................................................October
15, 2006 Past newsletters can be accessed at:
http://pages.prodigy.net/rockaway/ACNewsmenu.htm
The PASSUR air****t
flight
tracking system at many major U.S. air****ts
http://www.passur.com/sites.htm
(you must have Java installed to view it). If you want to get the
newsletter
sent to you every week, sign up to AviationWatch. Bill Mulcahy
rockaway@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Institutes A "Tem****ary" N.Y. City Small Plane Restriction!!!
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As Bill Sees It: (Editorial) FAA "Restricts" Small Plane Flights Over New
York City After Crash: The FAA got what it wanted; a phony headline saying
the "FAA restricts small plane flights in N.Y. City." In an effort to show
that they are doing something to prevent planes cra****ng into high rise
buildings in New York City, the FAA quickly formulated a rule that will
help
deflect media attention away from them. As soon as the public forgets
about
it, like the flight restriction rules after 911, the tem****ary restriction
will disappear. Rather than an outright ban, the FAA concocted a rule
that
banned "fixed wing" planes which were "not in contact" with local air
traffic controllers. This new rule doesn't effect helicopters. So
apparently
any yahoo who has a pilot's license is still free to fly anywhere over
N.Y.
City, as long as they call air traffic controllers on the radio and let
them
know that they are doing it. That doesn't sound like much of a restriction
to me. As I have said before, it will probably take one of them bringing
down a large passenger jet, like recently happened in Brazil, before
anything is done to stop the dangerous spread of general aviation.
Another N.Y. Yankee Was Killed In A Small Plane Crash 1979!!! The
incredible
dangers of flying a small plane became apparent once again when one went
out
of control and crashed into a N.Y. City high rise apartment killing a N.Y.
Yankee pitcher, Cory Lidle and his flight instructor. Incredibly, this
wasn't the first N.Y. Yankee killed in a small plane crash. In 1979 Yankee
catcher Thurmond Munson was killed practicing takeoffs and landings in a
small plane. Despite the fact that the potential for being killed flying
in
a small plane is twemty times greater than driving in a car, the FAA
continues to promote general aviation expansion!!!
N.Y. City Mayor OPPOSES Flight Restrictions On Small Planes!!! I wasn't
surprised when N.Y. City's mayor, Bloomberg said the current rules on
small
planes over N.Y. City are just fine. Billionaire Bloomberg obviously
doesn't
want any restrictions on his flying out of the city to his vacation home
in
Bermuda. He also has a pilot's license himself!!! I remember his phony
"war
on noise" to make N.Y. City quieter. He was all for cracking down on boom
boxes but when it came to the real source of sleep disturbing
noise....aircraft, he said "that was a federal government problem" and he
couldn't do anything about it. This clearly showed, to me at least, the
"little people" on the ground don't mean much to this billionaire pilot
creep .
Online Petition To Get EPA To Remove Lead From Small Plane's Fuel!!! These
small planes not only make an incredibly loud amount of noise as they
dangerously fly over our homes, apparently they also spew out toxic lead
fumes into our lungs. A environmental group called Friends of the Earth
has
filed a formal petition calling for the EPA to remove lead from all
aviation
fuel, not just jumbo jets. You can see it, and sign it if want by clicking
here: http://action.foe.org/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=5489
N.Y. City's Mayor Bloomberg Fights Against Small Plane Restrictions!!!
Cory
Lidle's plane crash has kicked off a growing debate over whether the
Federal
Aviation Administration should restrict small aircraft in Manhattan's
airspace with Mayor Michael Bloomberg stayed firm on his opinion that the
current Federal Aviation Administration rules are adequate. "The fact of
the
matter is that a small plane really can't do all that much damage," said
Bloomberg, a recreational pilot himself. "There are other ways. No
terrorist
is going to use a small plane. A big plane obviously, but a small plane,
no." Governor Pataki, Senator Charles Schumer and Congressman Anthony
Weiner
are among the lawmakers pu****ng for tighter rules, saying terrorists have
easy access to the city's skyline. Governor George Pataki is calling for
tighter restrictions on small planes flying at low altitude around the
city
following Wednesday's plane crash into an Upper East Side highrise.
http://www.ny1.com/ny1/content/index.jsp?stid=1&aid=54827
Editor's Note:
It's interesting to see politicians who have been pu****ng for aviation
expansion in N.Y. City come out for general aviation restrictions. I guess
general aviation hasn't been keeping up with their campaign
"contributions"
(AKA bribes).
Congressman Pleads Guilty To Taking Gifts From Foreign Aviation Company!!!
WA****NGTON - Ohio Rep. Bob Ney (picture on left) admitted improperly
accepting tens of thousands of dollars worth of trips, meals, s****ts
tickets
and casino chips while trying to win favors for a disgraced Wa****ngton
lobbyist and a foreign aviation company run by a gambler known as "the Fat
Man." Ney, a six-term Republican, had defiantly denied any wrongdoing for
months, but he reversed course and agreed to plead guilty in court papers
filed Friday. Prosecutors will recommend he serve 27 months in prison. Ney
was expected to formally plead guilty in court Oct. 13. Ney became the
first
lawmaker to admit wrongdoing in the election-year congressional corruption
probe spawned by disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff (picture on right). Ney
said he was hopeful "that someday the good I have tried to do will be
measured alongside the mistakes I have made."
http://www.examiner.com/a-288412~Rep__Bob_Ney_Agrees_to_Plead_Guilty.html
England: London Borough Sues Government Over Increased Night Flights: The
council will press ahead with legal action against the Government for its
failures to reduce air noise from night flights to Heathrow. As part of
Richmond council's ongoing campaign to get a total ban on night flights,
cabinet members agreed on Monday night that in partner****p with Wandsworth
borough, it will take the Government to the High Court. Two years ago, the
neighbouring boroughs took action against the Government over its 2004
public consultation on night flights. The fresh legal action stems from
what
the council sees as weaknesses in the Trans****t Secretary's summer
announcement about night flights. In June the Secretary of State for
Trans****t, Douglas Alexander, announced a new night flights regime for
London's three main air****ts, including Heathrow.
http://www.richmondandtwickenhamtimes.co.uk/news/localnews/display.var.968832.0.storm_clouds_brew_over_night_flights_legal_action.php
N.Y. City: FAA Admits Two Near Misses At LaGuardia Air****t!!! More than a
month after they occurred, two near misses on the same night in the skies
over LaGuardia Air****t are still under investigation, Federal Aviation
Administration officials concede. On Sept. 5 at 7:51 p.m., a LaGuardia
tower
controller failed to maintain the 3-mile separation rule between a Colgan
Air twin-engine turboprop plane and a Cessna after both planes took off
from
the same runway, FAA officials said. The planes were just 2.9 miles apart,
but no evasive action was required. The controller who cleared the
departures was not removed from his duties after that, just reassigned to
verify flight routes and clearances. "The supervisor saw no need to remove
him. He allowed him to continue to work," said Jim Peters, a spokesman for
the FAA's Eastern Region. Then, at 8:30 p.m., a Piedmont Airlines
twin-engine turboprop left LaGuardia minutes before a U.S. Airways Airbus
319 jet took off, the FAA said. The U.S. Airways pilot, said the FAA,
failed
to turn on the plane's transponder, which would identify the plane on
radar
to air traffic control. The agency said controllers at an FAA monitoring
center in Garden City noticed the missing transponder signal, and that the
jets were just 2-1/2 miles apart. The FAA said it was then that the
LaGuardia controller was removed from his job by management. Bill
McLoughlin, president of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association
at
LaGuardia, said hundreds of lives were put at risk because management
failed
to do its job properly. "[The FAA] put [the controller] in a very
vulnerable
situation where they are supposed to be protecting their employees and the
flying public. I think they compromised safety by not removing him [after
the first incident]," said McLoughlin, who heads the local controllers'
union. Editor's Note: This is a strange story. The controller's union is
demanding that management remove one of its controllers from his job?
What's
the story behind this story?
http://www.nydailynews.com/boroughs/story/460079p-387070c.html
@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Aviation News Stories This Week
England: Storm clouds brew over night flights' legal action By Colleen
McDonnell
http://www.richmondandtwickenhamtimes.co.uk/news/localnews/display.var.968832.0.storm_clouds_brew_over_night_flights_legal_action.php
The council will press ahead with legal action against the Government for
its failures to reduce air noise from night flights to Heathrow.
As part of Richmond council's ongoing campaign to get a total ban on night
flights, cabinet members agreed on Monday night that in partner****p with
Wandsworth borough, it will take the Government to the High Court.
Two years ago, the neighbouring boroughs took action against the
Government
over its 2004 public consultation on night flights.
The fresh legal action stems from what the council sees as weaknesses in
the
Trans****t Secretary's summer announcement about night flights.
In June the Secretary of State for Trans****t, Douglas Alexander, announced
a
new night flights regime for London's three main air****ts, including
Heathrow.
In a written statement to Parliament in June Mr Alexander said: "I
consider
that for each air****t the decision strikes the appropriate balance between
the need to protect local communities from excessive noise and the
benefits
that services can bring to the national, regional and local economy."
The new restrictions, which will apply until October 2012, kept the
six-and-a half hour night quota period' as being from 11.30pm to 6am, and
kept the average number of flights permitted to take-off and land during
this period capped at 16 per night.
The council said the trans****t secretary has failed to hold to his promise
that he would "bear down" on night-time noise and improve the night noise
climate'.
The council said the Government's decision to keep night flight
restrictions
as they were instead of banning them all together was based on "shaky
foundations".
The council will now seek a judicial review of the legality of the
Secretary
of State's June decision.
Council leader Serge Lourie said: "Night flights pose a massive
environmental problem, both in terms of pollution and noise, and seriously
affect the quality of life of residents in this and neighbouring boroughs.
"If successful, these new legal moves could mean the Government having to
rethink and issue a revised decision over future restrictions on night
flying."
The announcement came in same week the Government postponed - for the
second
time - its consultation on plans to end runway alternation at Heathrow.
The Department for Trans****t admitted ministers had not reached a decision
on the consultation originally planned for March then rescheduled for
October.
Runway alternation, the schedule for take-off and landings, gives the
borough's residents living under the flight path half a day's break from
air
noise.
In its 2003 aviation white paper, the Government said it wanted to end the
practice and introduce mixed-mode where planes land on both of Heathrow's
runways all day.
11:46am Friday 13th October 2006
General Aviation Safety from: http://philip.greenspun.com/flying/safety
by Philip Greenspun
Site Home : Flying : One Article
All life is the management of risk, not its elimination.
-- Walter Wriston, former Chairman of Citibank
The idea of plunging thousands of feet straight towards the ground and
then
exploding in a fireball seems to bring out the bourgeois fear of death in
many people.
First of all, let's be clear that dying in a plane crash of any kind is
one
of the hazards of wealth. Welfare mothers sitting at home watching soap
operas are not going to become victims of the Islamic Jihad on a
commercial
flight. A Walmart greeter is not going to take a vacation on a private
island so exclusive that it can only be reached via chartered Cessna 182.
The Kennedys keep dying because they are rich enough to become expert
skiers
and fool around on the slopes. Or rich enough to buy their own airplanes
and
crash them into the water at night.
How dangerous is flying? There are 16 fatal accidents per million hours of
general aviation. It is fairly safe to assume that when a plane crashes
and
someone dies, everyone on board dies. By contrast, the death rate for
automobile driving is roughly 1.7 deaths per 100 million vehicle-miles.
Car
crashes don't always kill everyone in the car so let's use this statistic
as
provided, which is for an individual traveling in a car rather than for
the
entire car. So considering that the average airplane accomplishes a
groundspeed of at least 100 miles per hour, those million hours of flight
push the occupants of the plane over more than 100 million miles of
terrain.
Comparing 16 fatal accidents to the 1.7 rate for driving, we find that
flying is no more than 10 times as dangerous per mile of travel. And since
most accidents happen on takeoff or landing, a modern fast light airplane
traveling a longish distance might be comparable in safety to a car.
We can also look at safety per hour. This makes sense for recreational
pilots who have the alternative of spending a few hours flying around or
spending those hours taking a scenic drive. If the average speed of car
travel is 50 miles per hour, those 1.7 deaths occur in 2 million hours of
driving. This makes general aviation, with 16 deaths per 1 million hours,
roughly 20 times as dangerous per hour than driving.
Risk management is much easier with airplanes than with cars. In a car,
you
are constantly at the mercy of other drivers. If an 18-wheeler crosses the
yellow line, you're toast. Except in the immediate vicinity of a busy
air****t, traffic is seldom an issue for pilots. If you die it is because
something went wrong with your plane or because you flew it into the
ground
by mistake.
If you don't want to die like JFK, Jr., who became disoriented on a dark
and
hazy night over water, don't fly at night or don't fly at night unless
you're absolutely sure that it will be clear with a bright moon. If you
don't want to die when a 25-year-old part fails in mid-air, get a new
airplane.
If you're really really scared, try flying commercial. Big airliners have
a
fatal crash rate of 0.34 per million flight hours, approximately 50 times
safer than general aviation. Try to avoid that final commuter hop, though.
Those smaller turboprops crash 10 times as frequently per hour of
operation,
making them only 5 times as safe as general aviation. See the FAA's
Aviation
Safety Statistical Handbook for more detail.
Better yet, stay home, crack open a 40 oz. malt liquor, and turn on the
TV.
It is difficult to get seriously injured falling off a sofa.
More aviation safety statistics:
* AOPA Air Safety Foundation publications, notably the annual Nall Re****t.
Why a Beginner Pilot Can Be Safer than a Retired Fighter Jet Pilot
A pilot with any level of skill can be a safe pilot. The real question is
"What is the ratio between the pilot's confidence level and skill level?"
A
guy who got his license yesterday and will only fly today if the wind is
calm and the sky is free of clouds is probably safer than the gal who
retired from flying jets for the Air Force and thinks that she can handle
ridiculously gusty winds and instrument approaches down to minimums. The
experienced pilot can fly a given fixed mission more safely, e.g., taking
a
Cessna 172 around the pattern on a sunny day. But if the two pilots are
allowed to make go/no-go decisions about cross-country flights in marginal
weather the end result may be that the novice pilot elects to wait a day
and
takes less overall risk.
The Most Dangerous Words a Pilot Can Say
"I will be there on June 5 at 6:00 pm." Pilots of light aircraft who utter
sentences of that form are very high risk pilots, regardless of skill
level.
If you promise to get to specific places at specific times you will
eventually run afoul of weather and other cir***stances that are beyond
you
and your aircraft's capabilities.
Consider JFK, Jr.'s famous last flight. He wanted to get a passenger to
Martha's Vineyard on a particular evening. Some folks blame the fact that
the weather was dark, hazy, and marginal VFR. Some folks blame the fact
that
JFK, Jr. chose to fly mostly over the featureless waterscape of the Long
Island Sound instead of over the well-lit sprawl of the mainland. Some
folks
blame JFK, Jr.'s failure to complete his instrument rating before the
accident flight. Some pilots reassure themselves by noting that they've
completed much more challenging instrument flights than JFK, Jr.'s simple
summer trip to Martha's Vineyard. All of these perspectives are reasonable
but all ignore a fundamental fact: using a small aircraft for scheduled
trans****tation, as opposed to recreation, is an accident waiting to
happen.
How do the airlines manage to keep their schedules and safety records
intact? An airliner has jet engines that enable it to climb over most
weather and therefore the airliner doesn't spend much time in the clouds.
An
airliner has de-icing equipment for climbing or descending through clouds
that are below freezing and might ice up the wings. An airliner has two
pilots in the front who do nothing but fly instrument approaches all day
every day. An airliner usually goes from one big air****t with instrument
landing systems and RADAR-equipped controllers. A private pilot with a
little single-engine piston-powered airplane doesn't have any of this
going
for him or her, especially not when going to a favorite out-of-the-way
air****t.
A safe attitude with a small airplane starts with the assumption that no
flight is going to be made at the time and date planned. It might happen
if
the weather happens to be good and the flight looks as though it will be
enjoyable. The plane is a recreational toy with trans****tation as a side
benefit.
Example of how this works in practice: I planned a flight from Boston to
Wa****ngton, DC for Thanksgiving with my parents. I left Boston on Tuesday
because the forecast for Wednesday was rain. I stopped in Teterboro, New
Jersey to see some cousins on Tuesday night, planing to proceed to DC on
Thursday morning when the rain had cleared out. By Thursday morning it was
still raining in New Jersey but not enough to make an instrument flight
unsafe. However, down in Wa****ngton, DC the surface winds were gusting up
to
50 knots and Boeing 737s were re****ting "severe turbulence" at the
altitudes
where I expected to fly. I had my dog Alex with me and didn't think he
would
enjoy being slammed around. So I ended up being 24 hours late for
Thanksgiving dinner and took three days to do a trip that could have been
done by car in 8 hours.
Example #2: As a novice pilot I took a trip from Boston to Alaska to Baja,
Mexico and back to Boston. On at least 10 occasions I had to wait a few
days
or change plans in order to avoid situations that were frightening and/or
beyond my capabilities as a pilot. I managed to complete the trip,
however,
without ever getting into an unsafe or even especially challenging
situation.
Your Tax Dollars at Work
What is the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) doing to improve general
aviation safety? Not as much as it could. For example, as a pilot it is
very
nice to know about the ****tion of the earth over which one is flying. How
high is the terrain underneath me? Over to the left? If I am forced to
start
descending out of the clouds due to ice forming on my wings, which way
should I go for maximum terrain clearance? Are there any radio
transmission
towers nearby that I might hit? All of these questions are answered by
reference to paper charts called "sectionals" published by the FAA. A new
small airplane in 2002 comes equipped with large high resolution color
displays and powerful computers but cannot show the pilot answers to any
of
these questions. A pilot planning a cross-country trip must juggle about
20
of these charts in the cockpit and constantly plot his or her position on
the paper chart, while dividing attention between the displays on the
panel
and the paper.
Because the FAA does not publish the charts or the underlying terrain
database on its Web servers, a typical $20,000+ avionics package for a
small
plane will have no provision to accept these data even if they were
available. It is possible to buy the information in electronic form but
only
from a private company whose prices are beyond the reach of the average
general aviation pilot (the company is Jeppesen, which is a division of
Boeing and whose customers are primarily airlines). Thus the device market
is stunted because the underlying data are trapped in government-published
paper. A user of the $50 Microsoft Flight Simulator program gets more
terrain information than the pilot of a $250,000 airplane.
If it is a lack of budget that prevents the FAA from putting their charts
on
a Web site one wonders how the FAA manages to send out so many nicely
printed mass mailings to the nation's more than 600,000 certificated
pilots.
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