Australian Flying March-April 2016 explores some of general aviation's most diverse topics, from the new Cirrus Australis and state-of-the-art Redbird sim to taking a couple of old stagers and pitting them in a competition to see who's the charter king. We also open a can of worms with the debate over noise-canceling headsets, look at flight separation rules and show you how to minimise weather damage if your aircraft lives outside. All of this is behind a magnificent Rob Fox image of the Australis high over Cape Schank, Victoria. It's on the streets now, so go and get it!
The wheel turns for general aviation once again with a new minister taking over from Warren Truss. Right now, we don't know which direction the wheel is going to turn, and we'll probably have to wait until after the Federal Election to tell. Minister Truss did a lot of work setting reforms in motion for aviation; those calling for a faster pace of change should reflect on how we'd be going if Truss hadn't commissioned the Forsyth Report at all. Now we have a Minister for Infrastructure and Transport, with the "Regional Development" bit palmed off to another portfolio. Darren Chester MP is now in the chair, and he comes with a bit of GA in his blood already. It is hoped he also comes with a decent suit of armour. Even now, only one day after being sworn in, there will be people in the GA community sharpening their knives and developing pithy, cynical nick-names for Chester without even waiting to see if the bloke is any good in the job. His first actions are unlikely to be anything other than keeping the Truss line until after the election. That's a political thing, and we have to accept that. Still, I suspect the first barrage he gets will be all about not doing enough quickly enough. I'm prepared to say this bloke will be alright until he gives me reason to believe that he's not.
Another young adventurer has emerged ready to take on the world, literally. Queensland teenager Lachie Smart is preparing to circumnavigate the world in order to bring the title of youngest person to fly solo around the world back to Australia. It's a mammoth task for anyone, but even bigger for a young bloke who hasn't even turned 18 yet. Part of the struggle to get something like this going is, of course, money. Aircraft hire, fuel, safety equipment ... the bills keep piling up and they all need to be funded before so much as a prop blade turns. Have a look at the Wings Around the World website and see what you can do to help this lad on his way.
In amongst the deluge of press releases coming from this week's Singapore Air Show was an announcement from Pacific Aerospace Limited (PAL) that they had completed the 100th airframe of the P-750 series. They reached the milestone 10 years after the type was released. Quick maths will show that means 10 aircraft per year, or slightly under one per month. That is a respectable pace for an aircraft made outside of the United States or Europe. But the last three years have yielded an average of only five aircraft, pointing towards a slow-down in demand. It's probably natural then that PAL is looking to China to boost sales. With the world starting to understand the benefits of single-engine turbo-props (SETP) and China's new GA industry flourishing (at the moment) we can hope to see some more good news coming from this NZ company soon.
Who got an e-mail from CASA's new on-line medical system telling them their medical was about to expire when it wasn't? I did, and it both freaked me and made me see 37 shades of scarlett. It was helped a bit later when a retraction e-mail arrived apologising "for any undue concern". I calmed down and stopped my plans to deliver the mother of all tirades in this Last Minute Hitch. The new medical system kicks in on 21 March, and CASA is exhorting its virtues and how much time it is going to save. To me, it looks like it will actually take longer. There's quite a bit to go through, most of us (and I do mean "most") are getting on in years and were not schooled in the intricacies of digital communication from the day we were born, and as you get older, health and medical condition get a great deal more attention. So it seems the burden of time has not been eliminated, just passed from the regulator to the customer.
May your gauges always be in the green,
Hitch