Tabla de contenidos para September/October2021 en Australian Flying

In late July, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Development Barnaby Joyce announced $29.5 million in grants for regional airports. The funding is part of Round Two of the Regional Airports Program (RAP) and will be spread across 89 projects around the country. “For our regional communities, the local airport provides an essential link to the rest of Australia,” Joyce said. “That’s why we’ve committed $100 million over four years from 2019-20 to 2022-23 to help owners of regional airports right across Australia deliver upgrades to improve runway and taxiway pavements and install new lighting or fencing. “These projects will improve the safety of aircraft, operators and passengers, the delivery of goods and services and better meet the operational requirements of aeromedical and other emergency services,…

In the days leading up to Oshkosh in July, Textron Aviation announced that it was shifting the in-development Denali turbo-prop from the Cessna brand to the Beechcraft brand. The Beechcraft Denali will join the King Air 260 and 360/ER in the line-up of Beech-branded turbo-props. "The Beechcraft Denali represents our continued strategy to invest in clean-sheet and current products in both our Beechcraft and Cessna iconic brands," said Ron Draper, Textron Aviation, president and CEO. "Beechcraft turbo-props are renowned for their versatility and reliability, and the single-engine Denali is a perfect complement to this legendary family of products.” Textron believes the Denali will outperform its competition and deliver lower operating costs. The panel will contain Garmin G3000 avionics and the aircraft has been engineered to achieve a cruise speeds of…

Pip Spence is one of the most well-credentialed bureaucrats to ever occupy the office of Director of Aviation Safety. With stints behind her at the Department of Transport Airports Division, NBN, Western Sydney Airport and Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet under her belt, she has the Canberra street cred to know how regulators work. At the time I spoke to her, she was only six weeks into her new role, but already had a solid handle on the task that was ahead of her. SH: Many people view the DAS position as a poisoned chalice. Why did you want the job? PS: I've watched quite a few different Directors of Aviation Safety over my career, and it might be a poisoned chalice, but it’s such an important job and…

The SAAA began as the Ultralight Aircraft Association of Australia and later became the Sport Aircraft Association of Australia. Before the annual Ausfly event at Narromine, airshows and gatherings were held for many years at Latrobe Valley and then Mangalore, Vic, in the 1970s and 80s. With around 1100 members, the SAAA is the key organisation that is involved with VH (CASA registered) home-built aircraft, flown by holders of a Private Pilot Licence (or higher). The essence of amateur-built experimental is that anyone can build anything they like, out of anything they like and power it however they like. There are no design standards to be met, though the completed aircraft must of course be in a condition for safe operation. Most aircraft builders tend to choose well-proven designs from…

The name “Comanche” translated from the Uto-Aztecan language spoken by the Comanche people, means “enemy”, or “stranger”. But the Piper Comanche seems to only have loyal friends, not enemies, although many people are strangers to the type. The Piper Comanche is a four-seat low-wing retractable monoplane, originally powered by a 180-hp Lycoming O-360 engine. The first prototype flew in 1956, and entered production as the PA-24-180. Piper Aircraft had taken to naming its aircraft after Native American nations and words when it moved from its rag and tube designs to modern metal aircraft in the 1950s. By the 1960s, it had developed a line-up of GA aircraft which included the PA-23 Apache, the PA-24 Comanche, and the PA-28 Cherokee. The Apache, later renamed Aztec, was a design inherited from its…

There will be many times in your piloting career that you will wish you could drive an aircraft into and out of the hangar. Alas, they are unable to do it under their own power, so alternative sources of locomotion are needed. Generally muscle-power does the job, maybe with some recruits from the flying school, or in some cases a winch installed at the back of the hangar makes life easy. The other method–particularly popular with large aircraft like helicopters, turbo-props and twins–is to use a petrol-driven or electric tow to provide the pushing and pulling power. The beauty of this system is that the tow (or "tug") can be relocated to do the job for multiple aircraft and in multiple hangars, unlike a winch that is restricted to the…

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Flight training organisations (FTOs) typically serve two masters: the airline industry and general aviation. Already battered by COVID and suffocating layers of regulation and associated costs, with even more regulatory changes to come, the industry is facing a new crisis set to compound its woes, in turn negatively impacting other sectors of the aviation industry. They face the existential threat of disappearing instructors, sucked up into the vacuum of a world-wide shortage of pilots driven by the pent-up needs of travel consumers. Some FTOs are seeing the writing on the wall and are calling for a more united voice in preparation and, at the same time, fix some pre-existing worries. Already suffering pre-pandemic, it is past time, according to several key industry players, that flight training organisations were recognised as…

Helitak Fire Fighting Equipment has been awarded FAA STC Certification for their FT4500 UH60 Black Hawk tank. In 2018, the Helitak FT4500 Fire Tank underwent rigorous flight-testing and trials in conjunction with High Performance Helicopters (HPH) in California. The tank received 8110-3 Major Alteration approval in early 2020 with HPH President, Brad Bauder commenting, “High Performance Helicopters has been testing and operating the new Helitak Black Hawk tank design for near on two years now and this tank is a game changer in the Aerial firefighting space. " Helitak, an Australia aerial firefighting design and manufacturing company, has been specialising in rotary aircraft fire suppressions systems for over a decade and pride themselves on the delivery of high-volume water and retardant from their retractable tank system. The STC Certification project…

One way to counteract the jolt of life in a foreign city is to start building an RV7 in your apartment. Mike Killingsworth and Mac Knell never had a cross word in the 13 years they worked together on the project, which, after 12 months, came from Hong Kong home to Ocean Grove, Victoria with their luggage. Their log book entries cover 2003 to 7 March 2016 and by the time Ross Woodward took it home to Mildura as the new owner, it was more advanced than a quick-build, though had no instruments or engine. Ross has lived in Mildura since his family set up camp on a family grape farm. His enthusiasm as a young bloke lay with motorbikes, but on a date with his wife to the gliding…

If the success of June’s RotorTech Helicopter and Unmanned Flight Exposition demonstrated anything, it was that the Australian helicopter and unmanned flight communities are a resilient bunch, and that face-to-face engagement is still high on the industry’s priority list. Originally planned for 2020, the event held at Brisbane’s Royal International Convention Centre from 15-17 June signaled the first time RotorTech had been held in a capital city location, after outgrowing its original Sunshine Coast venue. Despite the challenges of COVID-19, RotorTech 2021 not only succeeded in providing the Australian helicopter and unmanned flight communities with a welcome return to face-to-face engagement, but also grew markedly in the process. The event attracted 1806 attendances across the three days, around twice that of the 2018 event, and a 40% increase in exhibitor…

Rotary aviation industry convention and exhibition RotorTech 2021 set a new record for attendance last June. The event, which was held at the Royal International Convention Centre in Brisbane, attracted more than 1800 visitors over three days, a record despite the lack of overseas attendances and the lock down imposed on the Melbourne metro area. The result is very satisfying for AMDA Foundation CEO Ian Honnery. "We believed that industry sought an in-person event as a platform to begin rebuilding confidence and reaffirming face-to-face relationships," Honnery said. "That is confirmed by the great growth in the event. Despite the challenges of COVID the total combined daily attendance nearly doubled over the three days of the show compared with 2018, and the number of participating companies involved in the industry exhibition…

Avionics manufacturer Avidyne announced a new suite of avionics in July aimed at upgrading GA cockpits. Called Avidyne Vantage, the new avionics are being released as a retrofit to replace ageing Avidyne systems that have been in use for many years. “We are incredibly excited to introduce Vantage as an innovative option for GA pilots seeking to update their flight decks,” said Avidyne President, Dan Schwinn. “We’ve challenged ourselves to provide large displays that are even easier to use than our earlier products, while being more capable and functional than anything we have done before. "Eventually the Avidyne Vantage product line will include a wide range of display sizes and levels of functionality, and certification across a wide range of aircraft and associated legacy equipment. Vantage provides pilots with an…

World Championship Air Race is gaining momentum for the 2022 season with more pilots committing to the competition. After announcing Australian Matt Hall as the first competitor in April, WCAR now has 12 pilots on the books, including former Red Bull Air Race World Champions in Hall (2019), Japan’s Yoshi Muroya (2017) and Czech pilot Martin Sonka (2018). Other RBAR Masterclass alumni include British tyro Ben Murphy, Frenchman Mika Brageot, Canada’s Pete McLeod and Spaniard Juan Velarde. Four other pilots who competed in the RBAR Challenger Class will be racing in the WCAR GP1 class: Italy’s Dario Costa, France’s Melanie Astles, American Kevin Coleman, three-time Challenger Class champion Florian Berger from Germany and South Africa’s Patrick Davidson. Astles will be the first woman to compete at the top level of…

I could have nearly cried. My favourite aeroplane had been destroyed after another hirer tried to land at an airfield unfamiliar to him without doing much homework first. There was an obstruction on the runway; a call to the owner would have told the pilot that. A decade later it happened again. Another aeroplane that I share a lot of wonderful history with was damaged when a hirer taxied it into a ditch at an airstrip that had actually been closed. Calls to the owner had been unsuccessful, but the pilot decided to land anyway. It is easy to pillory these two pilots, but many of us, on genuine reflection, can probably name an instance or two when we should have done more due diligence on a destination than we…

Aviation has an epigram for everything, but one of the classics is, “when the weight of the paperwork equals the weight of the pilot, you’re cleared for take-off.” While the mighty EFB has certainly lightened our load in terms of having to carry maps, charts, ERSA, printed weather, weight and balance and the AIP, our flight bags aren’t necessarily becoming any lighter with the abolition of paper, whizz wheels and protractors. Add to your bag a potential portable GPS, ADS-B receiver, portable VHF radio, personal ELB, mobile card reader, along with the requirements for EFB back-ups, portable battery chargers, mounts, cases and charging cables and there is still a blooming future for flight bag manufacturers. But before you dash out and buy a new flight bag with wheels, let’s take…

ASA has signaled its commitment to listening to and acting on feedback from the aviation community with the finalisation of three new plain English guides to the safety regulations. Plain English guides are now available covering the general operating and flight rules, fatigue management and small commercial drone operations. The guides set out the regulatory requirements in concise, clear language using a practical format. They summarise and re-state the content of the relevant Civil Aviation Safety Regulations (CASR) and the associated Manual of Standards. If a pilot, air operator or drone operator carefully follows a guide they can normally expect to comply with the relevant regulations. It means people in the aviation community do not have to trawl through the detail of the regulations and standards for the information they…

There’s a lot more to this than meets the eye. I have noticed that single engine Cessnas run out of fuel a lot more often than Cherokees. My guess is that the ratio is about five-to-one against Cessna. There has to be good reasons, and there are indeed – three main ones: dihedral, aerofoil section and tank breathers. I have no idea why this particular Cessna ran out of fuel, but the problem is so common that it’s worth devoting this accident discussion to explaining why you have to keep your fuel wits about you when flying single engine Cessnas. Dihedral This is the upslope of the wings. Designers use it for lateral stability in low-wing aircraft. This has an unintended benefit: it makes the fuel tanks slope in towards…