Snoopy wrote:
Just pointing out that the measures in question (and named in that article) are pointless, because the PA46 was N-reg (so the flight was illegal anyway)
They can’t stop the last tragedy, I guess they are aimed at preventing the next.
Timothy wrote:
They can’t stop the last tragedy, I guess they are aimed at preventing the next.
The article might help to do that by making the public aware of the problem.
Why would illegal charters be particularly concentrated around Jersey airport and the aeroclub there – as that article alleges?
At all three of the Channel Islands there seems to be a steady stream of people who live there and who are determined to “escape” regularly. This is especially visible on Alderney which has only about 1800 inhabitants but which manages to keep a pretty solid flow of twin turboprops busy. Are these the people who are paying PPL holders to fly them to the mainland and back? I can’t believe it is cheaper, despite the high cost of the “airline” flights. GA flying is pretty expensive; more so if the pilot is to make money out of it.
Also it would seem to me that the best business model for illegal charters is scenarios where airline flights are not readily available. Or where discrete transport is desired, for people who are easily recognisable but don’t want to be seen travelling, or obviously for criminals etc.
It is not the common purpose rule which makes advertised cost-sharing flights illegal in US-registered civil aircraft. This point was exhaustively addressed in posts 25, 43 and 44 to the Wingly—illegal with an N-reg? thread.
OK, fair enough. I didn’t read that summary carefully enough. But it seems clear to me that Wingly-type cost sharing is not legal in an N-reg, anywhere in the world.
Peter wrote:
Why would illegal charters be particularly concentrated around Jersey airport and the aeroclub there – as that article alleges?
Because the paper sells ads to make a profit :)
And a high profile celebrity dying is a great way to make money.
Except for a few aviation nuts, the topic is boring, not relevant to many and not a problem (how many deaths in illegal charter compared to anything else really). So the media created a problem, and the authority has to live up to this crap, harassing some aeroclub pilots.
If people hand someone they don’t know cash to fly in a small prop plane and then expect this to be the same as boarding a BA Airbus they are, in my opinion, stupid.
No regulation, law etc… will ever help to change this.
Besides, why a CPL holder cannot accept money and fly someone in a small prop for hire is ridiculous.
As is the requirement to run the same kind of AOC that is necessary for an airline for such a low key endeavor. Circle of stupidity, because it incentivizes illegal charter, which the regulations intend to forbid in the first place.
Peter wrote:
Why would illegal charters be particularly concentrated around Jersey airport and the aeroclub there – as that article alleges?
I think the article goes some way to explaining this – no direct flights between Alderney and Jersey, so it is a major ballache to go by airline (turn up an hour before the flight goes, wait around the airport, fly to Guernsey, go through security again and wait at least another hour, then finally to Alderney). Then you have to go through the same rigmarole on the way back. Opposed to GA, turn up, and then within 15 minutes you’re rolling down the runway and even in a Cessna 150, you’re landing in Alderney in about 20 minutes. These flights are ideal for a GA plane.
It sounds like it’s so inconvenient and slow to go fly to Alderney from Jersey, it would be almost quicker to go in a small motorboat.
OK; I can see that. Except that when you visit these places you don’t see a vast amount of light GA activity. Especially on Alderney! If somebody was running an “airline” it would be hugely obvious. Everybody there knows every sheep person by their first name; in fact they probably have a high % of shared DNA 
If one of the commuter operators even half smelt illegal charter, the full details would be on their way to the local CAA within the hour. AOC operators are extremely hot when it comes to reporting alleged illegal charters.
I thus suspect that there may be some island residents who are good friends with some GA pilots and get them to fly them to the other island(s) and pay them in cash. There is no way this will ever be picked up. “You” can allege what you like… Nobody will be stupid enough to do a load of flights, with a queue standing in the airport terminal building.
Of course nobody is alleging that N264DB was doing anything like this… But if I didn’t want to be tracked, I would not be looking at Mode S transponders I would just install a Mode C.
This is quite interesting
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-48694561
A 64-year-old man from North Yorkshire had been arrested and released while investigations continue, a spokesperson for Dorset Police said.
No public speculation on his identity, please
The Times has already published.
The “ever trustworthy to get the best dirt” Daily Trash has posted it:
Dorset Police revealed last night they had have held David Henderson, 64, from York, on suspicion of manslaughter by an unlawful act following the doomed flight from Nantes to Cardiff on January 21 this year.
