what if a 100ft/10 second infringement caused a loss of separation?
I would suggest that a loss of sep is pretty unlikely with a 1000ft/3nm or 1000ft/5nm rule as applied outside the UK. You would need an airliner within 3nm or 5nm from the infringed corner of the zone and within 1000ft vertically. The 1000ft is especially unlikely when you look at where jet traffic actually ends up. Take any (typically busted) corner of the LTMA for example and look at the height of the jets within 5nm of that corner. You can see this from FR24, or by running an aviation-map GPS on an airline flight. Bearing in mind that the jet has to be contained within the CAS, it will be struggling to be right there.
I know it can be there – because it can be anywhere in CAS. OEI cases can certainly produce traffic barely contained in CAS. But if you talk about ATC workload and such, this is extremely rare.
But with a 5000ft/5nm rule a loss of sep is very much more likely. In fact given the 1000ft LTMA steps, if say you nip a corner of the 3500ft bit, the chances of a jet being at 8500ft (or a bit less) at that lateral location is high; this CAS (eventually FL075 base) extends all the way to France!
So the UK has artificially created a rule which ensures ATC mayhem, very often.
BTW, I have no view on what drove the CAA policy change. My guess would be that it is CAA-internal, and a part of the internal recriminations following the Hunter crash. These are wide-ranging and are affecting many facets of CAA work.
G1000 supports this and AFAIK every G1000 installation does
OK; a good point. It’s quite funny; Enhanced Mode S was illegal on light GA not so many years ago 
Hi Standby,
No-one here is suggesting that we don’t need to do better. We can all improve.
The issue though is a combination of this recent change in policy at the CAA and the reality of what causes pilots like us to infringe.
What causes pilots like us to infringe?
It isn’t because we don’t know how to plan a flight or navigate, it isn’t because we don’t have GPS and it isn’t because we’re crap on the radio and think we have a clearance when we don’t. It certainly has nothing to do with us not understanding how serious a matter infringements are and just charging about without a care in the world. Yet the CAAs attitude and the GASCO course assumes these are the issues.
What will cause pilots like us to infringe is a moment’s inattention. A distraction while talking to a passenger or some such.
For that reason I’m sceptical about the CAA approach and the GASCO course. I cannot see what the course could cover that would be of use to the average Mode S transponding accidental LTMA corner-nicker. Unless they literally don’t know how to navigate and talk to ATC?
Standby I think you are approaching this from the wrong angle. Fines, penalties and GASCo must ultimately be judged on whether the strategy has the desired result – reducing the number of infringements. There is no evidence yet it does. In fact the problem may be getting worse.
It is indeed a strange world when we arent told if the strategy is working.
Its an even stranger world when the process surrounding the strategy appears to be a closely guarded secret.
Why is a charity running the courses? Why is the charity accumulating funds in excess of its stated objective? Why isnt there clarity about the tendering process? In fact was the tender ever publicly announced? Why doesnt GASCo appear to be registered to hold private data about pilots? Why is the material published littered with references to minor infringements, and infringements easily resolved between pilot and ATC, and no loss of seperation, on the one hand, and mass disruption on the other. When questioned the answer is so and so head of NATS was off script. How terribly insulting!
Any organisation carrying out this type of work must stand above questions of this sort, but there are no answers to these questions, which unfortunately places the whole efficacy and competence of those involved in doubt. Its the type of stuff if it had a wider audience the press would have a field day, but because it effects maybe 300 pilots a year there is not yet sufficient traction within the pilot community to insist on answers to these fundamental questions.
I am afraid it has all the makings of jobsworth missing the obvious, but thinking we should all be grateful and respectful because they give up their time to sit on these committees, when in fact they do not have the experience to do so.
If I were involved I would be terribly worried of doing GA an enormous disservice, and, for that reason, I question the whole arrangement and those involved with it, at the moment.
I threw down the challenge some time ago, let just one person provide some answers. I predicted they would not, and there would be the tried and tested politically conceived reasons for not doing so, and this has so far proven accurate. I am not holding my breath that a single person is prepared to engage with the community in which they argue they are promoting safety. In fact their very actions may yet result in a reduction in safety.
For me the answer is terribly simple. Answers the questions, explain how the policy is working, engage with pilots, prove you really want to solve the problem and I am sure there would be universal support. Do none of that and expect more cynicism, and ultimately, that you may have had a hand in increasing the very risk you seek to diminish
Oh dear!
Fuji_Abound
You are entitled to your opinion and views and I know very little apart from what i have read on here. GASCo have been covering infringements in their safety evenings for years now so maybe them doing the courses was an extension from that? Has anyone asked them? You say nobody is engaging with the community but I heard a talk at Wellesbourne from the CAA chap who was also due to talk at AeroExpo so I’d not hold that breath too long. Maybe he/they just aren’t at the places you want; have you engaged yourself?
You could examine the situation in the following way for any commonly infringed bit of the London TMA
Even at the start of the ILS, west of Tonbridge, the typical traffic is at 4000ft, so the 5000ft add-in is guaranteed to cause a loss of separation against somebody popping up at 2600ft, whereas a 1000ft add-on would not.
Of course someone will point out that jet traffic could be anywhere in CAS, but if you want to create hazardous situations in order to keep yourself in some £100k job which involves the management of hazardous situations then this 5000ft add-on is a great way to do it, because it will generate lots and lots of them.
flybymike wrote:
I don’t think infringers would normally report their own infringements. They are normally identified by mode S, (the “ANPR” of the skies.)
Well, in Norway you can get in trouble if you don’t report incidents like this, while incident itself will cause no problems (no fines or anything). (Not talking about closing down big airports kind of busts which obviously is another matter. It doesn’t really matter how you close down an airport, you will be in serious trouble no matter what), What is ANPR?
Standby wrote:
airmanship across the aviation industry is maybe not quite what it could be
Maybe. From what I read here it’s usual for UK GA pilots to turn OFF their transponders (true or not, I don’t know). Yet it’s clearly written in SERA and AIPs that if the plane has a transponder, it shall be kept ON at all times (mode C or S), also in non transponder mandatory airspace. IMO turning OFF the transponder is not only against the regulations, it’s also very poor airmanship.
This “us against them” attitude is also very poor airmanship IMO, extremely poor, completely unacceptable in fact. In the air it should be “us” exclusively, ATC included. I think maybe this is the main point of Timothy? How to reach that “us” attitude when GA pilots believes some rules don’t apply to them, and the CAA enforces rules with a sledge hammer (apparently)? I have a hard time making heads and tails out of this thread.
LeSving I could not agree more. For me its one set of rules, my issue is entirely creation of a lack of trust between pilot and regulator which must be avoided at all cost.
Peter wrote:
Enhanced Mode S was illegal on light GA not so many years ago
That link seems to say that installing enhanced mode S in not illegal but rather a major mod. That isn’t relevant to an aircraft which is certified with an avionics set transmitting enhanced mode S, like the G1000.
Peter wrote:
The main issue appears to be a recent change of CAA policy on what to do with infringers, with the indications being that most if not all of them, no matter how minor, getting sent straight down to the Gasco course which for practical purposes is a £400 fine.
20% of them is not most or all! It’s quite a small minority.
Most (80%) get a nastygram in the post.
I meant most major TMA and CTR busts go to Gasco. To date, 22 sessions and ~20-25 per session. Participant reports confirm the general delegate profile For example some 90% using GPS, whereas some external stats suggest some 80% of busts (of all types) not using GPS.
Surprisingly there are a lot of ATZ busts, whose reporting can be “most interesting” at times.
installing enhanced mode S in not illegal but rather a major mod
OK, although the distinction is (was) moot since nobody was willing to tackle that issue economically. One UK avionics shop (no longer doing light GA today) wrote an article saying they were ripping out that GPS-TXP wire from hundreds (IIRC) of installations, following that EASA ruling. But I think that ruling is now dead. Later, Garmin did new GTX330 software which enabled the radiation of the extra parameters to be disabled in config.
