I think the major idea was to say that if anything goes wrong, anyone will try to blame the pilot first. One will try to prove that, in fact, the offending flight should be seen as a public transportation. It doesn’t matter if the pilot will finally win a lawsuit, he will not have enough money to get there. It was not about saying a site is legal or not. It was about saying that whatever may happen, insurance will try to limit its responsability.
How does this differ from crashing with passengers who were “recruited” in a more conventional way?
The passengers or their estates will try to sue, and will try every trick in the book to get more money e.g. alleging negligence.
Peter wrote:
ow does this differ from crashing with passengers who were “recruited” in a more conventional way
It should not impact the personal bank account of the PIC (or his family).
It should not impact the personal bank account of the PIC (or his family).
It most definitely can.
Aviation liability varies according to country but in general the pilot and the operator are jointly liable. In the UK case, there is (curiously) no passenger liability unless the pilot is found negligent (ref: Civil Aviation Act) and this is why pilot negligence is such a hotly pursued item in UK aviation litigation.
What I don’t get about this French position is what creates any new liability IF the passengers were recruited in accordance with the law. France is an EU member and is thus bound by EU law.
That’s why I think the driver behind the DGAC position is something different. It could be (as stated in that IAOPA article) industry interests, or it could be something else which is too controversial to say openly.
Actually most of the opposition concerns the club scene where the presidents of French flying clubs believe that the will get prosecuted if one of “their” aircraft is involved in an accident during a cost sharing flight. Basically they believe they are a lot more important have a lot more liability than they really do. This position attracts a megalomaniac authoritarian rather peculiar type of individuals.
That said I do to certain extent agree that there is a legitimate safety concern when seeing all of the incident and accident reports from AAIBs, which could be addressed by requiring a minimum experience. But even when that is suggested, you are met with a blanket refusal.
Part of DGAC’s proposal diktat makes sense (from memory requiring 200 hrs TT and 25 hrs in the last 12 months?) Requiring a CPL, FI or IR does not.
A CPL is nothing more than some theory and tighter standards. A FI teaches you to teach. An IR teaches you to fly according to instruments. None of the above guarantee that the pilot has any experience apart from the hours for the license or rating. And none of them guarantee that the pilot will exercise sound judgement.
Somewhat tongue in cheek I will say there are two ways to build experience and become a really safe pilot: push your personal limits and those of your machine so much you end up scaring yourself and learning from it, or be teamed up with a senior pilot operating within strict company procedures multi-crew.
Very few of us are born with good judgement. Just look at children. No matter how many times you tell them they are found to hurt themselves doing this or that, they won’t necessarily take your word for it. Look how fearless they are in the ski slopes (for a while).
The people on the French aeroclub scene tend to mix up advertised cost-sharing and public transportation. They are worried about the reputation of the flying clubs in the general population should a cost sharing flight crash, and the restrictions that may ensue on their activities. They are worried about the liability of the flying club presidents. Some also think cost sharing will pull the rug under air taxi.
What surprises me the most is how worked up they get every time the subject is brought up. It is almost impossible to have a rational conversation about this.
The Q is why do people (who are not club presidents) get worked up.
Forums suffer similar “personality” issues all over Europe.
Do the people on the French GA scene think French PPL training/capability is such that if the scene changed with passengers wanting to be flown more than the often mentioned usual club lunch run of 50nm (and let’s face it few will want to be flown a distance which they can drive in less time) and maybe in non-CAVOK wx, there would be many crashes?
That to me seems to be the hugely obvious unspoken “elephant in the room”.
The air taxi business in pistons has been dead for years and I am sure it is just as dead in France.
The GA scene has the same issues everywhere (lack of touring experience) so why are French pilots especially upset about this?
So in August of last year, the DGAC decided to apply a flexibility provision in the Basic Regulation (Article 14.1 – Immediate Reaction to a Safety Problem) and published an “operational requirement” to restrict cost-sharing in France essentially to pilots having
In addition, cost-sharing flights are restricted to day VMC.
The reason I bring this up now is that it is somewhat related to the “EASA FCL (anti N-reg provisions) postponed to April 2019 – not quite!” thread in the sense that in both cases an EASA MS has applied some part of Article 14 of Commission Regulation 216/2008, and presumably notified, EASA, the commission and other MS according to the process described here.
What is interesting is what happens after the notification is sent, and simply stated, it seems that it shall end up with either EASA taking some action, or the MS having to withdraw the measure.
Unfortunately, although it has been 7 months since France applied this measure, I have not been able to find any documents regarding France’s notification, but I observe that it can take 18 months from the time a notification is sent and until there is a decision by the Commission. EASA however shall make a recommendation within one month of formal notification, but the time of the formal notification is defined as the time EASA has received ALL relevant information from the member state.
I am curious as to whether it is possible to gain more visibility wrt the process in this particular case. No because I care so much about this particular case, but because I would like to better understand the decision-making process within the EU, and the latitude MS have to apply additional requirements.
EASA has one month to take a decision, but it can ask the MS for more information, in which case the clock starts ticking again from when the MS responds. I understand the request for more information is a useful mechanism where there are significant discussions to be had. I believe that was used in this case.
EASA convened a Safety Action Group. My understanding is that it has now informed France and the EASA Advisory Bodies of the outcome of its work. To my knowledge France has not yet withdrawn its 14(1), but they are aware of the group’s discussions and recommendations, which were not supportive of the French 14(1).
bookworm wrote:
EASA convened a Safety Action Group.
Thanks, bookworm.
So I take it that means that it is not possible to get insight into the process, minutes of meetings for example, or some sort of log saying that the issue was discussed.
In the long run, won’t France be forced to comply with the decision of the EC as per the recommendation of the EASA? (I realize we’re not there yet) What are the next steps in the process? Has EASA taken a decision, or when will they?
bookworm wrote:
they are aware of the group’s discussions and recommendations,
I take it from that, that the group’s recommendations are non-binding? Does EASA then make a decision, taking the groups work into account, which is binding, or is the recommendations the end of the road?
