My state of residence, not country, is larger in itself than all EU countries individually except Spain, France and Sweden. I don’t file a flight plan to leave the state, or to fly between other states. You know the drill – flying outside of the US is analogous in terms of distance to flying out of the EU to Africa or Russia. This is well trodden ground.
You might note that I have asked LeSving three times in this thread why the latest EASA rules on maintenance shouldn’t encourage people. I think filing maintenance programs of any kind is a dumb procedure, but clearly the rules have improved from the CAMO etc comedy that was previously in force. I’m not ignoring the issue, under D-register or any other 
PS I’m not attracted to IFR in the US for three main personal reasons: I like flying without a flight plan, I don’t like real time negotiation with the ground on the radio, and finally (most importantly) I don’t fly in bad weather or want to. Airspace is not a consideration, as it is elsewhere, and I don’t care if my movements are visible to others as much as I might be concerned in principle about my movements being tracked by government. The third factor (interest in IMC flying) might change someday, and then I’d be forced to put up with the first two factors. I doubt it, but I could imagine it.
That is not correct.
To fly from state to state equals flying from Bavaria to Saxonia.
Flying from Germany to Poland is flying from one sovereign country to another. The EU is not comparable to the USA.
I know at least 5 US pilots now who hate flying IFR, because their every movement and flight data is recorded – and published everywhere – including their radio. One pretty well known US pilot I know has not flwon IFR for five years now becasue of this “total control by big brother” (as he, not me, calls it all the time).
Since all planes are tracked by civilian / military radar, and their GSM phone activities and locations are logged every activity and every 10 minutes, these people are either drug runners (etc) or have severe psychological issues best not disclosed to their AME. I guess Germanwings would take them on?
Control by big brother??
If your plane is D-registered you can even have a maintenance program approved by the LBA that gives you similar freedom as you enjoy it in the US.
That is such nonsense that I can’t possibly type up anything useful on my phone.
Peter, if I had to file flight plans, I wouldn’t fly
Fair enough although there are apps where you chuck in a flight plan with hardly a clink, so the sham of a VFR OCAS FP is easily achieved.
Peter wrote:
Since all planes are tracked by civilian / military radar, and their GSM phone activities and locations are logged every activity and every 10 minutes, these people are either drug runners (etc) or have severe psychological issues best not disclosed to their AME.
It’s actually a very common point of view in the US. Not a typical British point of view, but Americans in general, under a Constitution that explicitly created and encouraged it, distrust Federal government power… and the FAA is the Federal government. Also and FWIW VFR flights are commonly below radar coverage in normal flying, cell phones are off when airborne, and they don’t commonly have Mode S or similar.
I have immediate family members from all three countries under discussion, which I suppose is not such a common thing.
Flyer59 wrote:
When you say “movements tracked by the government”, can you please explain what your mean exactly?
Sure, this gets back to the thing about being charged for using the air. With either Mode S or ADS-B Out, government has a very easy route to automatic billing for every mile flown. And as per my previous post and yours, it’s symptomatic of my typically American distrust of the Federal government or any similar consolidation of government power
@Silvaire
That is the attitude I mean, and on my plus 40 travels through the USA, to 36 states, I met many pilots who do not want to be controlled by “the Feds”. Many pilots in Texas will never talk to anybody on the radio if there’s a way to avoid it. I remember how the guy who taught me flying the T-6 in Texas said “Who invented aviation, Bernoulli or Marconi?” … and switched off the radio before I could use it ;-)
I think there’s a reason why the FAA is so methodical and deliberate in its regulatory activities, and why FAA controllers are low key, in general. You’re careful like that if you know your organization is viewed as inately untrustworthy, maybe even by yourself, and as result you’re vaguely uncomfortable. Maybe EASA will evolve into the same mode, if and when they and their national CAA operatives are kicked in the face a few more times.
Automated billing for every mile flown… interesting concept. I wonder how people who go up in arms about a potential per-mile taxation via the mode S transponder to fund the FAA reconcile that with the 20 cents per gallon of Avgas they pay for the same purpose regardless of number of miles flown. If the “feds” really wanted to tax you they’d increase excise tax, not go through the mode S rigmarole.
I rode a motorcycle from Savona to central Austria a few weeks ago, across the Brenner, arriving by 2 PM. When I added up the taxes it was about €130 for the morning ride IIRC, derived from pay per mile (road tolls) plus fuel tax in Italy, then after crossing the border the Austrian fuel tax, sticker and separate pass toll. Four separate types of tax averaging about €20 per hour to ride a motorcycle. Austria has the most imaginative setup, three different types of taxes applied simultaneously, four if you count vehicle registration tax paid wherever the motorcycle is registered.
Obviously governments almost everywhere also charge both income tax and sales tax on the same personal income stream. It’d be nice if they didn’t diversify taxes to hide the total, but given opportunity they do. The potential to extract money per mile based on mandatory, discreet aircraft position reporting is equally obvious.
