On 11 Feb 2017, at 4:19 AM, Jim Staniforth <staniforth...@yahoo.com> wrote: > > Many of us thought that the GPC was going to give holders responsibility for > themselves. > Perhaps some situations where people felt they were under an instructor's > "control" only happened because the instructor was concerned about legal > liability under the present rules. Seems an unnecessary burden on instructors.
Having control creates liability. You can be liable for an act under a range of different constructions if you know something is happening, and you have the ability to prevent it from happening, and you fail to act. Giving instructors the power to intervene in everyone’s operations (e.g., by giving them authority to checkfly or ground pilots) means they have the unique ability to know about and prevent virtually anything from happening. So they’re in the liability firing line. The present rules place the duty instructor in charge of an operation. If they were redefined so that instructors were only in charge of the instructional aspects of the operation, with no authority over pilots who weren’t undergoing training, then their liability would likely be constrained. Of course, this is all theorizing. We’ve had 70 years to find out: Have any GFA duty instructors been found liable for any glider accidents? - mark _______________________________________________ Aus-soaring mailing list Aus-soaring@lists.base64.com.au http://lists.base64.com.au/listinfo/aus-soaring
