On Sep 2, 2014, at 3:48 PM, Paul Bart <pb2...@gmail.com> wrote: > Thank you for a detailed and logical post. Frankly I do not think I would > take issue with most points you make. I simply think my personal experience > is different. I am not a member of any other flying organisation so I cannot > compare.
That’s fine, we all come from different backgrounds, and different things are important to all of us. That’s one of the points I was making. For those of us for whom “the freedom of flight” is important in the manner I described, GFA has literally nothing to offer us - indeed, its very existence is an impediment (the CASA GPL would likely be very different if GFA had not been involved in it) > The fact is that I do not see that GFA impedes what I want to do, nor what a > majority of glider pilots I personally know (a limited sample) do. Does a > level 2 instructor impedes my flying, not in the least, do I feel in any way > "supervised"? Not in the least. When it is my turn to run the day, do I > interfere with any of the solo pilots? No. It’s not a question of interference, that isn’t the point. You cannot take responsibility for rigging a glider, because GFA seems to be saying that its trained certificate holders lack the alacrity to perform that task without someone else looking over their shoulder and countersigning. When you are running a day, you are on an undefined, open-ended legal liability hook for any accidents or injuries they suffer. Could you have prevented an actionable event by preventing a launch? Even if you couldn’t, could an insurance company’s lawyer paint a picture that says you could? You might not even know those other pilots, but you’ve “taken charge” of their operation. Do you know what that means? And anyone who isn’t an instructor should feel “in any way supervised” because that’s what the instructor’s actual job is. Everyone is under supervision. All the time. I don’t know how to describe how oppressive that is for the group of pilots for whom “freedom of flight” is important; how much the knowledge that you can never be so well trained or well skilled that you can be trusted to command your own aircraft can suck the enjoyment out of the sport — When that’s precisely the expectation held by pilots in literally every other aviation discipline I’ve ever come into contact with. I can remember 14 years ago, one of the very first aus-soaring messages I ever read was Mike Borgelt making the entirely reasonable observation that it is impossible for a L2 Independent Operator to legally fly his own self-launching glider out of his own private airfield, because the act of rigging it requires another GFA member to be physically present to countersign the maintenance release. 14 years later, nothing has changed. How is that possible? That renders the entire L2 Independent Operator rating worthless. How pathetic is it that so much time can pass without such an obvious regulatory defect being closed? > So the only time I feel as a second-class aviator is when i hook into a 6 kt > thermal and I know that Alan Barnes would be doing 8 :). That’s just Imposter Syndrome. Alan Barnes knows Ingo would be doing 12. :) - mark
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