By Paul Clough, Solicitor 

With all due respect to William Shakespeare, the following is a comparison between the laws of aviation as they apply in Australia and in Europe, during winter.

In a former life, your correspondent earned a crust as an airline pilot for 22 years. He laboured in the sharp end of various airliners in and about Australia. In so doing, one learnt to obey certain physical laws as well as the temporal laws as regulated by Department of Civil Aviation, Department of Transport, Civil Aviation Authority and, latterly, Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA).

However, little has been discussed as to the comparative regulation of aviation between Australia and say Europe or Asia or the Americas or the Middle East. These other regulators see things differently from Australia in many respects. It is axiomatic that Australia has an enviable record of airline safety in the wider community due principally to the fact that Australia has low hills and good weather all year round. Our highest hill is Mt Kosciusko at about 7,500 feet. It is a long way from anywhere important. The two cities with reasonable hills about the airport are Canberra and Cairns. Getting in and out of these two places in an airliner requires one to absorb many and varied charts and departure and arrival procedures. Every other continent or close lump of land has high mountain ranges. New Zealand has Mt Cook near Christchurch at about 21,000 feet. Papua New Guinea has Mt Willem at about 20,000 feet. India has Mt Everest the highest mountain. Japan has Mt Fuji also at least 17,000 feet. Europe has Mt Blanc also about 22,000 feet and Switzerland is all high mountains. Geneva has a hill to the right of take off westerly at 7,500 feet about 10 miles from the threshold. Europe in winter has bad weather and this is what your correspondent had to cope with for nine months when flying in middle Europe in 1989/90.

The employment check flight was an eye opener. The three standard stalls were done on instruments not above 5,000 feet, as above that height airliners from the US of A were letting down into Frankfurt for landing. In Australia, all stalls were done at about 15,000 feet lest the pilot, it and we tumbled down. Then I was asked to carry out a simulated instrument approach to 50 feet. Yes that is not a misprint: 50 feet above the ground on instruments. In Australia, the minimum decision height on the ILS is 300 feet above the ground. Not in the fog capital of the world, Luxemburg. If one cannot fly accurately to 50 feet one would not get into most airfields in winter, so I was told. After a second try at pointing out the approach chart height of 300 feet, I was asked if I wanted the job. Germans have a direct way of putting things. I tried my luck having never been below 300 feet on a precision approach before. At 75 feet, I slide off the localizer, but was considered safe enough for the job. I was never asked to fly a non approach for the job as captain. I wondered why.

I then flew with the line First Officers. Most had obtained a US commercial licence in Texas in weather similar to Australia. Then they came back to Amsterdam and did an F27 engineering course and on to Luxembourg for 10 hours flight training on F27s. Most had less than 400 hours, but all of them could fly instruments better than anyone I had ever seen operate in Australia. I arrived there in July and had about three or four months to get used to the IF standard. However, in November, Europe became its nasty weather self. Low pressure systems in the North Sea at about 957mmbs. Yes, it’s not a misprint: 957 millebars.  Having been weaned on cyclones in Queensland with lows of 985 millebars I expected it to be exciting, turbulent and wet. I could not imagine the winds or turbulence a low of 957 would throw up. Perhaps it was the temperature but the winds never get above 75 kts. The crew I flew with never gave such lows a moment’s thought. However, with the winds came the low cloud, fog, mist, snow and sleet. I then had to fly in actual weather to 50 feet to get into Charles de Gaulle, Frankfurt or Karstrup on each sector of the day’s flying. Frequently, when the F/O was flying, his performance was as good as or better than mine. The standard of IF was extremely high. The regulators knew that the airlines in the region were all exceeding the lower limits of the approach charts to get in and turned a blind eye to these daily, weekly events.

It was obvious that all airfields in Europe are at least 12,000 feet long, that they have ILS at each end are served by two locater beacons on each ILS. Nobody does NDB or VOR approaches in Europe as the higher minimums would ensure that no one landed at any time in winter, and most aircraft would arrive in Spain or Morocco as alternates. This was why I had not been required to demonstrate an ND approach on appointment.

Another feature of the regulated operation was that whatever I flew, I carried fuel for an alternative even in good weather. In Australia, at that time, we carried flight fuel + 15% variable+ 45 minutes holding fuel and something for mum and the kids. In Europe, I carried flight fuel + fuel to a designated alternative + any required traffic holding at the alternative + 45 minutes holding fuel as a minimum. This frequency meant that I carried full fuel for a 50 minute hop from Luxembourg to Frankfurt. There was no room for fuel for mum and the kids. The regulators approved this arrangement.

The corollary to the high standard was that the F/Os were incapable of flying visual approaches that I was flying still in Europe after Winter had passed. Some of the days in Spring were magnificent and it was a joy to fly in the area with the green fields and beautiful landscapes. I ventures a few visual approaches into de Gaulle and each time the pained looks on the F/O and the exchanges with Paris approach and tower were interesting. It seems that no one but no one, other than the Australian, would suggest a short visual approach instead of a lengthy 10nm ILS final It was unheard of. When I was so forward as to suggest that the F/O carry out a similar visual approach instead of a lengthy time consuming ILS into the home field, there was a mutiny in the crew. I had to have the approach aids switched off to encourage the F/O to fly a visual approach. The few I tried it on broke out into a cold sweat and never stopped mumbling. How did the regulator deal with this impasse in the cockpit? The F/O reported me to the German check captains and I was called to account. The regulators in the form of the German check captains, agreed that a visual approach saved about five to seven minutes flying time, they agreed that a visual approach was the standard approach in the operations manual, they agreed that it was not wrong to fly a visual approach in the circumstances, BUT they said that it was eccentric of me to impose my will on a reluctant F/O when the ILS method both from a airfield flow pint of view and from the weather view point was more common. They added that the F/Os had limited experience and to introduce a radical visual approach took them out of their comfort zone and into the exotic realm of the Antipodes.

Watch this space…