Flight Time Vs. Air Time Personal Logbook

[Batiskaf]

I smell future litigations...Pandora's box is open!

[R0T0R]

This was a question of technical records. They made no mention of flight crew logs.

[Coastal]

Wow. What a convoluted and contradictory explanation. The portion where he explains why holding power can be counted as flight time makes perfect sense and I was actually starting to think that a clear answer might be forthcoming. Then I kept reading and it all went downhill. I don't think this guy has any idea what the industry standard is when it comes to this issue. Yikes.

[Brian Jenner]

So, TC now has a, new "official" interpretation for the "flight time" and "air time" definitions in CARs. But that does not necessarily make it so! All conflicting opinions on the subject not withstanding and TC's opinion remains just one of many, the law remains the law as written and it will take a decision by a Court of Law to provide an authoritative interpretation of what the writing means.

 

Unfortunately, while TC has no dictatorial powers to re-define the CARs definitions as per their latest opinion, TC carries a big stick, which gives their opinion a certain "my way or the highway" value; unless someone is willing to stand their ground before the Transportation Tribunal of Canada or the Federal Court of Canada.

 

To set up that process before the Tribunal, TC would first have to take action against someone's document: fine, order to "change a COM or else". Of course to avoid a Tribunal challenge, TC may decide to just keep brow beating the weak, the poor and the hungry into submission.

 

Before the Federal Court the process would be a bit more complex and costly but any document holder could take action anytime. It would suffice to present the new policy as stated in this forum as the object of a request for declaratory judgement.

 

One way or the other, TC has no "authority" to dictate to the Court either. At the outset of the Court hearing all opinions on the subject will be equal. And in the end the opinion that will prevail is the one that can muster "authoritative" support (for example:compliance with international standards that Canada is obliged by treaty to follow).

 

Therein lies the challenge for TC ! If someone does contests the new interpretation. How on earth could they possibly explain to the Court that their own Aviation Policy Letter 2005-02, was wrong and their new one right. How will they prove the old policy did not conform to international standards (ICAO) while the new policy does.

 

Any volunteers?

[BadMonkey]

****, they even started making us...sorry, strongly suggested...that we start attaching photocopies of the aircraft log sheets to pilot training records so that their PVI audits would be easier. The reasoning was some operators were fudging training records by having 1.0hrs Flight Time recurrent, but only 0.5-0.6hrs Air Time in the journey log. Somewhere along the line many Transport inspectors seemed to think their opinion is regulation, and many operators caved in just to save themselves the headache of dealing with them.

 

The problem with demanding clarifications for certain things within CARs is that few in Transport will nut up and put their necks out, and when they're finally forced to, you end up with the most restrictive and extreme interpretations to take liability off the regulator.

[Freewheel]

So, TC now has a, new "official" interpretation for the "flight time" and "air time" definitions in CARs. But that does not necessarily make it so! All conflicting opinions on the subject not withstanding and TC's opinion remains just one of many, the law remains the law as written and it will take a decision by a Court of Law to provide an authoritative interpretation of what the writing means.

 

Unfortunately, while TC has no dictatorial powers to re-define the CARs definitions as per their latest opinion, TC carries a big stick, which gives their opinion a certain "my way or the highway" value; unless someone is willing to stand their ground before the Transportation Tribunal of Canada or the Federal Court of Canada.

 

To set up that process before the Tribunal, TC would first have to take action against someone's document: fine, order to "change a COM or else". Of course to avoid a Tribunal challenge, TC may decide to just keep brow beating the weak, the poor and the hungry into submission.

 

Before the Federal Court the process would be a bit more complex and costly but any document holder could take action anytime. It would suffice to present the new policy as stated in this forum as the object of a request for declaratory judgement.

 

One way or the other, TC has no "authority" to dictate to the Court either. At the outset of the Court hearing all opinions on the subject will be equal. And in the end the opinion that will prevail is the one that can muster "authoritative" support (for example:compliance with international standards that Canada is obliged by treaty to follow).

 

Therein lies the challenge for TC ! If someone does contests the new interpretation. How on earth could they possibly explain to the Court that their own Aviation Policy Letter 2005-02, which they enforced as CARS Gospel, for many years, was wrong and their new one right. How will they prove the old policy did not conform to international standards (ICAO) while the new policy does.

 

Any volunteers?

 

Well Brian,

 

We've got a program validation inspection during the week of November 30, 2015. I can tell you that we have two separate and distinct columns for flight time and airtime in our logbook and in many cases the values in these columns differ. This has been the case for the 16 years we have been in operation and they have audited these journey log books numerous times.

 

I spoke with the inspector who will be l leading the PVI today and he believes that in all cases flight time equals airtime in the skid equipped helicopter.

If a finding is made with regards to this we will commit to completing a root cause analysis . Unfortunately this root cause analysis will demonstrate that the root cause lies with in transport Canada .

 

Since corrective action plans are meant to be made against the actual root cause we will not be submitting corrective action plans for the findings . They will have no choice but to take us to tribunal or close the PVI without receiving a corrective actions from the operator. FYI this is what happened with our 2013 PVI which they finally closed this summer.

 

Forcing commercial operators to implement corrective actions that are not made against the root cause does absolutely nothing to prevent future recurrence.

 

As we've always stated, we may or may not be logging correctly but I don't think anyone could argue with the fact that the root cause lies within transport Canada's organization.

 

By the way I don't think the enforced GAPL. 2005/02 like the gospel. Not in our region anyway. In our region they barely acknowledged it. Many believed it was meant to advise people in a certain sector of our industry to log in accordance with ICAO. (Ie schools etc). The wording stated something like "for the purpose of licensing" I believe. The inspector who will be leading our POI IN 2 weeks mentioned this over the phone yesterday. The Fact is: they made similar findings in 2011 while GAPL2005-02 was still valid.

[Freewheel]

GAPL 2005-02:

In order to clarify the interpretation of the definition of "flight time" with respect to helicopters as it applies to flight crew licensing, "flight time" shall be as it is set out in Annex 1: "The total time from the moment a helicopter's rotor blades start turning until the moment the helicopter finally comes to rest at the end of the flight, and the rotor blades are stopped."

 

Many seem to infer "as it applies to flight crew licensing" means it didn't apply in all cases. Not sure why they feel the regulations give them the authority to apply the CARs differently for some. This points to much larger issues like violations to the Public Service Values and Ethics code---specifically the Respect for Democracy section. As you have pointed out in the past this kind of thing is also a violation the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. I believe personal logbooks are required for licensing purposes so suggesting otherwise seems silly. Expecting pilots to log flight time differently when monitoring flight time limits is equally absurd. Flight Time only has one definition and one meaning.

The Flight time/air time issue is just one example of the much larger issue here.

[Brian Jenner]

Freewheel, just as a contextual note, TC can not initiate any action before the Tribunal, only Document Holders have that right

 

As for the possibility of another fonding on the subject of your times not being consistent with CARS, that should, theoretically, be impossible because findings are made in reference to the COM not CARs. I believe you've said your logging is consistent with your COM definition of "flight time" which is more or less "rotors turning to rotors stopped".

 

In practice, the lines between findings, COM, CARs are blurred by everyone. So most TC inspectors act on their own best judgement, rather than a strict application of the law. Sometimes that's good sometimes not so good - depends on your definition of "good". Nonetheless, if anyone rells you CARs trump COM, remind them that in approving your COM, the Minister exercised his authority to waive CARs, in favour of less stringent rules.

 

So, given their new interpretation of "flight time" what should happen is that TC may give notice that tour COM definition of flight time" must be ammended to comply with CARs, as TC now sees them. In that case you can initiate Tribunal appeal based on the fact that the COM approval is an Aviation Document (as defined by the Act and confirmed by the Tribunal and the Federal Court, previously).

 

 

.

[Freewheel]

Freewheel, just as a contextual note, TC can not initiate any action before the Tribunal, only Document Holders have that right

 

As for the possibility of another fonding on the subject of your times not being consistent with CARS, that should, theoretically, be impossible because findings are made in reference to the COM not CARs. I believe you've said your logging is consistent with your COM definition of "flight time" which is more or less "rotors turning to rotors stopped".

 

In practice, the lines between findings, COM, CARs are blurred by everyone. So most TC inspectors act on their own best judgement, rather than a strict application of the law. Sometimes that's good sometimes not so good - depends on your definition of "good". Nonetheless, if anyone rells you CARs trump COM, remind them that in approving your COM, the Minister exercised his authority to waive CARs, in favour of less stringent rules.

 

So, given their new interpretation of "flight time" what should happen is that TC may give notice that tour COM definition of flight time" must be ammended to comply with CARs, as TC now sees them. In that case you can initiate Tribunal appeal based on the fact that the COM approval is an Aviation Document (as defined by the Act and confirmed by the Tribunal and the Federal Court, previously).

 

 

.

Funny you should mention that Brian because the only 2013 PVI finding (operations) we received was made against our Training program syllabus in the already approved COM. They advised that changes needed to be made to the COM (as several "observations" withinn the finding). We reviewed applicable CARs and disagreed that the changes requested were a requirement of the CARs.We advised the minister had already approved it and no amendment to the applicable CARs had occurred.

 

We provided no changes to the COM in the CAP. The CAP was declined twice. The 3rd CAP was reviewed then accepted...despite the fact it did not include the changes they expected.

They closed the PVI without conducting any follow/up.

 

Getting back to our current flight time logging practices as currently approved in our COM: the gentleman who wrote this new interpretation claims to have reviewed this section of our COM and NO CHANGES are needed. Say what?

 

He also told us over the phone that in many cases flight time could be logged different than air time...say what?

 

Despite committing to offer clarity, I'm more confused than ever.

[Freewheel]

Freewheel, just as a contextual note, TC can not initiate any action before the Tribunal, only Document Holders have that right

 

As for the possibility of another fonding on the subject of your times not being consistent with CARS, that should, theoretically, be impossible because findings are made in reference to the COM not CARs. I believe you've said your logging is consistent with your COM definition of "flight time" which is more or less "rotors turning to rotors stopped".

 

In practice, the lines between findings, COM, CARs are blurred by everyone. So most TC inspectors act on their own best judgement, rather than a strict application of the law. Sometimes that's good sometimes not so good - depends on your definition of "good". Nonetheless, if anyone rells you CARs trump COM, remind them that in approving your COM, the Minister exercised his authority to waive CARs, in favour of less stringent rules.

 

So, given their new interpretation of "flight time" what should happen is that TC may give notice that tour COM definition of flight time" must be ammended to comply with CARs, as TC now sees them. In that case you can initiate Tribunal appeal based on the fact that the COM approval is an Aviation Document (as defined by the Act and confirmed by the Tribunal and the Federal Court, previously).

 

 

.

I've brought this up in the past by the way. Apparently they disagree with you. They have recently refused approval of a COM amendment submission (without providing grounds) until we changed other areas of the COM (that had nothing to do with the sections submitted for amendment).

 

Excerpt from E-mail Sent to POI:

 

"you should proceed with approval (as per CARs 703.104(4)) of the Amendment No.15 (as currently submitted).

If you feel that there are areas that were submitted for approval that do not meet the minimum regulatory requirements of the CARs please advise which "qualifications or conditions necessary for issuance or amendment were not met or fulfilled and provide details of Minister's grounds for the decision not to approve (as per Aeronautics Act 6.71 and CARs 103.06"

 

 

Here are excerpts from the response from my current POI (with Technical Team Lead cc'd):

 

"The Aeronautics Act 6.71 and CARs 103.06 are applicable only to a Canadian Aviation Document which a Company Operations Manual is not and therefore are not applicable in this case.

However the CARs and CASS references that follow are applicable and are the basis on which Amendment 15 to your Company Operations Manual demonstrates non-compliance.

CAR 702.81(3) ....... where the Company Operations Manual no longer meets the Commercial Air Service Standards, the operator shall amend its Company Operations Manual.

CAR 702.81(4) ........ Minister shall, where the Commercial Air Standards are met, approve those parts ........................

 

Although you are correct in your statement that your COM has already been approved with regards to Aerial Application, it was approved with error, and does not alleviate the requirement of CAR 702.81(3)..."

 

Our Aerial Application Training Syllabus in the COM was approved as being in accordance with CARs in 2009 by the TTL; our operation has not change significantly, nor have the regulations.

 

Like I said, if you are correct there a much larger issues here.