Australia is the worst. Not only do you have to comply with performing all airworthiness directives but you also have to perform all service bulletins.
Which if you’re not into flying planes - an air worthiness directive is like a recall - “hey we found this problem with this seatbelt randomly unlatching - you are not allowed to fly until you take it to the dealer to get swapped”. Which is fine and I don’t have a problem with that for non-experimental aircraft.
A regular service bulletin on the other hand is like - “hey we upgraded the seats on the 2020 Honda Accord to premium vegan leather. If you drive a 2018 Honda Accord you need to swap out the seats for the 2020 model. Even if you just swapped out the seats for the regular 2019 vegan leather model 6 months ago.”
Makes private aircraft ownership prohibitive for all but commercial operations. In the US one does not need to perform service bulletins but as a rule they’re good to track.
>Not only do you have to comply with performing all airworthiness directives but you also have to perform all service bulletins.
Again, just not true.
CASA is more aggressive than most other countries with maintenance requirements - their name (Civil Aviation Safety Authority) gives it away, their mandate is to increase safety and cost doesn't appear to factor into many of their decisions. I'm not defending that, but there is no requirement to apply all SB's.
The particular gripe 99% of people are upset about is covered well by Mike Busch:
Thank you for clarifying. Requiring all SIB’s, alert SB’s, but not all other SB’s is both better and worse than I imagined. Better in that this is less of a problem for new aircraft but worse as this is the quickest way to kill your general aviation community by targeting the guys in Cessnas and Beechcraft.
The recent part 149 fiasco [1] can only be justified by self serving behavior - in effect not allowing the general aviation community to self administer medicals but allowing CASA staff to do so (in effect making themselves exempt) doesn’t sound like the actions of an organization which stands for Safety. Between the two I can’t see it anything but a compromised, self-dealing institution.
Thank you for clarifying. Requiring all SIB’s, alert SB’s, but not all other SB’s is both better and worse than I imagined. Better in that this is less of a problem for new aircraft but worse as this is the quickest way to kill your general aviation community by targeting the guys in Cessnas and Beechcraft.
The recent part 149 fiasco [1] can only be justified by self serving behavior - in effect allowing CASA staff to self administer medicals but not extending the same privilege to the general aviation community. Between the two I can’t see it anything but a compromised institution.
I am not a pilot, but I am an Australian living in Australia and know some folk who own aircraft.
CASA doesn’t mention ”service bulletins” but does have a category called Airworthiness Bulletins and states:
* An Airworthiness Bulletin is an advisory document that alerts, educates and makes recommendations about airworthiness matters. Recommendations in these bulletins are not mandatory.*
A browsed some of the actual airworthiness directives and didn’t see anything about seat leather or such.
CASA issued its own supplemental AD’s based on foreign AD’s AND SB’s.
At the minimum looks like all alert service bulletins in addition to most non-alert sb’s. The chap I spoke to may have been technically incorrect with the all bit. If you learn differently I would love to know. I was incredulous when he told me but he insisted it was true and went on to say (in less polite terms) the current CASA leadership happened to be particularly aggressive in “looking like they were doing something.”
As it stands, even this level is still tremendously onerous for private non-commercial operations by reclassifying every alert SB as a CASA AD and then requiring official CASA inspection. Rent-seeking comes to mind.
I've been curious how airspace between countries is handled in GA, especially with city-states like Singapore or Hong Kong.
Can one freely file a plan that crosses to Malaysia or China without landing there? Does it require visas or special permits?
Otherwise there is not much where one can go besides the ocean, especially with those busy airports occupying much of the airspace that’s left over land.
In Western law, intent is important, but Chinese culture uses strict liability. They don't accept excuses like, "Oops, my engine failed and that's why my plane hit the apt. building."
Over Singapore, you're not allowed to overfly buildings, so you have to fly along rivers or marshes.
For international flights, you're treated like an airline.
US, Australia and Canada have a GA culture, but most countries cater only to airlines, and tolerate flight training for airlines.
> Chinese culture uses strict liability. They don't accept excuses
Daily life in mainland China or South Korea gives such a different impression. “Oops, I was late/bored/tired/on the phone and that’s why I drove on a red light.”
Now, Hong Kong does accurately match your description.
