More on Spot

I've blogged on the Spot before, as have others. Since my last post there has been more from Kevin Psutka at COPA. Basically every thing that looked so reasonable about the proposed ELT regulation has been washed away. US pilots take note, the proposed regulation will require you to install a 406 ELT before venturing into Canadian airspace. What impact this will have on our tourist economy I do not know, but on top of high gas prices and the dollar, it can't be good.

However, this is only a proposed regulation. As Kevin advises, if you have issues with the proposal, let Transport Canada know. Kevin tells you how.

Lastly, there is also an article about Spot at InterGovWorld.Com.

406 ELT Eh?

If you are a member of the Canadian Owners and Pilots Association (COPA) you have probably already read Kevin Psutka's large and detailed article on ELT options for Canada. If you aren't you can, and should, read it on the web site in English or French. The article is full of links to other sources of information, including SPOT a potential alternative to a costly TSO C126 installation, that I first read about at Information Echo in this article. If nothing else you should have a look at the presentation of results.

I would like to thank Kevin and the COPA staff for this work on our behalf. If you are a Canadian Owner or Pilot and aren't a member of COPA, think very seriously about joining.

Canadian SARTECHs

It is amazing what you can find once you know it exits. I have the full resolution version of the video below. Just for fun I thought I would see if it was on YouTube (isn't everything?). Sure enough it has been there for a while, enjoy.



While I was looking around I also found this one that shows other Canadian Forces air operations, so I threw it in as well.

Three Year Old Girl Rescued from Plane Crash in B.C.

Canada.com, The Globe and Mail and Canoe.ca all have substantial stories of three year old Kate rescued from a Cessna 172 that went down near Golden British Columbia. A fortunate combination of forethought and luck joined forces to bring some good news from a tragic accident. A passing plane, listening to the emergency frequency, picked up the ELT signal. An ongoing search in the area placed SAR resources near at hand. Young Kate was strapped into a child car seat. Sadly, the two other occupants did not survive.

Radar Loss of Separation Alerts, ELTs and Smoke Alarms

How are these things related? Well the simple answer is that they could save your life. An other answer is that they are all complex technologies which aim to solve pernicious problems by alerting humans to danger. They also share a property with all complex technologies, bugs. Bugs in an alerting system lead to two types of false alarms:

• False negatives, where a real problem goes undetected, or unreported by the technology.
• False positives, where an alert is issued when there is no problem.

False negatives lead to law suits and so get prompt (in the broadest sense of the word) attention from regulators and manufacturers. False positives are often seen as an inconvenience that can be most effectively dealt with by the human when alerted. Unfortunately humans usually have a direct response when face with a high rate of false positive alerts.

The tech that cried wolf

When smoke detectors first became available they had a very high false alarm rate. Often residents would solve the problem by disabling the smoke detector with predictable and unfortunate loss of life. However legally mandated installation in residential buildings created a huge market. Competing suppliers drove improvements to the technology that has brought the false positive rate down to a very low level.

Aircraft ELTs (Emergency Locator Transmitter, which Search and Rescue can use to find missing aircraft) come in three flavours by TSO designator (the Technical Service Order or TSO is one of the ways equipment can get approval for use in an aircraft, and is required for ELTs); C-91, C-91A and C-126. Due to a whole bunch of history that I won't go into, the C-91 and C-91A units were (in my personal opinion) never properly engineered to do the job. This has lead to a staggering number of false positives, and an appalling though not widely reported number of false negatives. While the aviation community was wrestling with the limitations of C-91/C-91A units, the maritime community was adopting the Category I and II EPIRB which would later be imported into aviation as the C-126 or 406MHz ELT. Through some creative and dogged pursuit of their mandate the aviation SAR community has never given in to the temptation to ignore this particular boy crying wolf. But the system has. Citing the better performance of the 406MHz technology, and the high cost of maintaining the 121.5MHz COSPAS/SARSAT packages processing of the 121.5MHz signal will cease 1 February 2009. If you read enough material on the subject you will also encounter references to the high false alert problem.

So why not just buy a C-126 ELT? This is a very complex issue. If you are involved in general aviation this is something you should educate yourself on and decide for yourself what to do.

Lastly, in the aftermath of a mid-air collision over La Mesa California Feb 8, 2006 it appears that controllers have displayed the same human frailty as early smoke detector owners. I am glad to see that at least some attention was given to fixing the false alerts. If the response is only to require controllers to forward alerts to pilots as the technology issues them, it would only move the problem from controllers (who are all professionals, current and experienced in assessing the traffic threat, of whom we can expect more) to pilots (who may only fly recreationally, be inexperienced in dealing with high traffic volume and the technology quirks, and finally just as able to fall into the trap of ignoring the boy who cried wolf).

If we want safe homes and safe airspace we need to deal as proactively and diligently with false positive alerts as we would with accident investigation reports. Replace the cranky smoke detector and give it fresh batteries, check ELTs after landing or servicing the airplane, be vocal when safety technology promotes more annoyance than safety.

Finding a SAR Plane

While reading Cockpit Conversation this weekend I learned about the selection of the new Canadian fixed wing search and rescue airplane (FWSAR). I'm glad Aviatrix has her finger on the pulse of the nation because I don't seem to have the time to read everything I need to, let alone want to. Leaving aside the political fur ball over the contract I think they picked the right aircraft for the following reasons:

• The C-27J sports military style glazing in the cockpit, where as the C-295 has a more transport category windscreen. When the mission includes prowling around at 500ft AGL in less than ideal weather surrounded by hills or mountains, the more glass and less aluminium around the pilots the better.
• The Spartan shares engines, propeller and avionics with the C-130J which can greatly simplify servicing, maintenance, training and operations.
• SAR pallets can be moved between the C-130J and the C-27J without reconfiguration. While the plan seems to call for all current SAR Hercs to be replaced with the new FWSAR, the ability to move SAR crews and their equipment rapidly to the larger aircraft should the need arise is a big advantage.

And of course it has an in flight operable ramp which is essential for loading, unloading and deployment of SARTECHs and their equipment, and many other elements of SAR operational doctrine. The C-27J also has larger side doors than either the C-295 or the C-130J. While this is good for dropping troops it may be a slight disadvantage for a SAR aircraft. Current SAR configured CC130s replace the rear side doors with a plexiglass window attached to a pedestal mounted swivel/slide chair. For searching the spotter can position the chair very close to the window facing outboard. From this position the spotter can easily view from horizon to nadir. If you haven't seen a C-130 side door, imagine a 737 passenger boarding door replaced with a plexiglass wall. Now imagine your seat is positioned so that your knees are in contact with the plexiglass. There aren't very many better positions for a spotter engaged in search. At 700ft AGL and 130kts it provides a riveting view. It would be nice if the existing doors could be moved from the C-130s to the C-27Js but I don't imagine it would be difficult or expensive to have such a window manufactured for the Spartan.

The final judges will of course be the SARTECHs and their flight crews. They truly are heroes and deserve whatever they need to their job effectively and safely. I hope they like their new kit.

See also The Hunt for Affordable & Effective SAR by Peter Pigott and Replacing the Buffalo in Canadian Defence Review.