lacloudchaser(at)yahoo.co
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 Posted: Thu Apr 20, 2006 8:31 am Post subject: new RPA directors and news on ACM, RedStar Magazine, etc. |
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Folks,
Congrats to the new regional board of directors elected by members this month, they are:
Gordon Witter, South West Region (exceedingly close race with Dave King!)
Joe Giffith, North West Region
Terry Slawinski, South Central Region (exceedingly close race with Scott McMillian)
Shane Golden, South East Region
Dan Fortin, North East Region
The North Central Regional election remains open for the about a week as there is a tie vote between Russ Witt-Dycus and David Mills. If your in the NC region and have not voted, head to "Governance-Elections" on the web.
In line with the 2005 By-Laws posted on the website under Governance, 3 Nationally elected directors for the board opens in about a week, candidates are:
Alex Harwick
Barry Hancock
Jim Goolsby
Byron Fox
Dave King
Rob Mortara
Terry Calloway
Kevin Campbell
These folks will review old policy, set new policy, and I hope work as a team to see all programs forward on behalf of owners and members.
++++ RPA NEWS ++++++++++++++++
Events:
Events Section on the web is now being totally recoded by Mr Waites. Mr Waites is the talented coder who has recently redesigned the navigation of the assoc site and created such services as "aircraft sales". "Event Registration" now has a stand alone link on the home page and he is developing a graphical interface to locate events, simplifying the no-fee registration form, and adding excellent back end administration tools for the event organizer - the end result is organizers will be able to edit their events, cancel them and download excell lists if attendees.
Advertising the association:
We are in final negotiations with Trade a Plane to advertise the association to folks shopping for a warbird or aircraft.
SunnFun 2006:
Congrats, RedStar was the largest warbird display group on the block from day one - and "RedStar" was finally used as the call sign by the airboss. McGirts RV and the house were exceptional digs. I had a debrief call with the airboss last week, Wayne (who will also airboss oshkosh) wanted to let everyone know how professional Redstar was and in particuliar, the formation element that aborted their takeoff when [wild bill] had to make a quick return to land he wanted to say thanks, their quick and by the book reaction, clearing his runway he felt really avoided a possible issue that day - great job guys whoever you were. I asked Wayne to insure RedStar has a lower block altitude for Oshkosh, he said he will cycle us down to the lowest block - let's hold him to that agreement and show up in mass.
Formation:
At SunnFun this year I pounded the idea of our FAST pilots knowing the rules and regs of flying in waivered airspace, showlines, min distances, critical wingman and the impact this has on accurate dress and interval. Part of this desire is the energy we are expending towards the redstar mass formation program to put more of our pilots in the airshows as they desire. Please note we are working on the next version of the RPA Formation Manual that includes a chapter on this subject, we realize this is an area of RPA formation training we can include, and should, for the airshow formation interested. Applicable chapters (49/50) of FAA 8700 has been under the process of rewrite by the FAA for some time, we heard of pending changes at ICAS 2003 and hear rumbling of this today. The association should take on the responsability of getting the latest information to members on this and incorporating critical information in to it's training program and we will.
Sponsors and their impact on your services: Directories, Tech Bulletins, etc...
We are bringing on several minor and some major sponsors. As you know, anything this association does is "labor intensive", sponsors allow us to execute programs that otherwise we struggle to find the man hours to accomplish. I, and I know you, would really like to see more direct mailed services and tools that help the owner, a directory of updated vendors and members directories (really vital when you break down going cross country) and a system to mass mail quickly tech bulletins (which must come from you the members). We have a website and ecoms to get things to you efficiently in an electronic environment, but having the capability to fund fulfillment services to get them to you in paper form is an end goal as well. All of these services will be made possible by the success of the RPAs sponsorship drive. If you have suggestions please email admin(at)flyredstar.org (admin(at)flyredstar.org) or Stephen Fox, our sponsorship chairman.
ACM/BFM:
Someone mentioned why the Assoc. no longer supports ACM training, another mentioned the association should stay out of it and stick to ownership issues. Folks, the assoc has never had a formal training program and I have followed the associations history, and inspected it's documents, since its "club" inception in 1993. The association does not restrict owners on what flight activities they indulge in. The Associations current position, based on a board of director vote, is focusing it's energy in such areas as improving the formation training program, expanding event support, fielding a members magazine, determing ways to pay for expanded fulfillment services, etc. I attended the NWOC in Florida this year and was exposed to the current climate concerning ACM and warbirds among signatories and the FAA, I later met for a face to face with one of our largest insurance underwriters (not the broker) to gain a clear understanding of where they stand (more later). What you do as an individual is no concern for your association, however, what the RPA does as your pilots association may impact every owner - and the board of directors is doing what they responsably believe is the right thing to support everyones ownership in this community. And as you know, our insurance brokers who represent the underwriters are also members and fin. sponsors of the association and we appreciate that support. Our events are public gatherings, they are not conducted in secret - what your association does is there for the world to see. The reason the RPA does not ramp up an ACM training program, which again, the association at large has never done, is for several reasons: 1) Your basic formation program as it now sits is not designed to prepare pilots for that activity - it is not as comprehensive as US military flight school basic to advanced formation training and the program would need to be flushed out to give the basic skill set training first (email me and I will give you more specifics) - to do otherwise would be putting the cart before the horse as an association wide effort. I hope you can understand that fielding an advanced training program like this for the association would not be focused at the few civilian pilots who have read "Air Combat" cover to cover twice, but would be open to all members and must be designed for all. We are expanding the formation training program and making it more comprehnsive, but that labor intensive effort is not designed to prepare folks for "dog fighting", its to make our members better, safer and more capable formation pilots 2) The underwriter has made it very clear that if this association hosts ACM training clinics and you approach them to include dog fighting on your policy, they will apparently refuse to cover such activity. If your association did it anyways (yes, said one thing to protect your insurance coverage and did another thing...), and there was an issue, then we all have an integrity issue to deal with - the association may lose a sponsor, and you may certainly loose your policy (will they fight you to not cover your loss, medical bills or whatever because they became aware that the event you attended was a publically advertised "dog fighting clinic" - who's to say, probably more economical to cover the loss than a court fight - lawyers aren't getting any cheaper), and would the underwriters would think about applying a premium on all Yak and CJ owners insurance policies for this perceived "high risk" community, would this effect our current insurance boker-sponsors that help bring needed services asked for by the majority of owners - would the RedStar Magazine be cancelled or heavily scaled back for all members as we have to work to find other ways to generate the capitol to pay for it's projected $9000 production bill - or raise everyones dues to something like $70-90 a year (by the way, sponsorship does not drive the decisions, but we might as well factor in all negaitves and positives to a decision). I'm sure that the majority of RPA members, and we are working on a member wide questionnair, would appreciate it if the association does not help, in any way, of landing their aircraft in the boresights of the FAA mandated inspection programs that were covered in such gruesome detail for the T-34 and T-6 at NWOC this year. And as I said, the association has no ACM program ready and its current formation program does not address the subject or prepare the aviators for that program. So for many reasons, training, insurance, FAA, manpower, volunteer manhours, money, etc -the last board and the new board will have to carefully consider the positives and negatives for all owners, of taking on such an effort for a segment of those owners. And as I mentioned, what I do in my CJ I'm partnering in here in Florida is up to me, the association has no governing power over what I do with it. Things may change in the future, and ultimately it's up to the voice of the majority of owner-members and a board vote. In 1994 the club put out a questionnaire that refected that a vast majority wanted to learn formation training - the result of that was thousands of manhours of labor were expended to get us from there to here. That process is not complete. I am putting together a questionnaire for us now, this will help the new board understand which programs are most valued/desired by members....
I'm sure there is plenty of response about ACM, email me off list if you have a burning comment or opinion for me please, otherwise I may miss the list.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
Fly often - fly safe folks,
Drew
Drew A. Blahnick
RPA President
305.803.9158
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