25 Aug 2003

The R22 Chronicles

Part Three:   "The Numbers Game"

From Part Two: The daily mathematics and juggling required to keep the CAA formula up to date became too much for many - mainly because of one important factor - the cattle couldn't count! It was and would not surprise me one bit to find that it is still common for some individuals to put down "1 for 3", that it is - one flight hour for every three hours (or More) flown. How come the CAA (CASA) haven't eliminated this practice? They knew about it didn't they? They certainly did! Do you think that they did anything about it?

Before we look at CAA, CASA (from this point, for ease of writing, I will use CASA as the ID for CAA & CASA) BASI and the dept which absorbed BASI - the ATSB, let's step back a bit and look at accidents, accident rates and introduce the insurance companies.

In part two I mentioned the accident rate was 50:100K hours. What does this mean? Where do these figures come from? Are they accurate?

In Australia, aircraft accidents are required to be reported to the Bureau of Accident & Safety Investigation (BASI - now the Australian Transport Safety Bureau - ATSB).

BASI investigated all accidents for the purposes of accident reduction research and was not a compliance or punitive organisation. As Federal funding dwindled, BASI drastically reduced it's scope of investigation. ATSB appears to be currently operating at reduced scope and interest.

Importantly, for understanding the following paragraphs, BASI published each accident and their findings in their monthly journals and accident reports.

The figure 50:100K means that - according to Federal Govt statistics - for every 100K hours flown there were 50 reported accidents per year.

To look at it another way - if I owned 4 helicopters and they averaged 1000 hours per year, then statistically, 2 would have some sort of accident a year (100K divided by 50 = 1 heli accident every 2000 Hrs. My 4 helis @ 1000 = 4000 per year . 4000 divided by 2000 = 2)

Click here for a chart on reported helicopter accidents 1981 - 1996.

Now comes the crunch! The Government Statistics were regularly collected to give an overview of various aircraft classes of operation.

Most probably the flight hours reported by the airlines would be very accurate.

However, thinking back to Part Two of this article, any helicopter operator who was not recording or logging flight hours would also not be reporting that they were breaking the law to the authorities. Would you?

Fact: we now know that the Federal Government stats are wrong due to incorrect data supplied due to record falsification.

With this knowledge it is easy to conclude that the statistics were wrong and therefore the conclusion that there was a high accident rate may also have been very wrong - but was it?

Some operators simply never reported their accidents. Why should they if no one was hurt? Why make public via the BASI journals that you were operating machines in such a way that a CASA investigation would cover record falsification? It was easier and safer to either fix the machine or park it in a shed somewhere out of sight. It then seemed to the authorities that these people were safe operators!!!

Some operators purchased their machines during the eighties and nineties by utilising hire purchase or lease arrangements. Their repayments for an R22 could even have been as low as 3 or $4K per month. Compulsory Hull and 3rd Party insurance @ a rate of 15% plus a 15% excess plus - in some cases - pro-rated costs on finite life components, plus - again in some cases - an excess for inexperienced mustering pilots meant that the following scenario was sometimes a better option:

It was cheaper and easier to obtain future finance and insurance rather than report some accidents and then find a way to keep up the monthly finance repayments.

On a $150K Hull the insurance premium would have been $22,500 plus other costs which would have come to over $25K - payable in quarterly installments.

As soon as an accident happens, the insurance company requires the whole premium pus the excess etc to be paid up front before the helicopter claim is accepted. If I had an accident in the first 3 months of the insurance policy life, I would have had to find the remainder of the premium ($18,750) plus the excess ($22,500) and any other costs etc.

Not many operators could come up with the immediate $41,250 - it was easier to forget it for the moment, not report the accident, keep paying the $4k per month to the bank and buy some time to try and find a way out of the mess. Even if the operator eventually defaulted to the bank, the accident wasn't reported and the bank had no need to as it wasn't affected.

From all the above we could conclude that not only was record falsification happening but also Federal Government Reporting Regulations were ignored. Maybe the accident rate was really 50:100K - we will never know due to the rorts.

Click Here for a PDF copy of a report I sent to an Insurance Co on the success of the AeroStar Aviation Robinson R22 Pilot Safety Course.

The insurance companies were one of the few agencies who had any idea of what was actually happening in the industry. They knew of the falsifications, yet I am unaware of any underwriter pursuing this with CASA.

The insurance and helicopter sales game has also had its fair share of rogues.

Imagine the thoughts racing through the minds of the aviation orientated persons who were sharing an evening dining out with me on the waterfront at Caloundra when we heard a prominent Sydney sales person in the R22 industry - who hadn't recognised us - talking on his mobile phone telling a client how to make a false report to an underwriter if the client had an accident while undertaking an mustering ops without a mustering rating.

Remember Part Two and the letters sent to the Authorities? There is a kiddies game called "Pass the Parcel". The Authorities' have their own version - I call it "Pass the responsibility".

Here is the hard evidence that the authorities knew what was going on:

Click Here  to go to a page containing the communications to the Government - you will be amazed. I feel in my heart that they sure managed to kill and maim a few people by avoiding responsibility.

The widespread introduction of the Robinson R22 after 1985 ramped up the whole process. Record falsification, rorts, all that we have seen so far accelerated and became the norm for many.

Click here for Part Four: "Robinson arrival"