A Sporting NPRM
by Ralph Hood
The FAA has announced a Notice of Proposed Rule Making (NPRM) on one of the more interesting changes in aviation since I've been watching these things. Among other things, the proposed rule would create a Light-Sports aircraft category with a max gross weight of 1,232 pounds, a max speed of 115 knots, and a stall speed of 39 to 44 knots, depending on configuration.
These aircraft could
be flown by pilots with specified minimum training and - here's the shocker
- a drivers license in lieu of a medical certificate! (Yes, Virginia,
there are a lot more details. Go to www.aopa.org or www.eaa.org for more
info.)
I rather expect that the main furor will be over the idea of flying without
an FAA medical. I've thought about this, and I must say that never, in
all of my 61 years (by the time you read this), have I ever been physically
incapacitated to the point where I could not operate an airplane except
- and this is a biggie - on two occasions when I was so sick so far in
advance of the event that I never would have left the ground in the first
place.
In junior high school I fainted once, but I'd been sick for days. A little
over 20 years ago I got food poisoning so bad I probably couldn't have
flown, but I was sick for hours in advance. Other than those two times,
I have never been so ill that I couldn't have flown to a safe landing.
Seems to me that we should ask one big question: Have there been incidents
where sailplane or ultra-light pilots without medicals have become incapacitated
and crashed? If the answer to that question is no (or damned few), I favor
the ruling, and hope it passes.
* * *
Change
of subject…I have ridden the airlines many times since 9/11, and
have found it to be mostly miserable. Not being into pain and indignities,
I am, therefore, flying less and driving more, as is every other business
traveler I know.
One oft-touted solution - or at least an improvement - is a so-called
Trusted Traveler Card. Anyone who wants one could voluntarily submit to
an investigation only slightly less invasive than an application for employment
by the old KGB. Once gained, the card would entitle one to circumnavigate
much of the security imposed on the hoi polloi.
The ACLU and others scream that this would be an abuse of privacy. I can't
follow that line of thought. If the whole thing is voluntary, how can
it be abusive? I want a card, I would volunteer for the investigation.
You don't want a card, don't.
Besides, my privacy is already being abused. In the months since 9/11,
I have been wanded, groped, asked to remove my shoes, and asked to reveal
the backside of my belt buckle and inside the top of my pants. One young
lady asked, straight-faced, if she could, "Touch you there?"
"Sure," I answered, "as long as I can touch you there after
you finish." She declined to participate, but she and the other bored-to-death
staff certainly got a big kick out of it. They were still teasing her
about it when I left.
By the way, I would pay up to $50 for that card. That might be the best
way to finance it. At least it would keep infrequent travelers from getting
it just for the conversation value at a cocktail party.
I say let's allow each individual to decide if it is worth the money.
No doubt there would be much screaming about that, too. The rich, it might
be said, are buying their way around security. Still, letting those who
want it pay for it seems only fair.
