Deisel

Yes, I saw that after this one.

I agree that transparency is a must. But there is something to be said about protection of the individual being subjected to a disciplinary hearing. Some things should be probably should be handled in private. Perhaps we should give the accused the option of making their case public. But at any rate, pontification in cyberspace doesn't actually do anything. Maybe you should put together a motion and present it at the next BOD meeting that outlines exactly how matters of personal privacy and transparency should be handled in the future.

My friend, I have no earthly idea what you're talking about. And I don't buy into conspiracy theories. If you have proof of something - then show me the money. Otherwise, you're wasting all of our time with conjecture.

One thing I'd add is that this is a motion, not a final decision. I'm not a legal beagle, but I'm pretty sure that a judge has to sign the last word in the case, not the plaintiffs lawyer. So I wouldn't expect USPA to hand over a dime until ordered to do so and after exhausting all options.

My friend, I have no earthly idea what you're talking about. And I don't buy into conspiracy theories. If you have proof of something - then show me the money. Otherwise, you're wasting all of our time with conjecture.

Well the next BOD meeting is at the end of the month, so I guess we'll see where it stands. Not sure that the FAA is completely done with this yet though.

AOPA, who has a much stronger database, has the rate of private student pilot completion at less that 20%. They track this information much more closely than USPA as it's required by law since 9-11. I'd assume that we're in a similar situation. The FAA maintains the data on their website for all to see.

As I make plans to attend the upcoming symposium (with a brand new rigger's ticket in my pocket) I'm trying to decide which briefings to attend. A couple stand out as 'musts' like Bill Booth's presentation and Ron Bell's fatality summary, along with the reserve packing master classes. Just wondering if there were any recommendations on what other talks would be good to sit in on. Also, are there gear deals to be had at this event? I've only been once before and that was years ago in Florida. Don't remember if there was much gear selling happening.

What stood out to me was the 500 training jumps. Then doing the equivalent motorcycle training. Then putting it all together until it was right. To me, that's what 'doing it the right way' looks like. I wonder how many practice runs Team Red Bull made before they put airplanes into the deck.

My TC man crush gets bigger with every movie. Cannot wait for this one.

Good questions which I don't know the answer to. I had assumed that they were FAA employees and that the students being tested were covering the travel expenses. I'll shoot a note to the aero clubs and ask for a clarification.

That's interesting. I've been learning to fly in Germany and Japan over the last 3 years. They both have well established procedures for FAA examiners to regularly come out to conduct check rides in the local area. Covid travel restrictions prevented me from doing a check ride because the examiners have been prohibited from coming out. I would have assumed that the same procedures apply to DPREs.

Raeford (aka Paraclete)

I recently used a PCS move as an excuse to throw out a couple years with of back issues. Had to lighten the load and stop moving boxes of old mags around the world.

I would disagree with the permanent video records. Some things just don't age well. And under the current system, the candidate gets to elect to use video or not. It's highly recommended, but not required. This is because the candidate pays all costs. And the video can never be used to lower the score, only increase it. Anyone can pick apart a skydive in a slow motion review and find discrepancies all day. We currently depend on the eyeball of the examiner on the jump to provide the initial feedback of go/no-go. So all of that would have to change to implement your suggestion. I do however like having an outside examiner as an independent reviewer. Not sure how that would work other than situations where there's a disagreement about the scoring. It wouldn't be practical for every jump of a course. Again, this would increase costs to the candidate to hire a secondary or tertiary examiner. And whatever we can do to avoid cost increases would be a positive. Also, recommend that the mods edit the topic of this thread.