Flight Safety Information January 2, 2015 - No. 002 In This Issue France sends search experts to jet crash scene Specialists join AirAsia jet search, more bodies recovered AirAsia Pilot's Final Request Was Met by Two-Minute Radio Delay Too Many Pilots Can't Handle An Emergency PH aviation safety standards (Philippines) Airbus A320-200 Safety Record: AirAsia Flight 8501 Plane Model Involved In 54 Incidents Beef up global aircraft tracking systems PRISM TO HELP PREPARE FOR E-IOSA Plane 'blown off' Stornoway Airport runway Female Fighter Pilots Taking Off in the IAF (Israel) FAA authorizes drone use for mosquito control in the Keys ERAU NextGen 101 Seminar - Washington, D.C. Upcoming Events France sends search experts to jet crash scene Jan 2 (Reuters) - France's BEA crash investigation agency said a specialist black box search team and equipment arrived on Friday at the search area for the Indonesia AirAsia flight which crashed on Sunday en route from Indonesia to Singapore. The agency said a ship carrying two hydrophones, or underwater listening devices, was bound for the suspected crash site with French, Singaporean and Indonesian experts on board. Investigators hope the black boxes will reveal the sequence of events both in the cockpit and the jet's systems, but safety experts stress it is too early to say what caused the crash. The BEA assists in investigation of any air crash involving an Airbus aircraft because the company is France-based. It is also seen as specialised in underwater searches after leading a two-year search for an Air France jet that crashed in the Atlantic in 2009. Heavy seas have stopped divers reaching the possible wreck of the AirAsia Indonesia jet off Borneo. Although bad weather was again hampering search efforts on Friday, the operation is seen unlikely to stretch the limits of technology in the same way as the deep-water search for Air France 447 or the fruitless search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, which disappeared last year. Given the relatively shallow depth of 50 metres (165 feet) at which the Indonesia Air Asia wreckage is believed to be located, experts say finding the boxes should not be difficult as long as the beacons - with a range of 2,000 to 3,000 metres (6,560-9,840 feet) - are working. Commercial aircraft carry two black boxes, one for flight data and the other for cockpit recordings. Each is equipped with a beacon or "pinger" able to emit signals for at least 30 days - which in practice can be closer to 40, according to manufacturers. Regulators ordered the minimum transmission time to be increased to 90 days after Air France 447, but this does not take effect until 2018. Black boxes from a Kenya Airways jet that crashed off Ivory Coast in 2000 in 50 metres of water were recovered intact. At such depths, investigators prefer to carry out acoustic searches with hydrophones, such as those that arrived on Friday, for as long as the pingers are supposed to be working. They are seen as more effective than alternative methods such as sonars, magnetometers or video, according to a blueprint drawn up by the BEA after the AF447 disaster. But how quickly investigators can zero in remains sensitive to a slew of factors from the water's salinity to its temperature to noise from machinery and marine life. http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/01/02/indonesia-airplane-airbus-group- idUSL6N0UH0JG20150102 Back to Top Specialists join AirAsia jet search, more bodies recovered A specialist multinational team armed with acoustic equipment will arrive at the suspected crash site of a sunken AirAsia jet off Borneo on Friday, bolstering the search for the plane's black box flight recorders. Bad weather has hampered the search, keeping divers from looking for the wreck of the Airbus A320-200, which was carrying 162 people when it crashed on Sunday en route from the Indonesian city of Surabaya to Singapore. France's BEA crash investigation agency said late Thursday a ship with two hydrophones, or underwater acoustic detection devices, was due to arrive at the scene early on Friday with French, Singaporean and Indonesian experts aboard. The Indonesian-led search for the wreck of Flight QZ8501 is centred in the northern Java Sea, close to the Karimata Strait, where search teams have recovered bodies and pieces of the plane. Previous reports of a sonar image showing the plane body in the water have not been confirmed, officials said. Officials earlier said it may take up to a week to find the black boxes, which investigators hope will reveal the sequence of events in the cockpit and in the heavily computerized jet's systems. The BEA team attends the crashes of all Airbus planes. Even in bad weather, the search for the AirAsia jet is unlikely to be as technologically challenging as the two-year search for an Air France jet that crashed into deep Atlantic waters in 2009 or the so far fruitless search for Malaysian Flight 370 which disappeared last year. Given Flight QZ8501 crashed in shallow seas, experts say finding the boxes should not be difficult if the beacons, with a range of 2,000 to 3,000 metres (6,560 to 9,800 ft), are working. Tatang Kurniadim, the head of Indonesia's National Committee for Transportation Safety, said late Thursday that rescuers would use five ping locators - two from Indonesia, two from Singapore and one from Britain - once bad weather had eased and the waters had calmed as expected within five days. International experts equipped with sophisticated acoustic detection devices joined search teams scouring the sea off Borneo on Friday in the hunt for the black box flight recorders from a crashed Indonesia AirAsia passenger jet. Bad weather has hampered the search, keeping divers from looking for the wreck of the Airbus A320-200, which went down on Sunday en route from Indonesia's second-biggest city Surabaya to Singapore with 162 people on board. The Indonesian-led search for the wreck of Flight QZ8501 is centred in the northern Java Sea, close to the Karimata Strait, where 10 bodies and pieces of the broken-up plane have been recovered. No survivors have been found. "With the increasing amount of evidence and data, it's very likely we're getting closer to the fuselage of the AirAsia aircraft, based on what has been detected by sea vessels," Supriadi, operations director of the Indonesian search and rescue agency, told reporters. Previous reports of a sonar image showing the plane body in the water have not been confirmed, officials said. Two ships carrying hydrophones, or underwater listening devices, left the southern Borneo port of Pangkalan Bun on Friday, Indonesian officials said. Aboard one vessel were experts from France's BEA accident investigation agency, which attends the crashes of all Airbus planes, although officials were unsure if the weather would allow the sensitive hydrophones to be deployed. Search and rescue official Supriadi, who like many Indonesians uses just one name, said it was raining at the suspected crash site on Friday morning, with waves 3-4 metres (10-13 feet) high and wind speeds of 30-40 knots. Stall Theory The cause of the crash - the first suffered by the AirAsia group since the budget operator began flying in 2002 - is so far unexplained. Investigators are working on a theory that the plane stalled as it climbed steeply to avoid a storm about 40 minutes into a flight that should have lasted two hours. Officers arrive via helicopter on the Indonesian Navy vessel KRI Bung Tomo as it takes part in search operations on January 1, 2015 for victims and debris from AirAsia flight QZ8501. Officials earlier said it may take up to a week to find the black boxes, which investigators hope will unravel the sequence of events in the cockpit during the doomed jet's final minutes. Even in bad weather, however, the search for the AirAsia plane is far less technically challenging than the two-year search for an Air France jet that crashed into deep Atlantic waters in 2009, or the so far fruitless hunt for Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 that disappeared last year. Given Flight QZ8501 crashed in shallow seas, experts say finding the boxes should not be difficult if its locator beacons, with a range of 2,000 to 3,000 metres (6,560 to 9,800 ft) and a battery life of around 30 days, are working. So far, 10 bodies have been recovered from waters near the suspected crash site, search and rescue agency head Soelistyo said, along with debris such as a suitcase, an emergency slide and a life jacket. The bodies are being taken in numbered coffins to Surabaya, where relatives of the victims, most of whom were Indonesian, have gathered. Authorities have been collecting DNA from relatives to help identify the bodies. Relatives, many of whom collapsed in grief when they saw the first television pictures of the plane debris on Tuesday, held prayer vigils at Surabaya airport. "Unbelievably" steep climb The plane was travelling at 32,000 ft (9,753 metres) and had asked to climb to 38,000 ft to avoid bad weather just before contact was lost. When air traffic controllers granted permission to fly at 34,000 ft a few minutes later, they received no response. A source close to the investigation said radar data appeared to show the aircraft made an "unbelievably" steep climb before it crashed, possibly pushing it beyond the A320's limits. "It appears to be beyond the performance envelope of the aircraft," he said. The source, who declined to be identified, said more information was needed to come to a firm conclusion. Online discussion among pilots has centred on unconfirmed secondary radar data from Malaysia that suggested the aircraft was climbing at a speed of 353 knots, about 100 knots too slow, and that it might have stalled. The Indonesian captain, a former air force fighter pilot, had 6,100 flying hours on the A320 and the plane last underwent maintenance in mid-November, according to Indonesia AirAsia, which is 49 percent owned by Malaysia-based AirAsia. Three airline disasters involving Malaysian-affiliated carriers in less than a year have dented confidence in the country's aviation industry and spooked travellers. Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 disappeared in March en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 passengers and crew and has not been found. On July 17, the same airline's Flight MH17 was shot down over Ukraine, killing all 298 people on board. On board Flight QZ8501 were 155 Indonesians, three South Koreans, and one person each from Singapore, Malaysia and Britain. The co-pilot was French. http://www.cnbc.com/id/102305041 Back to Top AirAsia Pilot's Final Request Was Met by Two-Minute Radio Delay Indonesian soldiers carry coffins containing victims of the AirAsia flight QZ8501 crash at the Indonesian Air Force AirAsia Recovery Slowed by Weather as Divers Deployed It took about two minutes for air-traffic control to respond to AirAsia Bhd. (AIRA)'s ill-fated Flight 8501 when the pilot requested permission to fly higher, according to Indonesia's air navigation operator. In the final communication from the plane, one of the pilots asked to climb 38,000 feet, said Wisnu Darjono, director at AirNav Indonesia, citing a transcript of the conversation from the National Transport Safety Committee. Air traffic control authorized the plane to ascend only to 34,000 feet about two minutes later, after which contact was lost, Darjono said. Accuweather.com data shows there were storms along the path of the plane, which Indonesia's air transport director has said was flying at 32,000 feet (9,800 meters.) There were six planes at different altitudes passing in the area at the time, which contributed to the delayed response, according to AirNav. Air-traffic control "couldn't immediately give permission to fly at 38,000 feet because checks needed to be made to see if there were other planes nearby," Darjono said in a phone interview. The "pilot didn't reply." Radar data appeared to show that AirAsia made an unbelievably steep climb before it crashed, possibly pushing it beyond the plane's limits, Reuters reported, citing an unidentified person familiar with the probe's initial findings. As divers seek to find the plane's black boxes, those final minutes may provide crucial clues as to what caused the Airbus Group NV (AIR) A320 plane to crash on Dec. 28 with 162 people on board into the ocean near Pangkalan Bun, about 600 miles southeast of Singapore. Rescuers started pulling bodies and debris from the water yesterday. Pilots' Hands AirNav can't publish the transcript, as only the National Transport Safety Committee has the authority to do so, Darjono said. He declined to provide further details from the transcript. Two minutes to answer a pilot's request for permission to elevate is not necessarily unusual, depending on how much traffic a controller is watching, said Bill Parrot, a retired airline pilot and associate professor of aviation at Lewis University in Romeoville, Illinois. In some busy markets, such as Chicago, a controller may be monitoring up to eight frequencies at once, he said. "There is a point of time when a sense of urgency really is in the hands of a pilot," he said. "If a pilot declares an emergency, they can do pretty much whatever they want to do." Rough Weather Rough weather was hampering the search today. "The weather's terrible: It's monsoonal and there's quite a bit of wave height," said Robert Mann, head of aviation consultant R.W. Mann & Co. in Port Washington, New York. "You just don't have visibility and you don't have a stable platform to work from." The recovery effort will involve salvaging large pieces of th31e plane, engines, landing gear and other wreckage requiring heavy-duty lifting capability. "It's not an easy task," Mann said. Losing the AirAsia plane caps the worst year for air-passenger fatalities since 2010. The AirAsia pilots didn't send a distress signal, drawing comparisons with Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, which went missing in March en route to Beijing from Kuala Lumpur. The hunt continues for that plane, the longest search for a passenger jet in modern aviation history. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-12-31/pilot-s-final-request-was-met-by-two-minute- radio-silence.html Back to Top Too Many Pilots Can't Handle An Emergency If The Missing AirAsia Plane Crashed, 2014 Was One Of The Deadliest Years In Aviation In Almost A Decade AirAsia Flight To Singapore Disappears With 162 On Board An AirAsia Plane Is Missing And Thought To Have Crashed Near An Island In Indonesia We now know that AirAsia flight QZ8501 crashed. And while we cannot be absolutely certain why it did so, the recent history of aviation disasters, which I have studied as a safety analyst for the last three decades, gives us a very good idea. Over the past 20 years, 1,800 airline passengers and crew have been killed because pilots simply lost control of their aircraft. Loss of control in-flight, not caused by any structural or technical problem, has become established as the aviation accident category responsible for more passenger deaths than any other. Back in the Seventies and earlier, airliners used to crash far more often than today, but for different reasons. Engineering and design then were less advanced, so technical failures of the engines, airframes, or the pilots' instruments (avionics) were far more common, and the aircraft themselves were more difficult to fly. But in those days, loss of control by the pilots of a sound aircraft hardly ever featured. The US Federal Aviation Administration has spent five years examining why perfectly airworthy planes now just fall out of the sky. The FAA's John Hickey explained the rationale behind the research: "An evolution has occurred in that pilots, with their training, have become somewhat incompatible with the way airplanes are built and designed today. When we look at accidents over the last 10 years there is a common theme in the US and globally. There is a fundamental misunderstanding going on between man and machine. We have to fix that." The FAA's study, published last year, was called The Operational Use of Flight Path Management Systems. That rather turgid title refers to the computers that manage today's autopilots. The pilots have to manage the computers. Pilots touch the traditional flight controls only for a couple of minutes in every flight, and spend much of their time programming and monitoring the FMS - the flight management system. The FMS is their main computer interface with the aircraft, and directs its flight via the autopilot. The FMS flies and navigates the aircraft more accurately and smoothly than a pilot could, and hardly ever fails. The pilots learn to trust it. The FAA sums up the difference between the Seventies and now: "Managing the flight path of an aircraft is a basic pilot responsibility, but the means for accomplishing it have evolved considerably." In other words, pilots used to fly by brawn and brain. Now they do it by computer, with the brawn and brain as a backup. That, at least, is the theory. In practice most pilots have not been trained for the modern piloting task. Regulations regarding what they must regularly practise - by law - are way out of date. A few airlines are voluntarily adopting evidence-based training - tailored to pilot needs rather than out-of-date regulations - but only a few. Not that pilots can be completely replaced by automation. This is because only one in 10 flights is completed as originally planned; as events change, so pilots are able to mitigate the risks. The FAA working group established that today's pilots have a number of "vulnerabilities". The prime one is that if the automatics fail, the pilots are no longer practised in managing without them. This leads pilots to lose confidence in their own traditional flying abilities, so when things go wrong they have a tendency to try to restore failed automatic systems when, in fact, they should be flying the aircraft to keep it safe. Now back to the AirAsia accident. Control was lost shortly after the pilots requested clearance to climb and alter course to avoid storms. This has not been the only such fatal crash recently: three others have taken place under remarkably similar circumstances. On July 24 this year an Air Algerie flight over West Africa also went missing shortly after the pilots reported changing course to avoid storms in their path. About two days later the wreckage was found in desert in Mali. In June 2009 an Air France Airbus A330 - flight AF447 - was lost on a Rio de Janeiro-Paris route over the South Atlantic. The pilots were manoeuvring to avoid storm clouds at the time. The aircraft's "black boxes" were eventually recovered, revealing that the pilots had been confused by a momentary loss of airspeed information. The autopilot relinquished control to the pilots, but they quickly lost control of the aircraft. The icing that had temporarily blocked the external airspeed sensors was related to the storms close by. In another weather-related loss in August 2005, a West Caribbean Airways Boeing MD-80 flying from Panama City to Martinique went out of control while the pilots were discussing how to deal with engine icing the aircraft seemed to be suffering in high-level cloud. The crew told air-traffic control that the plane could not maintain altitude. The stall warning - telling the pilots the aircraft was flying too slowly to generate lift - operated during the descent, which took just 210 seconds from cruise at 33,000ft to impact with the ground. In all three cases there was nothing wrong with the aircraft that would have prevented the pilots retaining control if they had been practised at operating without the automatics. But they were not. The loss of the AirAsia A320 and all 162 people on board may well add to this sad catalogue of avoidable accidents. David Learmount is operations and safety editor for Flightglobal http://www.businessinsider.com/too-many-pilots-cant-handle-an-emergency-2014- 12#ixzz3Nf4XDmMR Back to Top PH aviation safety standards (Philippines) The latest aviation disaster off the coast of Indonesia serves as a reminder to Philippine authorities to be more vigilant on air travel risks. It may also be the time to improve air regulations further and modernize ground equipment to make them at par with international standards. Indonesia AirAsia's Flight QZ8501, an Airbus A320-200 carrying 162 people, crashed into the sea Sunday en route from Surabaya in Indonesia's east Java to Singapore, after losing contact with air traffic controllers during bad weather. Air travel poses many risks, but some of these can be minimized by competent ground personnel in touch with the pilots and with modern airport facilities. The US Federal Aviation Authority on April last year restored the Philippines to category 1 aviation safety status after downgrading it to category 1 in January 2008. The US imposed the blacklist four years ago after the Philippines failed to comply with international safety standards. Regaining the category 1 status, however, does not fully guarantee that the Philippine aviation sector has fully met the minimum international standards compared with other countries with modern airport facilities. The Philippines, unfortunately, has one of the worst airport facilities in Asia alone. Its airport runways, while they can accommodate wide-bodied jets, are comparatively restrictive and the main cause of air traffic. Air terminals are cramped and not of international standards. The weather, too, contributes to the perils of air travel. The civil aviation authority, meanwhile, needs more trained personnel to direct air traffic and efficiently conduct inspection procedures. Aviation authorities must double their efforts in provincial airports, where the infrastructure and facilities are lacking. The expanding local air travel industry will be one of the drivers of economic growth in the Philippines. Aviation authorities will have their hands full with increased air traffic and the acquisition of more planes by local carriers in the coming years. The government should actively respond to the challenge to make air travel safer and avoid aviation disasters. http://manilastandardtoday.com/2015/01/02/ph-aviation-safety-standards/ Back to Top Airbus A320-200 Safety Record: AirAsia Flight 8501 Plane Model Involved In 54 Incidents An Indonesia AirAsia Airbus A320-200 passenger jet prepares to land at Sukarno-Hatta airport in Tangerang on the outskirts of Jakarta in this file photograph taken Jan. 30, 2013. Reuters/Enny Nuraheni/Files The kind of plane involved in the case of the disappeared Indonesia AirAsia Flight 8501 has been involved in 54 flight incidents -- 11 associated with fatalities -- since Airbus Group NV gave the aircraft its debut in 1988, according to a database maintained by the Flight Safety Foundation. The missing AirAsia plane, aka QZ8501, is an Airbus A320-200, a model that has been flown some 85 million times since its first flight, the France-based aerospace company said. The Airbus model hasn't crashed in six years, and has a "formidably good" safety record when putting the amount of incidents in perspective with the millions of flights flown on the aircraft, the Independent said. Maybe the best way to assess the Airbus A320-200's safety record is to weigh it against the Boeing 737-400, its main competitor, which also entered service in 1988. Since then, the Boeing 737-400 has had 29 flight incidents -- eight associated with fatalities -- according to the Flight Safety Foundation database. Airbus said in a statement it shipped the A320-200 to Indonesia AirAsia in 2008 and that the plane that went missing Sunday had accumulated about 23,000 flight hours and logged 13,600 flights. The plane is a twin-engine, single-aisle aircraft that seats as many as 180 passengers. Indonesia AirAsia Flight 8501 took off from Surabaya, Indonesia, and was bound for Singapore. It was carrying 162 people when it lost contact with air-traffic control Sunday at 6:24 a.m. local time (Saturday at 6:24 p.m. EST). The plane was flying over the Java Sea and has yet to be located. Bad weather and nighttime skies led to a suspension in the search for the missing aircraft. If the plane were found to have crashed with fatalities, it would mark the first time AirAsia has had a fatal crash. For the Airbus A320-200, it would be the 12th fatal incident. The last fatal crash of an Airbus A320-200 was in connection with a test flight at Perpignan Airport in France in 2008. Everybody on board -- five passengers and two crew members -- was killed when the pilot lost control during the landing in what was the sixth-worst accident involving the Airbus model, according to the Flight Safety Foundation database. "AirAsia has had a good safety record," Greg Waldron, the Asia managing editor for Flightglobal, an airline industry publication, told the Wall Street Journal. "Indonesia's safety record has been on the blemish due to some previous incidents, but AirAsia is a very well-run carrier and [Indonesia AirAsia] has escaped safety issues so far." http://www.ibtimes.com/airbus-a320-200-safety-record-airasia-flight-8501-plane-model- involved-54-incidents-1768248 Back to Top Beef up global aircraft tracking systems: Editorial Mourners hold a vigil for victims of the AirAsia flight QZ8501 crash in Surabaya, Indonesia on Dec. 31. When AirAsia Flight 8501 dropped off the radar screens and out of the sky this past week in the busy air corridor between Indonesia and Singapore it took searchers three days to locate the first signs of debris. At one point they faced the daunting prospect of having to scour 10,000 square nautical miles to find the wreckage. And nine months after Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 vanished over the southern Indian Ocean, searchers have narrowed their hunt down from 118,000 square miles, but still haven't located the aircraft. They may never find it. These tragedies are hugely different. Flight 370 may have been a hijacking by the pilot or someone else who switched off the transponder; Flight 8501 went down during a fierce storm. But both raise the same urgent question: given the $25 billion in profits airlines are expected to make this coming year, how can a modern passenger jet crash in our tightly connected world, leaving rescuers guessing at its location? The technology exists for aircraft to stream tamper-proof data about their speed, altitude and position from the sky. As the Star has urged before, the airline industry should adopt it as a matter of course. Speedy location of downed aircraft can save lives, recover bodies, avoid the huge costs of long searches and salvage the black boxes that contain information on what went wrong, and why. "Public trust and confidence in aviation is at risk when a large and modern aircraft cannot be located," a cross-industry task force set up by the International Air Transport Association rightly observed in a Nov. 11 report. Yet the industry has been slow to react, citing costs, the potential data overload from 100,000 flights a day worldwide, the rarity of crashes and other issues. The Aircraft Tracking Task Force tried to identify gaps in tracking capabilities, but reported that "the picture is not as complete as had originally been anticipated." While aircraft flying through busy airspace are closely tracked by radar and other systems, crews often simply report in from remote or oceanic areas. And although many aircraft transmit automatic signals giving their location via Automatic Dependent Surveillance - Contract technology or an Aircraft Communications Addressing and Reporting System, "many aircraft operating beyond the range of Air Traffic Service surveillance systems are not equipped with ADS-C or, in some cases, ACARS," the task force found. Moreover, it will be several years before space-based Automatic Dependent Surveillance - Broadcast technology is available. Given the industry's uneven standards, the task force felt compelled to urge the adoption of basic "performance criteria" that carriers should meet by year's end. Airlines should have a tracking system that pinpoints a plane within one nautical mile "at least" every 15 minutes, and more often if trouble arises. And "long term," the industry should consider preventing pilots from switching off transponders and similar gear. Well and good. But routine live-streaming of all key data should be the standard. Regulators should insist on it. And sooner, not later. http://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorials/ Back to Top Back to Top Plane 'blown off' Stornoway Airport runway Plane at Stornoway Airport Two passengers have suffered minor injuries after a plane came off the runway at Stornoway Airport on the Isle of Lewis. The Loganair service was due to fly to Glasgow at about 08:30. It is thought it may have been caught in strong crosswinds. All those on board were taken off the aircraft. Stornoway Airport said an investigation into the incident was under way. One passenger who was on board told the BBC it felt as if the tail was caught by a crosswind. Plane at Stornoway Airport A statement from the airport operators said: "An outbound aircraft Saab 340 aircraft operated by Loganair veered off the runway at Stornoway Airport at 8.33am this morning. "Efforts to remove the aircraft from the runway are ongoing and investigations into the cause of the incident are under way. "It is it our intention to resume normal operations as soon as the aircraft is safely removed from the runway. There are no scheduled arrivals or departures at Stornoway until later this afternoon." http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-30655967 Back to Top Female Fighter Pilots Taking Off in the IAF (Israel) "And she said, I will surely go with you; however the journey that you take shall not be for your honor; for the Lord shall sell Sisera into the hand of a woman." (Judges 4:9) The cadets of IAF Pilot Course 169 receive their pilot wings. (Photo: IAF) It has been two decades since Alice Miller took her case to the Supreme Court of Israel and demanded that females be allowed to become fighter pilots in the Israeli Air Force. Since that fateful day, 38 women have completed the rigorous course to become a pilot, making up just ten percent of those who begin the course. The newest member of that illustrious team graduated her IAF training course this past December. According to the Israeli military magazine BaMachane, 31 of those women are still serving in the IDF in active duty, while another five are in active reserves. Of the last graduating class of pilots, women represented seven percent of the total graduating class. During the recent IAF graduation, the Air Force held exercises for the 169th pilot's training program. 400 recruits began the course, which was completed by 37 pilots. Of the graduates, seven will fly helicopters, three are fighter pilots, 16 are navigators for fighter pilots, six will pilot cargo planes, three are navigators for cargo planes, and three are standby pilots. 85 percent of the graduates will serve in mandatory service and 15 percent are in the reserves. One of the graduating female pilots is also religiously observant. "It's not every day that you see a young women clad in a long khaki skirt marching alongside the elite of the Israel's military echelon," wrote Ynet. "However, those completing Israel's infamously grueling pilot IAF training program are an unusual bunch, handpicked out of thousands who vied for a spot in the lucrative program, and 'Yael' (not her real name) is no different." Captain Tamar Ariel (Photo: IAF) Yael is the second religious fighter pilot to have graduated the course. The first religious female pilot to graduate was Tamar Ariel, who died in a recent catastrophe while touring in Nepal. Both women are part of an illustrious history of trailblazing women who have achieved accolades in the Israeli military dating back to the pre-state militias who allowed female pilots. Until 1996, the training program was closed to women. Alice Miller then took the IAF to the Supreme Court and forced them to allow her to participate in the program. While the success rate among male trainees who participate in the program is higher (according to Air Force, data 20 percent pass the course as opposed to only four percent of females who succeed in passing), the women are no less counted upon when going into action. Both Yael and Tamar join the elite few who have decided to give their all for their country. http://www.breakingisraelnews.com/26861/female-fighter-pilots-taking-off-in-the-iaf- idf/#YUrex5QHQJ8Cduxb.99 Back to Top FAA authorizes drone use for mosquito control in the Keys KEY WEST, Fla. (AP) - The Florida Keys Mosquito Control District plans to use two drones to search for standing water in remote spots. The Key West Citizen reports (http://bit.ly/1rFHePw ) that it's the first time the Federal Aviation Administration has authorized drones for mosquito control in the U.S. The district's executive director, Michael Doyle, says the drones only will fly between Sugarloaf and Key Largo to avoid coming with 5 miles of the airports in Key West and Miami. Doyle said the district is concerned about a proposed Key West ordinance that would ban all drones within city limits unless an owner has permission from the FAA to fly a drone. Doyle says that ordinance doesn't address the potential risk of drones colliding with district helicopters that can fly low over the ground. http://www.seattlepi.com/news/article/FAA-authorizes-drone-use-for-mosquito-control-in- 5989793.php Back to Top ERAU NextGen 101 Seminar - Washington, D.C. "The Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University-Worldwide Office of Professional Education is pleased to announce a two-day seminar entitled NextGen 101. The course is designed to identify the key concepts, attributes, and challenges of the Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen). Government and industry employees with an interest in NextGen, aviation stakeholders and members of the military transitioning to a career in civilian education should attend. The course will take place in Washington D.C. on April 21-22, 2015. Course fee is $750 per person or $675 per person with five or more people registering from the same group. For more information and to register, please visit us online at http://proed.erau.edu/programs/specialized-industry-training/nextgen-101- seminar/index.html" Back to Top Upcoming Events: IS-BAO Workshop Information and Registration 13 - 14 Jan. 2015 Baltimore, MD USA https://www.regonline.com/CalendarNET/EventCalendar.aspx?EventID=1592658&view=Month A3IR CON 2015 January 16-17, 2015 Phoenix, AZ http://commons.erau.edu/aircon/2015/ Air Charter Safety Foundation (ACSF) NTSB Training Center, Ashburn, VA March 10-11, 2015 www.acsf.aero/symposium ERAU NextGen 101 Seminar April 21-22, 2015. Washington D.C. http://proed.erau.edu/programs/specialized-industry-training/nextgen-101- seminar/index.html FAA Helicopter Safety Effort three-day safety forum April 21-23, 2015 Hurst, Texas eugene.trainor@faa.gov www.faahelisafety.org Curt Lewis