Is the 200ft below Min Finish Height Rule Working?

On Tuesday, January 21, 2014 12:46:33 PM UTC-6, Luke Szczepaniak wrote:
A hard deck in a 4 mile radius doesn't resolve the issue, only moves the
problem further away from the airport. The only solution is a hard deck
throughout the task area - but wait... what about mountain sites, that's
OK, we will come up with a separate rule for that when we get there .

Cheers,

Luke


PS: I am not advocating a hard deck throughout the task area.. I am
just trying to demonstrate what happens when we move the responsibility
of flight safety from the PIC to the RC...



I don't want to start this pointless argument, but let's at least get the facts straight.

A hard deck sits over the valley floor. Mountains stick out. A hard deck is defined by SUA files, so varying valley floor is not a problem. There is no technical problem in using hard deck for mountain sites. Yes, the hard deck does nothing about crashing in to mountains or low thermaling over ridges. You'll have to do some PIC work.

A hard deck does the opposite of "move the responsibility of flight safety from the PIC to the RC." Under current rules, when you're at 500 feet, the RC says loudly "come on, thermal away, we give you hundreds of points if you pull it off." Under a hard deck, at 500 feet the RC says "we are not going to bias your decision either way. Thermal out, land, do what's safest. You are PIC. You get the same points no matter what you do."

How you can possibly construe this to be taking "responsibility for flight safety" is beyond me. Think just a little bit.

Again, I do not want to start a hard deck war. Pilots have spoken, and do not want it. But let us not pass around pure silliness on the subject. A hard deck is straightforward to implement in ridge and mountain sites. A hard deck does not tell the pilot what to do, it merely removes the current big point bonus for one decision.

Choose not to have a hard deck because you like winning and losing races at 300 feet, not because of false facts and rumors.

John Cochrane