Minutes of Fall 2014 USA Rules Committee meeting posted on SSA website

I think it's important to meditate on just how much of a problem there is, and therefore how complex our procedures need to be to stop it.

Just how much actual, sustained, undetected, artificial-horizon-enabled, and contest-winning cloud flying is going on in US contests? How much more of it will there be if we abandon the current largely unenforced rules about carrying cell phones or disabling the AH features of flight computers? How much less of it will there be if we dream up some complex verification scheme involving satellite loops and traces?

We're not talking about VFR pilots going up in the wispies. That happens, and banning AH doesn't make a difference. We're talking about the kind of sustained cloud flying that could potentially win a contest. You need to go up at least 2000' in some pretty thick clouds for that to work. Or you need to penetrate the wall of thunderstorm keeping the others from going in to the turnpoint. We're talking about really big, blatant, and monstrously illegal behavior.

My view, is that this sort of thing is rare; if it did start happening we could see it with an informal and case by case review of flight traces; and if so we can afford to lower the boom after the fact.

To Tom's post, it makes perfect sense for a tighter standard at the worlds. People care more, are more willing to do crazy stuff, and it's appropriate to impose greater costs on organizers and teams.

I've been on a kick to simplify rules lately, prompted by the many requests to do so in the polls over the years. This is a good test case of the kind of judgment we all need to make if we want simple rules.

The simple rule says, carry anything you want. Don't cloud fly. If you get caught there will be monstrous unsportsmanlike conduct penalties. If you are carrying, expect a little more careful look at your logs.

The complex rule has a long list of forbidden equipment, a procedure that CDs actually follow to check said equipment, surprise inspections, a complex trace evaluation procedure, and so forth. That is more ironclad, yes. But is ironclad worth it, in the real world of contest flying (not in the infinitesimal probability speculation we do on ras over the winter)?

So, when you ask for the latter, recognize you are asking for a rule book that is longer and denser than the current one. We all need to think whether problems really are problems before fixin' them, and think about the costs of the fix.

John Cochrane