Canada's Transportation Safety Board is recommending a process be established to update pilot medical requirements following a 2021 crash that may have been related to the pilot suffering a heart attack. The board has issued a recommendation to Transport Canada to ensure the handbook for Civil Aviation Medical Examiners (CAME) "contains the most effective screening tools for assessing medical conditions such as cardiovascular health issues."
Cool video and nice landing but only a steady max 15KT crosswind, evidenced by birds flying normal tracks and a steady windsock 30 seconds in the video. Optical illusion due to cameral angle as evidenced by touchdown in seemingly heavy crab but the aircraft not changing angle when tracking straight down the centerline after touchdown. But nice video nevertherless.
Despite the negative remarks of an uneventful cross wind landing, the sight of a beluga (whale with wings) landing in cross winds is amazing. I’m sure these pilots stick to the poh of never exceeding cross wind limits. Tires and landing gear suffers as side loads build up to maximum limits while transferring these loads into the airframe.
The camera angle and long lens definitely makes it hard to see the real angle, but I think it might be more than you think. Before touchdown, we can see the right side of the aircraft. After touchdown, we’re looking at the left side. The nose probably has to swing something like 20 degrees for that to happen. Assuming a landing speed on the order of 120 knots, that would mean the crosswind component is more like 40KT.
If it had been a tire-popping, side-load bending, smoke pouring off the runway: it would clearly have been a major crosswind and the pilot was way above his head.
If it’s a picking-up-rubber, butterfly with sore feet landing…no crosswind to speak of and any 10hr Cessna pilot could have done it.
Could be. Interesting point. I remember learning a lot from watching the autopilot fly ILS approaches providing a demonstration of perfect technique from localizer intercept to DH. Seems like autopilot autolands could do the same for landings.
Sounds like the AeroMed folks in OKC are now running C eh N eh D eh aviation now, too. Eight crashes in 20 years and they want very expensive med testing to do what … ground them all? So do these same people drive cars and RV’s?
Eight crashes in 20 years that might have had cardiovascular issues as a contributing factor. Cardiovascular issues that might have been detected by expensive screening.
Holy crap! I feel sorry for our Brothers and Sisters up North. I presume the cost of those tests is on them as well? Hopefully the FAA has their ears turned off…
Except that, in Canada, blood tests requested by a doctor are covered by the provincial health insurance system. There are only a few tests that have to be paid for out of pocket, and they can be reimbursed by most, if not all, private health insurance policies - which most, if not all, Canadian pilots enjoy as a job benefit.
There is therefore no cost to someone who goes to a lab with a requisition signed by a doctor for a draw for blood lipids tests.
It’s one of the benefits of a universal healthcare system - so perhaps the American correspondents here could base their comments on the excellent Canadian system rather than the politically-charged, partisan attitude to healthcare prevalent in the US.
Indiscriminately testing people who have no signs or symptoms of disease is guaranteed to generate many falsely positive test results (quite possibly more than true positive test results, especially if “positive” is is a person who will crash a plane due to a heart condition).
It is well-established among clinicians and epidemiologists that such testing is poor clinical practice - it leads to additional testing (in follow-up of the false positive) that is potentially risky with no chance of benefit.
Only an angiogram will tell you what is actually happening. A nuclear stress test will hint at it. A blood screening only tells you that you have high cholesterol. That in itself doesn’t indicate you are absolutely at risk. Lots of folks have high cholesterol naturally. I was a runner, normal cholesterol levels, felt fine, had a current class 2. I did feel a slight discomfort for a while when running. It would go away. I finally mentioned it to my family doctor.l He said just go to a cardiologist and get a stress test. I went. Hadn’t felt the discomfort for several months. But he said it could have been angina and only an angiogram would tell for sure. Did one through my wrist. After it was completed he said, “you need at least a triple bypass. You are 90% blocked and due to fall over dead at any time.” The angiogram is the only way to actually know if you are eligible for a sudden heart attack. The blood work only tells you that you might want to eat a healthier diet.
You didn’t mention your age, but a middle-age or older man with elevated cholesterol who has chest pain while engaging in aerobic exercise that goes away at rest has angina (most, but not all, angina is cardiac in origin) and is “eligible” for a heart attack. The angiogram is the definitive evaluation that demonstrates blockages of coronary arteries and whether bypass or angioplasty is likely to be an effective treatment.
In the first paragraph of AvWeb’s reporting, the figure of 33,000 pilots refers not to all Canadian pilots, but rather - as made clear in the CTSB report - those who hold Category 1 medical certificates (required to exercise commercial pilot and ATP privileges, and similar to the FAA Class 1 and 2 medicals).
Also, the CTSB report concludes with a single recommendation: that Transport Canada “establish a framework for routine review and improvement to the Handbook for Civil Aviation Medical Examiners to ensure it contains the most effective screening tools for assessing medical conditions such as cardiovascular health issues”.
I appreciate AvWeb including links to source material in its reporting.
My wife and I are paying about $1000 a month for medical insurance. I’d be pretty happy with even a $10,000 annual tax increase if it meant having medical care available as a public service - but since countries with national systems generally have lower per capita medical costs than we do, that’s unlikely. Public medical services are some of the most popular things our peer countries provide, and practically nobody envies our “you bet your house” medical system, with bankruptcy looming if you get seriously ill.