Deliberate overloading of topdressing planes alleged

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32563, 24 March 1971, Page 3

Deliberate overloading of topdressing planes alleged

(New Zealand Press Association) AUCKLAND, March 23. Pilot safety in the New Zealand aerial topdressing industry has been immovably locked to the economics of the industry and to company profits, said the secretary of the Agricultural Pilots’ Association, (Mr J. A. Houlton) today at the Committee of Inquiry into Aviation.

Too often questions raised by topdressing pilots concerning their safety during topdressing had been answered by the attitude that improvements would “cost money and therefore couldn’t be done,” he said.

The chairman of the committee is Mr R. K. Davison, Q.C., and the members are Messrs A. C. Williams and W. J. Mygind. Mr Houlton said the pilots’ association had been formed because of the excessively high accident rate in topdressing and the “total lack of attention to the real causes of accidents.” The association in no way questioned the integrity of the Civil Aviation Division’s Chief Inspector of Air Accidents (Mr E. F. Harvie). Yesterday Mr Harvie revealed that human error was behind 60 per cent of all topdressing accidents. The association believed,

however, that the real cause of many accidents was hidden, and that the inspector’s reports were made over a narrow spectrum. “NO WEIGHING” • From the early days of topdressing in New Zealand financial success had been tied to a deliberate overloading of aircraft. Trucks were consistently check-weighed, but this was never done on topdressing machines. As overloading had been ignored by the Civil Aviation authorities

over the years, the financial , and economic basis of the . industry was wrongly placed, , said Mr Houlton. i Price-cutting and competi- ■ tion within the industry per- ’ petuated intentional overload- , ing, he said. The Fletcher aircraft, which came into service during the mid-19505, carried the greatest overload. Initially the Fletcher had been designed to carry 15cwt of topdressing, with a 300 h.p. engine. This engine did not become available, however,

until about two year? ago, and the same payload was carried on a smaller engine. Somewhere along the line, Civil Aviation had authorised the overloading, but the dptails of how Uiis was done had been “shrouded in mystery,” Mr Houlton said. CLIMB RATE

Today, aircraft were still being overloaded. With larger ' hoppers now available, and ' granulated phosphates, excessive loads could and were being carried. Because overloading had apparently been legalised, the association tried to get a mandatory rate of climb established for aircraft —many topdressing planes were flying at full throttle near the ground, so some reserve was necessary for emergencies. While Civil Aviation regulations insisted oh minimum climb rates during take-off, they did not include “en route” flying. The association had sought installation of equipment in hoppers to limit loads, but “this was another saga of high hopes and good intentions being buried after ’ three years of time and effort,” said Mr Houlton. Load limitation would prevent employers “leaning” on pilots to overload machines, and would stop employers pricing jobs on overload. Topdressing aircraft now did not have to have the same ' number of instruments installed as other aircraft. If more instruments, including some of those which he described as basic, were fitted the accident rate could be lower. ' A topdressing pilot told the committee that at times his aircraft was overloaded by 20001 b. The pilot, Mr W. M. ' Sanderson, of Masterton, told . Mr Davison that he had personal experience of overload- ; ing on all the aircraft he had flown since joinning the topdressing industry in 1950. Asked why topdressing planes were overloaded he ; said: “On our wage structure we get a percentage of the turnover as a flying bonus. If you don’t keep loads well up you are flying for nothing.” The overloading was 'deli-

berate and not just inefficient loading. Mr Sanderson said he thought pilot flying hours should be regulated. “Until five or six years ago I was against any restrictions being put on flying hours.. Now I think differently. 11 think if the Civil Aviation; Division had done something; about it and given the fool pilot some protection against himself we would have been better off.” Pilots in his company were lucky and got Sundays off. "Others work 16 hours a day, seven days a week up to a month at a time,” he said. He thought younger pilots should be protected against themselves.