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Safety Meeting in Colorado April 12


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Due to recent mid-airs in Colorado some of us have organized a safety meeting to discuss issues concerning our air spaces and the differences in fixed wing and helo operations. If you are near and can come please do.. our goal is to have these on a regular basis.

 

Thanks,

 

dp

 

 

 

IMPORTANT

PLEASE PLAN ON ATTENDING!!

You Are Invited To An Open Forum To Discuss Possible New Collision Avoidance Procedures And Guidelines That The GA Community Can Mutually Create And Adopt To Improve The Safety Margin In The Aviation Practice Area Bounded By LMO, EIK, BJC, And BDU.

When: Thursday, April 12th, 2012 At 7 PM

Where: Colorado Heli-Ops (BJC)

11844 Corporate Way

Broomfield (at the base of the rotating beacon)

303-466-4354

Moderated By: Andy Munnis, Denver-Area Designated Pilot Examiner

Hosted By: Dennis Pierce, Owner, Colorado Heli-Ops (BJC)

Who’s Invited: Everyone!...From Brand New Student Pilots, To Chief Flight Instructors, To Renter Pilots…All The Way To FAA Inspectors. If You Have An Interest In The GA Community And You Have An Opinion On How We Can Make This Very Congested Airspace Safer, We Want To Hear From You.

 

---Pizza And Soda Provided For All---

--RSVP To Heli-Ops or Andy (303-870-3970) So We Have Enough Pizza--

---NOT Affiliated With Any Flight School Or Business---

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  • 4 weeks later...

The meeting was awesome at Heli-Ops last week with over 130 pilots attending. If you are in the area and are interested please pm me your email address so i can put you on the list for future meetings. Here is the latest update!

 

 

Hi everybody !!

 

Thanks so much for attending our first Airspace Safety Meeting at Colorado Heli-Ops this past Month. We feel it was a great success with over 130 people attending from GA pilots, to commercial operators. To name a few; Two helicopter EMS companies were there, Seven Flight schools (FW & RW), many private aircraft owners, the Tower at KBJC was represented, Boulder Airport was there, Front Range and Centennial airport were represented, Folks from Longmont airport, Glider folks, Paraglider pilots, Aerobatic pilots, the list goes on and on.. I will run down a quick overview of what we talked about and what progress we have made so far after the meeting. We think this has been a long time coming and are very excited about keeping all of these folks meeting on a regular basis to further communication about safety. We sincerely hope to see you and all of your friends at our next meeting Thursday, May 17th at 7pm back at Heli-Ops. I have also included minutes from the meeting as an attachment (please keep in mind that these are a rough draft and we'll get the proofed final out to you asap). Heli-Ops team is also working on a video of the whole meeting as we had two video cameras going throughout..

 

Andy opened the meeting with a powerpoint about the airspaces and our general ideas about how to proceed with this focus group.

 

Andy's main ideas here are to continue to heighten awareness and communication between all of the area pilots/operators. Many of the operators don't know what areas the other schools and or pilots are using for practice areas or what frequencies they are using to communicate.. meetings and communications like these could help a ton.

 

One of the ideas was to develop a website to offer locals and transients a place to go for current information about airspaces, frequencies and such. Many folks in the group offered to help and I met with Connor Duchen this past Sunday to discuss how to proceed on this project and we made some really good progress. We will keep you informed as the website comes together. On that subject; we need a name for the group and for the website, so if you have any ideas please bring them to the next meeting and/or respond to this email.

 

One of the names we came up with (yet none stuck so far): CASA-Colorado Airspace Safety Association (or Organization) CASO. We thought about North Metro Safety Asso, but didn't want to limit it to only a portion of Colorado.. so, let us know if you have better ideas.

 

One of my team pointed out that a group in California has done something similar, here is the link to their website, please take a look at it and let us know your ideas on how to emulate their program.

 

http://www.scauwg.org/

 

You might also just do a search for similar websites for more ideas.. we need all the help and input we can get on this.

 

After Andy spoke about general ideas and focuses he discussed his concerns as a DPE and Local Pilot about the airspaces and how busy they have become.

 

 

I spoke after that and was surprised to see how many folks raised their hand to my question: 'how many people in here have had a near miss' .. seems that everyone in the room had. I was also shocked to find that some are flying in our busy airspace with no radios and no communication..

 

Then Robbie Moon from McAir Aviation spoke about local flight statistics and current practice areas for fixed wing training areas. He had some really good info that was eyeopening to say the least.

 

After Robbie Andy Gold from the Control tower at KBJC spoke with a powerpoint about their prospective, he mentioned a few times that they are here for us, to help us be as safe as possible and that they welcomed any and all interaction with area pilots and operators.

 

The fifth speaker was an aerobatic pilot from the Longmont area and he enlightened the group on local procedures and areas for the local groups of aerobatic fliers..

 

All in all it was a great group and i feel we got a lot accomplished.. most importantly, just getting everyone in the same spot at the same time discussing safety !!! Yes we realize that we have a long way to go and a lot to learn.. but it's a great start. Thank YOU!!

 

 

I will be working on setting up a Constant Contact News Letter program for this project so we can get the info out on an organized regular basis.

 

Andy and his team are working on Maps and more power point presentations for the future meetings that will also be added to the website.

 

Connor and i are working on the website and will keep you updated on that.

 

We will most likely need sponsors for the upkeep of the website and printing hand outs and such, so if you have contacts that would consider pitching in please let us know. The last meeting cost Andy and I almost $600 so there is that as well.. any help would be appreciated.

 

Here is a link to some photos from the meeting on our facebook page (with comments).

 

https://www.facebook...29809710&type=1

 

Here is a link to all of the photos on my photobucket account.

 

http://s298.photobuc...fety%20Meeting/

 

 

Thanks for your time and sincere efforts in being a part of the solution...

 

respectfully,

 

 

 

 

dp

Subject: Next Safety Meeting

 

You are invited to our second open forum to further discuss possible new

collision avoidance procedures and guidelines that the GA community can

mutually create and adopt to improve the safety margin in the aviation

practice areas bounded by LMO, EIK, BJC and BDU.

 

When: Thursday, May 17th, 2012 at 7pm

 

Where: Colorado Heli-Ops (BJC)

 

11844 Corporate Way

 

Broomfield (at the base of the rotating beacon by Stevens)

 

Phone: 303-466-4354

 

http://www.coloradoheliops.com/

 

 

The meeting will be moderated by Andy Munnis, Denver-Area Designated Pilot

Examiner. Andy will talk about collision Avoidance Procedures.

 

Tim Head from Boulder Airport will talk about the airspace in his areas and may have some other operators present.

 

It will be Hosted by Dennis Pierce, Owner, Colorado Heli-Ops (BJC)

 

Our first meeting was May 12th and was a huge success with a turnout of over

130 pilots from our area.

 

 

Who's invited: Everyone !!! From brand new pilots in training To Chief

flight instructors, renter pilots, business owners, all the way to FAA

inspectors. If you have interest in being a part of the solution and have

an opinion on how we can make the very congested airspace safer, we want to

hear from you.

 

RSVP to Heli-Ops or Andy

 

We are NOT affiliated with any flight school or business... This is about

YOU!!

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Being that I have not been there for 24 hours now, I think it is time to offer some input!

 

Get your FAASTeam PM to attend and put together a "Wings" SPANS event for future presentations both in and out of the area. It can then be put into the "Wings" resource library and offered nationally. I understand that you are working on an immediate safety issue in the listed area but Collision Avoidance concerns and practices are a concern for all of us as pilots.

 

I discussed applied techniques that were used during my recent flight last Saturday in that specific area during ground school Monday evening.

 

Fly Safe,

 

Mike

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  • 2 weeks later...

Here is an article about our efforts, the next meeting is May 17th at 7pm at Heli-Ops. If you can attend we would appreciate your participation. If you would like to get on the mailing list for more information you can email me at dp@coloradoheliops.com

 

thanks,

 

 

http://www.bcbr.com/databank.asp?djoPage=article_details&djoId=62830

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  • 2 weeks later...

This is the composite area traffic map that Robbie Moon developed for our Safety Meeting. Please get this out to as many local folks as you can. Most are surprised to find how many aircraft there are flying in this immediate area. I encourage you to do the same in the area that you fly in..

 

 

Sorry about the link, i didn't know how to convert it to a jpeg.

 

Our next meeting is tomorrow night (thurs 17th at 7pm) at Heli-Ops.

 

The folks from Boulder Airport will be speaking.

 

Here is a link for Wings credit:

 

http://www.faasafety.gov/SPANS/event_details.aspx?eid=44367

 

We hope you can make it..

 

dp

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Thanks JD...

 

Here is the latest:

 

 

Great time at the Airspace Safety Meeting last nite at Heli-Ops. This just keeps getting better as we get organized and bring in more speakers/operators. Andy opened with a recap of last months meeting and some suggestions on collision avoidance, he talked about a midair that took place a few years ago with a friend of his and both aircraft landed safely, it was very enlightening. The FAA was there and spoke about upcoming chart changes that were brought about by this effort and how our input is valuable to this process. The ‘Boulder Group’ was there; Tim Head the Airport Manager, and operators from the Fixed wing folks, Glider operators, Paragliders/Hang gliders, and the Parachute Operator from KBDU. It was awesome to get detailed input on all of their operations.. it was clear to see how many folk’s eyes were opened to the amount of activity in and around that airspace. i cannot stress how important this stuff is to our area pilots.. we had one 9K hour pilot that has flown in this airspace for 25 years say that he couldn’t believe how valuable this information is to him, that he learned things that he never knew in all his hours flying here.

 

One of the best parts of this is that all of the operators are here talking about safety, they are not ‘selling their wares’ or talking about the other operators, they are simply working together to get better.. it’s refreshing.

 

We had 82 people attend and Rotor & Fixed for Charity provided pizza for us all. They are a nonprofit that is focused on bringing Aviation to our local young folks. Check out their website to learn more. www.raffc.org

 

You can see all of this on the website soon, two of our Heli-Ops crew created a video of the last meeting and it’s great. We also videoed last night so we’ll get one put together on that meeting as well. Then you can forward them to people you know that are interested in being a part of this safety solution.

 

One of the most profound questions that came up last night was ‘where are all of the students?’... a very good question. Hopefully we can get more folks to attend. There were also NO other helicopter operators from our area present even tho they were all invited.. not sure why they don’t attend, this is for everyone’s safety, you’d think that they would want to be a part of that. Hopefully we can reach out to them via the website and videos. If you are reading this and think that you don't need to know this information you are PART OF THE PROBLEM... just saying.

 

Many thanks to everyone that helped and contributed to this event, our next meeting is June 17th, please add it to your schedule.. we’ll keep you updated on the time and place.

 

IF YOU ARE READING THIS AND YOU ARE SOMEWHERE ELSE... DO THIS!!!

 

 

Photos on fb:

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.427862380566569.101992.168764329809710&type=1

 

for those of you that don’t fb:

http://s298.photobucket.com/albums/mm243/RkyMtnHI2/Safety%20Meeting%202/

 

We will have videos of the meetings up asap...

 

sincerely,

 

dp

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Awesome job DP! In the San Francisco Bay area it is very busy. So much so, flight following is almost mandatory. Local ATC/TRACON almost go so far as to beg you to take it.

 

Welcome back….. As a co-OAK-FASSTeam member, whatdoyasay we spearhead the mother of all helicopter safety seminars here in the BA???? Maybe, the model of the nation given the historical significance of the region…. Not to mention the proximity of the Antique Examiner….

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DP,

 

I agree, it is puzzling why the other operators did not attend. Because you are at the fore front on these issues proves that you have a better program. I hope people take this into account when looking for a school to attend. If not I guess that will minimize my competition, fixing these safety issues should not be the wave of the future, it is how things should have always been. People who choose to ignore these issues are a danger to all of us, especially if they train their students to be oblivious. Change is inevitable, embrace it or go against it your fate is in your own hands.

That is just my opinion, and what I have heard repeated multiple times from the veteran pilots. I am not a member of the CHO team, and I am not trying to advertise or promote them. I genuinely like their vision, approach, and involvement in the industry, that is focused on bettering not only their students , but the entire community/industry.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Thanks GM!

 

The next Airspace Safety Meeting will be thursday the 14th of June at 7pm at Heli-Ops. Here is the Agenda:

 

 

AGENDA

 

7pm Opening: Dennis Pierce Colorado Heli-Ops

 

7:15 Recap of previous meetings and Collision Avoidance: Andy Munnis local DPE

 

8:00 Michael Shannon (Aspen Flying Club)

 

8:30 Rocky Mountain Flight School (School general practices)

 

9:00 Closing and questions

 

If anyone out there wants to add something to this agenda give me a call at Heli-Ops! 303.466.4354

 

 

 

It looks like we'll have some folks from KEIK (Erie) there talking about their airport as well and we expect there will be a discussion about helicopter ground resonance.

 

We have the website working but are finishing up on some tweaks, we have the video of the first meeting finished with imbedded power points but the FAA needs to see it before we post it since they spoke, we'll get them all up asap for those that can't attend.

 

If you are flying in our airspace we encourage you to attend. If you are flying in a busy airspace somewhere else we encourage you to do this.. it has been an eyeopener for all.

 

sincerely,

 

dp

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hi Folks,

 

Sorry for the late reminder, we are flying pipeline this month and have been really busy.

 

The third Airspace Safety Meeting will be tonight at Heli-Ops. Folks from KAPA, FAA, BCJ and others will speak.

 

We will have pizza and drinks.

 

Starts at 7pm at our hangar.

 

dp

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  • 1 month later...

Hey All,

 

I am so very sorry for the late notice, i have just been covered up due to contracts and utility work. Hopefully things are almost normal now and i can get back to communicating on a regular basis.

 

The Fourth Collision Avoidance Safety Meeting will take place tonight at 7pm at Heli-Ops in Broomfield. YOU DO NOT HAVE TO RSVP TO COME, and EVERYONE IS INVITED. So far we have had NO other helicopter schools in the area represented, but know that you ARE invited. We will also feed you so you can’t beat that.

 

The agenda for tonight is pretty cool, with some interesting topics:

 

7pm Opening: Dennis Pierce Colorado Heli-Ops

 

7:15 Recap of previous meetings and Collision Avoidance: Andy Munnis local DPE and Frontier Airlines Pilot.

 

7:30 The Chief Pilot from Skyraiders at KEIK will speak about Erie & their operations.

 

7:45 Guest Speaker: Mr. Robert Patlovany will be talking about midair collision safety recommendations incorporating the results of his computer simulations and the conclusions from his published articles.

 

8:15 Jeffco Civil Air Patrol

 

8:30 Guest speaker

 

8:45 Closing and questions

If anyone out there wants to add something to this agenda give me a call at Heli-Ops! 303.466.4354

 

We are videoing the monthly meetings and have two finished but are waiting for the FAA to approve their part of the presentations. We also have a web site up and will have the videos on the site with the speakers power points imbedded. Here is the link to the website:

 

http://safety.coloradoheliops.com/

 

KNOW that it's a work in progress and we realize there are things to improve upon. If you want to help with this project, or copy any part of what we are doing please contact me via the website or here.. this is about SAFETY, nothing more. (Also know that we put it on our url for convenience and expediency and will get it’s own dedicated url when it all comes together).

 

If you have issues, or suggestions for speakers, please let us know, we have the next two monthly meetings booked up already but would love any insight we can get. We also have had walk-in speakers and made room for them on the spot... if you have something important to share please come on in.

 

sincerely,

 

dp

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I also wanted to cover some things that have come out of these meetings, i don't want to stir anything up but get some input on what we can put on our website to hopefully help.

 

Our airspace is VERY busy, from KEIK to KLMO and in-between, some of the airports that you would expect to be safer aren't due to pilots not making radio calls or even having radios in their aircraft. One of the very high time instructors that grew up around here stated that he was staying at the controlled airspace for training due to the safety of the radar contact. So, my point is, some of these folks were trained at airports where the reporting isn't regarded as important, and some of them think that it's not that important for other reasons. What ever the reasons, we MUST encourage these pilots to make calls and start looking out their windows more.

 

I know my dad grew up flying, and stayed out of controlled airspace most of his life because he didn't want to deal with reporting. When he picked an airport to store his planes, he chose places far away from these areas so he didn't have to talk. I expect there are folks out there like this, and reporting and controlled airspace is difficult for them.

 

SO, that being said, do you know of programs or links that we could add to our site that might help or encourage people to sharpen those communication skills??

 

I am very sincere about this and will take your input to heart.

 

thanks,

 

dp

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  • 1 month later...

Our Fifth Air Space Safety Meeting will be tonight (thurs aug 30th) at 7pm at our Hangar at BJC. Everyone is invited.

 

Our speakers will be from the Air Force Academy and Doss Aviation, both from the Springs area, and the Manager from Front Range Airport. They will all have power point presentations and talk about their very busy air spaces and solutions they have put in place to have safer operations.

 

The FAA will also be there to update us on chart changes that we have encouraged.

 

We start promptly at 7pm and will have pizza, snacks and drinks.

 

Once again, everyone is invited.. so far we've had at least 60 pilots every month..

 

dp

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  • 1 month later...

Hi All,

 

Our sixth Air Space Safety Meeting will be this next Thursday the 25th of October at 7pm at our OLD hangar (we are moving starting this Monday to another larger spot on the other side of the runways).

 

 

 

Our keynote speaker this month will be Mr. Greg Feith. Greg is an International Aviation Safety Consultant, a great friend and flies at Heli-Ops as well. He's a former National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Senior Air Safety Investigator with a wide range of aviation investigative, safety and security experience. He has investigated hundreds of general aviation, business/corporate and air transport (commercial air carrier) aircraft incidents and accidents worldwide during his 30 years as an aircraft accident investigator and aviation safety expert, of which more than 20 years was with the NTSB.

 

Greg will speak about safety and ways we can protect ourselves in todays world of litigation. He speaks all over the world and this is one guy you don't want to miss.

 

Here's a link to more information about Greg:

 

http://www.aviationt...com/sats/feith/

 

 

Here’s a link to the SPANS event sign up page:

 

http://www.faasafety.gov/SPANS/event_details.aspx?eid=46795

 

 

Here's a link to the website we are developing for the videos of the meetings.. yes we know it's rough, it's a ton of work putting this all together and we are striving to make it as professional as we can. We have videoed every meeting so far and will have them all online eventually:

 

http://www.coloradoairspacesafety.org

 

 

The FAA will also be there to update us on chart changes that we have encouraged.

 

We start promptly at 7pm and will have pizza, snacks and drinks.

 

Once again, everyone is invited.. so far we've had at least 60 pilots every month.. last month was the first time we've had another helo operator (school) in attendance, when Mountain One showed up with about six pilots.. it was GREAT to see that others are stepping up!

 

If you need more information please don't hesitate to contact us at Heli-Ops: 303.466.HELI (4354).

 

Next Month the meeting will be at our new location:

 

http://www.justhelicopters.com/HELINEWS/tabid/434/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/11862/Colorado-Heli-Ops-Is-Moving-to-a-New-Larger-Location.aspx

 

 

Aloha,

 

dp

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Our safety meeting last night was, simply awesome. Greg Feith spoke to a group of 60 pilots at our hangar for two hours straight, no one wanted even a bathroom break.. they sat mesmerized as most of his audiences do. He spoke of mid air collisions and contributing factors to crashes, but kept coming back to ADM (Aeronautical Decision Making), Human Factors and CRM (Crew Resource Management).

 

I kept thinking how he and Mike Franz were SO on the same page, he even covered SBT and how he sees it as one of the best ways to improve our safety and insisted that many of these concepts should be taught to the pilots in training BEFORE THEY EVER GET INTO AN AIRCRAFT!!

 

I hope you all take a minute to let this soak in; you don’t realize what a resource we have in Mike, and how lucky we are to have him here on this forum and in our industry. Last night we had one of the industry’s most well known speakers on safety and aviation in general.. he speaks to crowds of pilots all over the world and has investigated hundreds of crashes for the NTSB (He retired after 22 years)... and the whole time he talked i just kept thinking ‘damn, he sounds just like Mike Franz’!

 

just saying..

 

I look forward to getting them both together in a couple of weeks when Mike is back at Heli-Ops.

 

dp

IMG_9460.jpg

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  • 1 month later...

Hey all, our 7th Air Space Safety Meeting will be this coming Thursday evening at 7pm at our new facility. Our speakers this month are awesome (as usual) with Greg Feith returning and Marine Helicopter pilot Matt Robinson speaking about Risk Management. This is for EVERYBODY, it's about safety and networking and we hope you all can come. There is a link to sign up for Wings credit and more information, so far we have about 55 people coming. (our phone number is 303.466.4354 if you have any other questions, and NO you don't have to sign up to come, everyone is invited, don't worry, we'll find a seat for you).

 

http://www.faasafety.gov/SPANS/event_details.aspx?eid=47449

dp

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