What an interesting month it has been in isolation. Hopefully you have embraced it positively and used the extra time at home to catch up on those tasks you were always putting off.
It might be gardening, cleaning or home maintenance but equally it could be servicing and washing your aircraft.
I do hope the aircraft owners amongst you are keeping your flying recency up and your engines ticking over. My understanding is there is nothing to prevent you from flying solo and indeed in some countries in lockdown they are allowing flying every 28 days to maintain your aircraft engine health.
You will also be aware that both CASA and RAAUS have provided extensions on requirements to renew medicals, BFRs, instrument ratings and the like. Check out their websites for details if you are affected.
You may have heard this week that the 2020 EAA flyin at Oshkosh, Wisconsin, has been cancelled. Understandable given that preparations begin in May and USA is largely still in lockdown. Also, international airline travel is probably still a long way off for all of us.
I have seen that EAA are continuing to offer Webinars throughout May and June with lots of interesting subjects discussed. You can sign up on their website for live participation or pick up an older webinar anytime.
Regarding our own club activity, I know that there will not be a meeting in May but signs are hopeful that the easing of restrictions coming imminently, could make a June meeting possible with social distancing applied. I will be liaising with the Feathers Hotel as to what this would look like.
The easing of travel restrictions at least within the state means that we could soon organise a local fly away day trip to say the riverland or the south east as we had originally planned.
If any of you are finding the lack of social contact with other club members difficult, RAAUS have offered clubs the use of their Zoom video conferencing account free of charge so we can meet online.
You would need to have your own PC and internet connection, and be familiar will Zoom to join in.
I would like to hear from you if you are interested in using this format and if we get enough takers we can do this until face to face meetings resume.
As you know, last month we held our AGM almost exclusively by proxy. There were 4 council members in attendance and 17 proxies. Thanks to those who returned their proxy so we did achieve a quorum.
All the constitution changes were carried so I am pleased to announce that we can now formally offer social membership to the club at half the normal membership rate for those who meet the criteria for this category. Details are on our website.
The club council was re-elected unchanged from last year.
They are:
- Steve Nelson President
- Chris Moore Secretary
- Greg Tabe Treasurer & Membership
- Chris Dearden Webmaster
- Bob Scrymgour Meals
- Rob Wintulich AV & Meeting Host
- Barry Windle Ordinary Member
So keep an eye on the club website for the latest updates and I hope to see you all in the flesh soon.
Blue Skies,
Steve
The only thing it would be nice to have more of would be M & Ms. –Astronaut Shannon Lucid, after 6 months isolation on the Mir Space Station in 1996.
