Schooner69A wrote: ↑Fri Jul 05, 2019 1:59 pmDuring the sign-up, ground-briefings, etc. the children are rarely out of sight of the adults with whom they came.
Your CFK events have been different from the ones i've been involved in. At ours, parents frequently try to drop their kids off and come back for them later... We have to tell them no, you can't leave your kids, this isn't a daycare. Even so, it's common for one parent to be left behind while the other carries on with whatever errands they wanted to run. Also, the parents are generally corralled into the outdoor area by the flying club to watch airplanes, while the kids are given a tour of the flying club, and ushered into a classroom for their ground instruction portion. Finally, while waiting for their flight, it's a bit of a melee of kids and parents standing or sitting around being patient. Kids and parents alike wander off, to the bathroom or wherever. There's *lots* of opportunity, for someone so inclined, to intervene.
It is only during their time airborne that they are in a situation that could remotely be called "at risk".
And yet, that's the most tightly controlled and coordinated period in the entire event. A marshall brings the kids out to the plane in full view of the parents, the kids are strapped in, and the aircraft departs. For 10 minutes the pilot has their hands full between ATC and rowdy kids. Then they land, taxi in, and they are de-planed... again, in full view of the parents. There's very little opportunity for anything.
So... In the best tradition of SMS, that risk, slight though it may be, is identified and steps taken to mitigate it. And if that means some inconvenience for we pilots, it's a small price to pay for being able to continue doing what we do.
And in the best tradition of SMS, the greater risk is ignored in favour of the optics of "doing something" when really, *nothing* is needed.
If any questions arose about the CFK events, both of our arguments could be combined to support not requiring checks at all. Pilots don't have the bandwidth during the flight to interfere with a child, and while on the ground, the children are "rarely out of sight" of their adults. This wasn't an insurance-mandated requirement. COPA chose to do this on their own, without thinking it through.
And be careful of that for which you wish: you keep coming up with arguments that anyone of the ground volunteers could easily be a predator and you may get an outcome that you weren't expecting...
With about a 5:1 ratio of ground volunteers to pilots at our events, it's statistically a lot more likely that a ground volunteer could be a predator than a pilot in the first place... There are a lot more of them. And they don't have to get the VSC! Not sure what you were trying to say with this, but it just reinforces my assertion that *everyone* needs the VSC, if we believe it's necessary at all.