ALL MEMBERS ! Please fill out those proxy forms..!!

[RDyer]

Tracey,

No matter what gender we are, what race we are or how rich, life is finite. We only get an amount of time to seek out what we want and with every passing year, the chances and possibilities decline and the wide horizon narrows. We are born and the only certainty is that we will die.

On YouTube are many examples of normal people doing amazing things in relative abscurity. They have no back up other than a GoPro in their back pack. For example there is a woman riding round the world solo, there are solo sailors, solo walkers and yes solo flyers including a chap who was attempting to fly a KR2 round.

We write our own story. Some have better tools, support and luck than others, some do not succeed in what they want in life. But I think the most important thing is to give it a damn good try.

I know what it is like to feel doubt. I feel doubt about the strength of my own attempts in life and how hard I pursued my dreams and it weakens me inside. Confidence comes not necessarily from success but from knowing that you tried your hardest. I suspect there is doubt in your mind and the real fight is not with award committees or countless fairly anonymous people - the fight is in how you feel. If you feel lacking without the award, then I doubt the reinstatement of the award will be enough. But until the body weakens it is not too late. I am still trying to make my modest dream come true and every holiday I have , I go weld a bit more, test a bit more - I will win and the fact that no one will really care or acknowledge my accomplishment no longer matters to me if it ever did.

You have experience, you have some means and you still have time. So why not rescind the motions, gather what you need and go do the trip solo? It does not have to be in a Stearman or even a biplane. It will remove all doubt, clear the air and should it matter what people think, then almost all will respect your decision and your accomplishment.
Most important will be how you feel.

[samrutherford]

Until then (and with thanks to another poster):

https://eu.usatoday.com/story/sports/20 ... e/1719739/

[Chris Martyr]

Tracey . It is almost possible to see the poison which is oozing from your latest post.

Your little spat with Sam has been going on for several years now. If you were the one being wronged , then this little forum of ours is not the place to air your dirty washing .

This thread is about voting at the LAA-AGM .

[samrutherford]

Tracey has variously described her flights as:

Solo
Sole pilot
Alone in the cockpit
Never solo
and now "that parts of the flight would be solo and others not"

It is perhaps unsurprising that people are confused.

[L21-B]

Tracey Curtis-Taylor
I sincerely hope that decency and a sense of justice prevails among the wider membership beyond what is conveyed by a handful of misguided people on this forum.

I am fairly certain the wider decent membership have already decided what is the right thing to do.

[Bill McCarthy]

I am stuck in a quandary - was the trophy REALLY awarded for a “feat of navigation, aviation, tenacity and endurance” ? Was it an easy decision - who else was considered for it, or was it a case of putting forward the eventual winner to gild the trophies listing a bit ?
The trophy that we all seem to be falling out over (that’s the biggest understatement since Noah said “it looks like rain” !) is a fairly minor one in the overall scheme of things and can you imagine the furore and hoo-ha that would follow if she ever made it on to an Honours List ?

[dmcnicholl]

Ms Curtis-Taylor, as always there are (at least) two sides to every story. You call Rutherford an unreliable witness, he says it's the other way round. Tomato, tomaato... He does however come across as much more consistent and measured and that's persuasive.

You tell us your sponsors were unconcerned about how the trip was to be conducted which suggests to me that the use of the terms 'solo', 'alone in a cockpit' etc came not from them which leaves either yourself or the film producers as the source. I'd guess it was yourself right at the outset because that was probably part of the dream, the production company liked it and decided to keep it as a good pitch. Whichever, your own use of these terms regardless of whether the words were spoken or printed on a slide at one of your presentations is damaging to you, as has been your subsequent equivocation on the matter.

As to the 2016 AGM motion and vote being flawed, I don't see that. There was a motion, a vote was taken and the motion was carried. Perhaps, as others have written here, the matter should have been referred back to the awards committee but if that would have been a more proper way forward why did you, and I mean you in person as a LAA member, not table such a motion? Why attack and threaten the LAA and its officers? How could you think that would do anything other than antagonise people? I rather suspect had you done so it would have been carried and that ultimately the award would have been confirmed.

Finally, to complain of bile and then to throw in accusations of mysogeny! How was that ever going to win people over?

My proxy vote is in the post so I'll shut up.

[Paul Catanach]

.....Honours List ?

And there it is, the motivation for this entire shambles.

[Petertweed]

Bill - its buried further back in this thread.
There was no-one nominated for the trophy, the awards committee decided to award it to Tracy based on what they knew.
Later, the committee discussed withdrawing it but said that despite any deception, it was still a meritorious flight.
See post by a committee member, Brian Hope:
https://services.lightaircraftassociati ... ous#p23413

[jangiolini]

If she ever made it onto the honours list it would confirm that its not what you have done but who you know.... They portray themselves as independent and above influence!!! Really but thats meat for another thread!!!

[L21-B]

.....Honours List ?

And there it is, the motivation for this entire shambles.

And thankfully "Honours" can and have been rescinded in the past.

[mikehallam]

Unfortunately a biass is inbuilt to the 2018 motion: the ballot set out for the AGM is certainly not neutral.

Apart from the relatively few number of members who read our forum, all others voting from our ~8,000 could likely simply follow our Chairman's recommendation to reverse the 2016 decision and re-award TCT - as per Mr Mole's treatise.

IMHO. The Board are expecting that many many more magazine reading only members will trust our Chairman's recommendation.

Thus the cogniscant minority will lose !

I belatedly suggest to our Board that the motion being inherantly flawed is withdrawn and the whole procedure overhauled first to satisfy scrupulous fairness for all parties.

mike hallam.

[josher]

i think my mind is made up on how to vote but i am following this thread just to see if anything posted might confirm or question my current thinking. Ms TCTs last post does but not in the way she might hope. Tracy your loosing it!!

But the highlight of my morning viewing was:-
'As for being mostly men, my wife is into paper crafting groups which seems to attract mostly females of a certain age and I am pretty sure they don't sit around pondering how to attract more men or teenagers.'

Thank you Kelvin Watson for a bit of light and levity in all this gloom.

Malcolm Rogan

[Paul Catanach]

Unfortunately a biass is inbuilt to 2018 motion: the ballot set out for the AGM is certainly not neutral.

Apart from the relatively few number of members who read our forum, all others voting from our ~8,000 could likely simply follow our Chairman's recommendation to reverse the 2016 decision and re-award TCT - as per Mr Mole's treatise.

IMHO. The Board are expecting that many many more magazine reading only members will trust our Chairman's recommendation.

Thus the cogniscant minority will lose !

I belatedly suggest to our Board that the motion being inherantly flawed is withdarawn and the whole procedure overhauled first to satisfy scrupulous fairness for all parties.

mike hallam.

Mike

This is my concern too. Very few members use this forum, a few more might use others but the majority will have no idea of the history.



PS. You have a PM sitting in your inbox.

[chrisadams]

Whenever I fly our group’s aircraft I am required to fill in a Record of Flights sheet (Pooleys). Now, I understand in an aviation context that there are differing definitions of “Solo”. If you are a student for a Licence or rating, you can only enter hours into the solo column if you are unaccompanied, I.e. truly on your own in the cockpit. Having then gained a licence, providing you are not under instruction or checkout by an instructor and are acting as Pilot in Command, it is my understanding that you fill in the hours as “Solo” hours even if you have a passenger, be they a non-flyer, a current pilot or an instructor!

I am happy to be corrected if the above assertion is incorrect.

This is probably at variance with what the general public might consider “Solo”, and seems to be the interpretation being levelled towards TCT. How many of you who criticise her flights fill in your flight time as “Solo” when you have taken a “passenger” with you? Everyone, I would suggest.

I have no connection with TCT and didn’t even know who she is, until reading this and other forum posts. I applaud her spirit of adventure and hope that her flights and documentaries do inspire others of either gender, to “spread their wings”.