ja's blog

Dear Delegates, pilots and any other readers

Those of you who know me, are aware that my predecessor, Flip Koetsier, and I have happily worked together in CIVL for many years, both in the CIVL Bureau and as FAI Officials at major competitions. From this you may deduce that there will be little major change in direction accompanying this change at the head of CIVL. Time will tell! I cannot guarantee, however, that there will be no change of style, as we all have our own personalities.
If you attended the recent Plenary, you will have heard my assessment that our current safety committee structure is historic and no longer meets today's needs and operating methods. It was agreed that we need to reorganise this to make it more effective. So you will certainly see some changes as a result. The safety focus for each discipline will be embedded within the sporting discipline subcommittees in future. The role of the chairman of the Safety & Training Subcommittee will move toward monitoring and coordinating the safety efforts in the other SCs, identifying synergies, perhaps steering those energies as well as reporting regularly to the Bureau. More detail on this will be available when the new Bureau has had a chance to consult with the SC chairmen and produce revised Terms of Reference for their work.
I hope that in my new role I can continue to help the worldwide community of hang and paraglider pilots to enjoy our sport in relative freedom and help those who wish to measure their skills against others, to do so in a safe, fair and friendly competition environment.

John Aldridge