As GA pilots in Alberta we are fortunate to have a lot of open airspace and very
few restrictions on where we want to go. I believe a side effect of this is the
thinking that there isn’t a lot of traffic to worry about in this open airspace.

I flew about 30 hours in November and had two close calls that could have been
easily avoided with the right technology. I always fly with a XAON PCAS which
provides sort-of accurate information on nearby traffic with a transponder. It
isn’t great but it helped me find traffic flying where I planned to be in enough
time to turn out of the way.

Adding ADSB Out and In can be an uncomfortable upgrade, especially for many
of us who fly inexpensive airplanes. I think we need to adopt the mindset that
safety is as important as clean fuel and oil changes. Almost everyone has a
cellphone, a PC, an iPad in their plane, we use WAZE and Google Maps to get
notified of traffic cams on the way to the airport, our cars have radar cruise
control with automatic braking and possibly even lane control.

We should expect that same level of technology in our planes. Some ADSB
options can be expensive, and there are others such as the uAvionix SkyEcho
($1000 ish) which are easily affordable by everyone. I bring up the SkyEcho
because it is being tested by some people in High River. They are working with
TC to try and get it approved for Canada.

I am sure that many reading this are cringing at the thought of another
mandatory cost to go flying. I think it’s another cost we need to accept as aircraft
owners.

It’s not enough just to buy the equipment to see other planes, everyone needs to
install the equipment to broadcast their location to other aircraft nearby. The old
idea of “see and be seen” made sense before ADS-B but it’s time for all of us to be
safer in the air.