As you’d like it.

Great picture – those smiles are genuine; the inestimable Fawcett who breathes hope into a depressed Australian aviation scene, despite the best efforts of CASA to regulate it out of existence; the ATSB who cannot seem to provide an accident report with any meaning; or, the ASA who are always seeking ways to increase their gross, monopolistic profits.   It is a great loss to aviation that Fawcett was not appointed a junior minister, even if just to manage the reforms proposed by both the Senate and the Rev. Forsyth, demanded by industry.

The good news is that finally, there is a glimmer of light at the end of the long dark tunnel that the Australian AOPA has been travelling through.  The newly appointed President is reaching out to other AOPA organisations.  The NZ contingent did him proud over the weekend, a bright spot in an otherwise grim couple of days of the CASA sponsored roadshow at Bankstown; welcome cooperation looms large.  There is also hope that a long overdue olive branch has been extended to our American cousins, which can only be a good thing.  Perhaps a united voice will help reduce the bureaucratic embuggerance of the regulator.  We can only live in hope, expecting the worst.

I wish I could see more pictures like the one above, flying clubs looking prosperous and well cared for, relaxed smiles and the easy camaraderie that was once the bond of aviators, world wide.

Selah.