The Last Minute Hitch: 11 July 2025
11 July 2025
– Steve Hitchen
Opponents of the new Class D CTR at Ballina will be relieved to be given an extra seven months of ATC-free flying. The new tower was to have gone live in November, but apparently Airservices are having trouble with some location issues and the tower has been pushed out until 11 June 2026: one year today. It goes to show you that some things are easier said than done. This extra delay–presuming none further–means that it will be 11 years since the alarms first rang on the need to do something about traffic at Ballina-Byron. It was July 2015 when the Office of Airspace Regulation (OAR) recommended solving the problem with a CA/GRS, which was probably always going to be a MacGyvered solution anyway. This project has been one of the most controversial changes to airspace in the past decade, and has many detractors, but given there is no way of stopping it nor getting a better outcome for GA, we need this in place soonest so we can stop talking about it.
"..Airservices needs to switch their thinking.."
More than ever before, the aviation community needs to weigh in on the Sydney airspace consultation because this is likely to be the last chance we'll get to inject some sensible comment into the debate. The latest rising issue from the industry briefing paper is that of dynamic airspace; airspace that changes levels with the time of day. Sharp-eyed commentators noticed on the draft VTC that the CLL over Camden is marked as 1500 on the main chart, but 4500 on the inset. Surely an error? No. In fact, they're both right. Airservices told me the idea is that the CLL is 4500 for most of the day, but will drop to 1500 when the Sydney Airport curfew is in effect between 2300 and 0530. This means that when there are fewer aeroplanes in the sky, the volume of CTA actually increases. I believe Airservices has done this to enable flights ex WSA to depart overhead Camden rather than overhead Penrith during the night. The CLL needs to drop to keep them in CTA. The crux is that political promises about noise over Penrith need to be honoured despite the impact on general aviation. But if we're stuck with it, Airservices needs to switch their thinking. The 4500 CLL should be on the main chart because a VTC is unlikely to be used between 2300 and 0530. It will be the chart of choice for daylight hours, which really makes marking the 1500 CLL on the main chart completely redundant except for the few NVFR flights coming into Camden or Bankstown. And it's going to challenge the EFB designers, who are faced with the task of having to deal with VTCs that show two different levels. We have been given a lot to think about, and Airservices needs to be told that.
I have recurring themes in what I write; things I sporadically return to because the represent some form of unfulfilled wish or a wound that refuses to be salved. One of those is that I believe private aircraft owners are Australia's greatest untapped resource. Skills, capacity and capability lie dormant and come to life only when the call goes out from an organisation like Angel Flight or FunFlight. I was reading today about Operation Airdrop, a relief organisation in the USA that mobilises private owners in times of natural disaster, flying tonnes of food and materials into impacted areas. They're all volunteers, and by the look of things get the boots on the ground where they are needed faster than government organisations can. Their most recent deployment has been to the Texas flood zone. It reminds me of Mallacoota in 2019-20, when the ADF closed the airspace around the town and chartered flights to bring in food, clothes, life essentials and everything needed to sustain an isolated town. Using volunteer private aircraft owners flying for the cost of the avgas could have shifted a lot more in a shorter time at a lower cost. Our problem over here is that our private pilots are considered unskilled and inefficient, to be shunned in times of need rather than embraced. As long as the government continues with that attitude, a valuable resource will continue to be wasted. Have a look at Operation Airdrop on their website.
May your gauges always be in the green,
Hitch
11 July 2025
– Steve Hitchen
Opponents of the new Class D CTR at Ballina will be relieved to be given an extra seven months of ATC-free flying. The new tower was to have gone live in November, but apparently Airservices are having trouble with some location issues and the tower has been pushed out until 11 June 2026: one year today. It goes to show you that some things are easier said than done. This extra delay–presuming none further–means that it will be 11 years since the alarms first rang on the need to do something about traffic at Ballina-Byron. It was July 2015 when the Office of Airspace Regulation (OAR) recommended solving the problem with a CA/GRS, which was probably always going to be a MacGyvered solution anyway. This project has been one of the most controversial changes to airspace in the past decade, and has many detractors, but given there is no way of stopping it nor getting a better outcome for GA, we need this in place soonest so we can stop talking about it.
"..Airservices needs to switch their thinking.."
More than ever before, the aviation community needs to weigh in on the Sydney airspace consultation because this is likely to be the last chance we'll get to inject some sensible comment into the debate. The latest rising issue from the industry briefing paper is that of dynamic airspace; airspace that changes levels with the time of day. Sharp-eyed commentators noticed on the draft VTC that the CLL over Camden is marked as 1500 on the main chart, but 4500 on the inset. Surely an error? No. In fact, they're both right. Airservices told me the idea is that the CLL is 4500 for most of the day, but will drop to 1500 when the Sydney Airport curfew is in effect between 2300 and 0530. This means that when there are fewer aeroplanes in the sky, the volume of CTA actually increases. I believe Airservices has done this to enable flights ex WSA to depart overhead Camden rather than overhead Penrith during the night. The CLL needs to drop to keep them in CTA. The crux is that political promises about noise over Penrith need to be honoured despite the impact on general aviation. But if we're stuck with it, Airservices needs to switch their thinking. The 4500 CLL should be on the main chart because a VTC is unlikely to be used between 2300 and 0530. It will be the chart of choice for daylight hours, which really makes marking the 1500 CLL on the main chart completely redundant except for the few NVFR flights coming into Camden or Bankstown. And it's going to challenge the EFB designers, who are faced with the task of having to deal with VTCs that show two different levels. We have been given a lot to think about, and Airservices needs to be told that.
I have recurring themes in what I write; things I sporadically return to because the represent some form of unfulfilled wish or a wound that refuses to be salved. One of those is that I believe private aircraft owners are Australia's greatest untapped resource. Skills, capacity and capability lie dormant and come to life only when the call goes out from an organisation like Angel Flight or FunFlight. I was reading today about Operation Airdrop, a relief organisation in the USA that mobilises private owners in times of natural disaster, flying tonnes of food and materials into impacted areas. They're all volunteers, and by the look of things get the boots on the ground where they are needed faster than government organisations can. Their most recent deployment has been to the Texas flood zone. It reminds me of Mallacoota in 2019-20, when the ADF closed the airspace around the town and chartered flights to bring in food, clothes, life essentials and everything needed to sustain an isolated town. Using volunteer private aircraft owners flying for the cost of the avgas could have shifted a lot more in a shorter time at a lower cost. Our problem over here is that our private pilots are considered unskilled and inefficient, to be shunned in times of need rather than embraced. As long as the government continues with that attitude, a valuable resource will continue to be wasted. Have a look at Operation Airdrop on their website.
May your gauges always be in the green,
Hitch