[Peetwo]

The corporate cloak and the minions dagger are, once again, used to service industry.

We let the Skidmore response to the Ministers SoE slide by as it masterfully side stepped  the government stated intent to follow the Forsyth reforms; there were enough loop holes, escape clauses and weasel words to ensure and prove that which has become increasingly obvious during the Skidmore reign.  There is no hope of serious reform.  That has been made clear since the Muff took centre stage, all that remained was for the Murky Machiavellian crew to put out a statement making it ‘kosher’.  Skidmore is a past master of talking well and achieving SFA, except that which ‘fostered and promoted’ his own legend.  So it was no big disappointment when the ‘statement’ was published.

But ATSB should know better; this ‘thing’ Dolan has signed off is another escape route, crafted by experts with the sole aim of changing sod all, while looking good.  You can easily picture it; there’s Beaker, fresh from another failed attempt at swimming lessons; feeding his face on the best of Toulouse tucker, when a text pings in – “Sign this Mate, all will be well, enjoy your break, L&K MM”.   “OK” texts Beaker; “Use the one on record”.  And so the legend of the ATSB is continued; unabated, unashamed and unrepentant.

Aye, nothing to see, move along, the new whitewash will cover the blood stains and the cloak of mystique will vanish all trace of the aberrations and indecency inflicted on the public, who have a right to expect better.

Selah.

ATSB CP Bullocks - Spring cleaning whitewash.


Never thought I'd say it but the ATSB is now officially one of the unblocked holes - organisational influences - in a very mouldy lump of Aussie Swiss Cheese.

Further to my post from the bump in the night thread - Of risks, red flags, ridiculous responses and a rooted system - PartII...
 

It is now obvious that the mandarins & minions in charge are air-brushing over a significant crater in the mouldy - aviation safety - Swiss Cheese. Instead of mitigating safety risk they are perpetuating and adding to the risk...FFS - ICAO...FAA..NTSB..TSBC anyone??- SOS      

It is worth reflecting on the causal chain for this bizarre phenomenon, where the so called air safety watchdog is complicit in helping cover-up multiple identified significant safety risk issues.

From the Oz Matthew Denholm article today:

It was released on request to The Australian, with the bureau saying it no longer classified such radar failures as “incidents” ­requiring inclusion in its incident reports database.

“In 2013, the ATSB changed its Australia-wide coding practice for classifying infrastructure reports,” a bureau spokesman said. “As a result, notifications of infrastructure failures are only included in the aviation safety occurrence data if the event ­affected the safety of an aircraft.”

  
This ATSB change in methodology in recording (or not recording) incidents on the bureau occurrence database also has much wider implications, as not only will those incident records be lost to Aussie industry stakeholders but also to the Worldwide aviation community.

It should also be noted that the ATSB whitewash of the ATCO reported TASWAM incidents - much like the PelAir cover-up - is not in anyway an isolated aberration.

I refer to a post of mine from the search for IP thread -
[*]#post9:

They ought to as the iceberg is well and truly exposed -  the myriad of QF issues since 2008, Lockhart, Pel Air, REX vs a coal loader, a bent VA ATR that simply defies belief that it never speared in, and the list goes on. The muppets at CAsA like to talk about 'red flags'. Well there are so many red flags covering the feckin Australian landscape it looks like the crash scene from the Germanwings crash. ICAO and the FAA must be concerned, surely?

Well you'd think so wouldn't you?? Not so much the smaller flying tin incidents but the Mildura fog incident and a couple of those recent ATC LOSA events you would of thought may have grabbed their attention?? Hmm...maybe there is some sort of filtering going on between the time the original incident report is received & when the official ATSB incident report is forwarded to ICAO for input into the iSTAR database?? Who knows but it is certainly passing strange and we all know that the powers to be have been caught fudging the books before...  

 Wikileaks: Australia nearly lost its air safety rating 
2004 AUDIT REPORT OF THE AUSTRALIAN TRANSPORT SAFETY BUREAU (ATSB)
{Ref: In particular see Appendix 5-1} 

Oh well at least we seem to have made some progress to aviation safety reform with the recent release of the 2015 ATSB/CASA MoU - see here or here.

However until such time as someone acknowledges that the muppet Dolan has to go, we will continue to get absolute bullshit statements like this in the joint ATSB/CASA MoU presser... {Comment: Or in the latest ATSB Corporate Plan} 


"...Mr Dolan said, ‘the MOU spells out how the two agencies will cooperate in the interests of improving aviation safety. We are working together - with the ATSB identifying safety issues through its investigations and findings, and CASA and the industry responding to those issues, as appropriate - to promote high standards of aviation safety.’ ..." 

Those words should - coming from the head of the ATSB - provide reassurance that maybe the worm has turned & after the PelAir cover-up debacle, the ATSB is on the road to recovering some of its former reputation & effectiveness as the Australian air safety watchdog. Unfortunately coming from Dolan - who has absolutely no credibility whatsoever and could not lie straight in bed - they are empty words coupled with much recent evidence (besides PelAir) to the contrary...

[*]

  Also refer to Ben's past article - Did Australia mislead ICAO over the Pel-Air crash?

Here was some quoted comments:


ME...

And on the subject of is Australia misleading ICAO? IMO that would be an emphatic yes…

From #P9:

“..The sketchy track record of playing fast and loose with ICAO protocols is not mentioned, that’s all of’ em. Australia has over 1600, registered differences which, rather cleverly, make it ‘technically’ compliant with ICAO, while thumbing it’s nose and laughing up it’s sleeve. Then there is the demonstrated complete disregard for ICAO Annex 13 and the allegations of breaches of the Transport Safety Acts to be accounted for, either proven of eliminated..”

And is there hard evidence that these govt agencies (in particular the ATSB) have been obfuscating their responsibilities to ICAO? Well I think so & for quite a while too – #P2:

“..Given the observations by Ben & #P11, one now wonders if these deficiencies were ever truly addressed and if the obfuscating of ICAO is a common theme that has been practiced for more than a decade. As #P9 mentioned one only need look at the over 1600 notified differences to ICAO SARPs to see that the Australian aviation safety authorities are taking the Mickey Bliss out of ICAO…”

 

Ziggy:

..The Senate have listened and worked so hard to make change, but alas blocked by the media, corporations with cash and finally the Oz Gov with regard to this important historical event of NGA.

Not to be reported to the ICAO. Despite the accident being the first of its kind, in the world.

Further historical searches will find many more questionable investigations I’m sure...

...Another productive and genuine concerned conversation on Friday 13/02 was with Ms Nancy Graham. A lady of extreme calm and the approach of fair and just Aviation Safety. Before and after an aviation accident.

An article sparked a dwindling flame within as I read an article regarding her advocacy for a speedy settlement for the families of the souls on board the recent air tragedies.

We spoke for quite a while.

What astonished both her and I was the fact that Ms Graham who is the a director of Air Navigation Safety for the ICAO was not aware of, or even heard of NGA. A complete hull loss. Absolute possibility of fatalities. But we lived, with a voice. As I heard “oh my” a few times, I could hear the clicking of a key board. Her word along the lines of, “Quite a bit of controversy surrounding this accident. A Senate Inquiry, 2009, all the reports, Oh my. I need to do some reading. I can not believe I have not heard of this. I can not believe I am speaking with a survivor of an internationals plane accident. We could learn so very much.”...

[*]

And finally..

[*]5
Sam Jackson
Posted February 18, 2015 at 3:37 pm | Permalink

I just find the similarities and parallels between the two ‘missing’ reports intriguing. We know that the ATSB system for reporting is spot on, the TSBC tell us so. Whoever is ultimately responsible for the despatch of those reports clearly has a bullet proof system and clearly uses it, as every other report transmission has been made in a timely, proper manner; which begs the question. How did these two heavily criticised, highly suspect reports slip through the robust ATSB system net. It’s probably just a coincidence that the same crew managed and edited both final reports, funny how things like that just happen. Must be one of them there ‘aberrations’. Some wretched clerical type will get moved, an apology issued and all will be bright and rosy, once again in the DoIT garden. Terrific.

[*][*]

Need I say more, except to state if M&M & co think they will again be able to word weasel (corporate plans etc) & white wash this disgusting state of affairs with the apparently ICAO compliant Aviation SSP (Annex 19), think again....MTF P2