[Peetwo]

Miniscule 8G McDo'Naught gets ignored on Hobart flightpath request? 


From that happy little chappy in Tassie, via the Oz...

Airservices ‘stonewalls’ on safe landings


Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack

• MATTHEW DENHOLM
  TASMANIA CORRESPONDENT
  @MatthewRDenholm
  
  
• 11:00PM OCTOBER 14, 2018
  
• 1 COMMENT
  

Three months after the Deputy Prime Minister promised changes to ease noise caused by Hobart’s new flightpaths, Airservices Australia has been ­accused of stonewalling and ­ignoring its own safety advice.

In May, The Australian revealed bungling of new standardised flightpaths, based on satellite guidance, had seen a spike in ­safety breaches, including two cases of passenger jets travelling too close to each other.

An Airservices review of the new flightpaths, known as STARs (standard instrument ­arrivals) and SIDs (standard instrument departures), is ongoing.

In July, Deputy Prime Minister and Transport Minister Michael McCormack requested Airservices to allow pilots to make visual approaches to Hobart. This would allow pilots to deviate from the new flightpaths when they believe a visual approach was safe, quicker and easier, such as in good weather. It would also reduce noise pollution for affected communities.

Mr McCormack wrote to community group South East Coast Lifestyle Association on July 23 confirming that visual approaches would be allowed, with “the ­potential to reduce the number of flights flying overhead for some communities”.

However, residents report ­little or no change and do not believe Airservices is genuinely ­offering visual approaches, available before standardised flightpaths were introduced in September 2017.

In response to questions from the Aircraft Noise Ombudsman in November last year, Air­services confirmed the reactivation of a ground navigation beacon, temporarily removed during runway extensions, could “facilitate alternative approaches including visual approaches”.

But the response, released under Freedom of Information laws, suggests Airservices has no intention of doing so because it would be an abandonment of the new flightpaths design. “Air­services will not roll back SIDs and STARs because these provide safety improvements,” it said.

This is despite Airservices’ “post-implementation” report into the new flightpaths recommending reinstating the beacon and visual approaches to reduce risks to an “acceptable level”.

This is because not all aircraft are equipped to use the new ­satellite guidance needed to fly SIDs and STARs.

“It looks like Airservices is willing to sacrifice safety and ­efficiency in Hobart to shore up its one-size-fits-all bureaucratic agenda,” a spokesman for the lifestyle association said.

Airservices said pilots could request a visual approach to Hobart “provided certain safety conditions are met” and that the beacon was an “unrelated issue”.

However, residents believe that without the beacon, the new flightpaths are too inflexible to allow visual approaches in all but a few cases. It is understood pilots have been denied permission to fly visual approaches.

 


Not sure where Matty Denholm cribbed that pic of our NFI DPM and miniscule McDo'Naught but can anyone else now see the resemblance to Muppet Norman (Mc)Ram...anyone??? 



Hint - it's all in the eyes...P2