06-26-2018, 07:56 AM
Passing strange P2 that Bankstown Airport is completely absent from any of the PFAS affected airport lists.
In fact you never hear anything about Bankstown contamination at all, and any inquiry to any of the government
environmental protection agencies is met with an unusually robust "Nothing to see here" attitude.
Yet of all the airport sites, especially one so close to the Georges river, one would imagine a very robust agency scrutiny
of contamination, given Bankstown's history from world war two days.
Consider the proven dumping of considerable amounts of live ammunition all over the airport at the end of the war.There are photographs in the national archives of rows and rows of fighter aircraft being decommissioned, their ammunition buried in long trenches.
There is also mention of large quantities of bunker oil being sprayed all over to suppress dust, there had been a drought which had diminished the grass cover on the all over field the airport had been in those days which was damaging fighter engines.
Then, after the war, Bankstown became a convenient location to dump "Night Soil" from the surrounding area, as a modern sewage system had not yet been built.
After the war right up to the seventies old Tug Wilson and his band of merry Fire'ies hosed foam all over the place as they practiced their fire fighting skills.
Lately the new Airport leasee decided that there was money to be made by developing the Southern side of the airport.
Inconveniently the Southern side was a flood plane off the Georges river and had the only north/south runway in the Sydney basin running across it, a life saver when those "Southerly Busters" rolled up the coast, to retrieve training aircraft caught in the training area with very inexperienced students on board.
So contrary to their lease, which stated the airport must be maintained in its original condition and with no consideration of the "safety" implications and after writing their own environmental impact statement (on a Federal Government letter head) they closed the North/South runway and dumped large quantities of asbestos contaminated fill on the floodplain.
All of that "stuff" is quietly leaching into the Georges river.
Yet we hear not a word, not a peep and any attempt to garner information or get any Government agency to conduct a meaningful investigation is met with a stonewall silence and uncooperative attitude.
There has been mention of late in the press about property developers making large "donations" to political parties, forbidden in NSW as it has lead too many times to corrupt practices, yet freely accepted by Federal politicians.
A billionaire Property developer had their sights set on building a DFO on the flood plane at Bankstown Airport, a developer known for being a strong supporter of political parties.
Given the fact that Bankstown has become invisible in the contamination stakes, that the Airports Act has been quite clearly been circumvented, that the head lease for the airport has quite clearly been circumvented, would a reasonable person strongly suspect that some form of skullduggery has been going on, all perfectly legal I suppose.
You cant beat the big end of town.
In fact you never hear anything about Bankstown contamination at all, and any inquiry to any of the government
environmental protection agencies is met with an unusually robust "Nothing to see here" attitude.
Yet of all the airport sites, especially one so close to the Georges river, one would imagine a very robust agency scrutiny
of contamination, given Bankstown's history from world war two days.
Consider the proven dumping of considerable amounts of live ammunition all over the airport at the end of the war.There are photographs in the national archives of rows and rows of fighter aircraft being decommissioned, their ammunition buried in long trenches.
There is also mention of large quantities of bunker oil being sprayed all over to suppress dust, there had been a drought which had diminished the grass cover on the all over field the airport had been in those days which was damaging fighter engines.
Then, after the war, Bankstown became a convenient location to dump "Night Soil" from the surrounding area, as a modern sewage system had not yet been built.
After the war right up to the seventies old Tug Wilson and his band of merry Fire'ies hosed foam all over the place as they practiced their fire fighting skills.
Lately the new Airport leasee decided that there was money to be made by developing the Southern side of the airport.
Inconveniently the Southern side was a flood plane off the Georges river and had the only north/south runway in the Sydney basin running across it, a life saver when those "Southerly Busters" rolled up the coast, to retrieve training aircraft caught in the training area with very inexperienced students on board.
So contrary to their lease, which stated the airport must be maintained in its original condition and with no consideration of the "safety" implications and after writing their own environmental impact statement (on a Federal Government letter head) they closed the North/South runway and dumped large quantities of asbestos contaminated fill on the floodplain.
All of that "stuff" is quietly leaching into the Georges river.
Yet we hear not a word, not a peep and any attempt to garner information or get any Government agency to conduct a meaningful investigation is met with a stonewall silence and uncooperative attitude.
There has been mention of late in the press about property developers making large "donations" to political parties, forbidden in NSW as it has lead too many times to corrupt practices, yet freely accepted by Federal politicians.
A billionaire Property developer had their sights set on building a DFO on the flood plane at Bankstown Airport, a developer known for being a strong supporter of political parties.
Given the fact that Bankstown has become invisible in the contamination stakes, that the Airports Act has been quite clearly been circumvented, that the head lease for the airport has quite clearly been circumvented, would a reasonable person strongly suspect that some form of skullduggery has been going on, all perfectly legal I suppose.
You cant beat the big end of town.