[Peetwo]

Up for discussion 8:30pm-9:30pm Monday -

AIOS reaches epidemic proportions in Can'tberra -  

Earlier in the week 'that man' from the Oz kept reporting on a something-nothing (possible) tailskid occurrence of a Singapore Airlines on departure out of Melbourne: 

Tail strike suspected
12:00amEAN HIGGINS

A Singapore Airlines plane flew on from Melbourne to Singapore despite being told it had struck its tail on takeoff..

  
Now along with Ben Sandilands from PlaneTalking, I was a bit bemused where 'that man' was going with what appears to be on the surface a non-event?? 

Probe into ‘tail strike’ flight
12:00amEAN HIGGINS
The air crash watchdog has launched an investigation into a now confirmed ‘tail strike’ at Melbourne airport...

But then after the 2nd Higgins report (above) the penny dropped...

This was not so much about the Singapore tail-strike occurrence but more about goading the ATSB into action by making reference to a) it being an immediately reportable incident that automatically must be investigated; and b) referring twice to the last high profile tail-strike incident that also occurred out of YMML:

..In 2009 at Melbourne airport, an Emirates Airbus A340-500 struck its tail three times, and sustained $100 million damage as it barely cleared the airport boundary fence before returning to make an emergency landing...

   
As a passing strange coincidence - - I too had recently referred to that accident in a Mount NCN post:

Safety loops, trends & disconnections?

Kharon: "..So to the 717 crew and their wee problems; how deep do we dig?  Is the fix presented adequate to task? Has the ATSB done enough to cure the problem?  Can this be classed as an ‘operational’ matter?   The rational way to answer is to examine one factor only – can this happen again?  The answer to that is a resounding absolutely. The loop remains open.."

 
Okay so referring to both the PT article & the Oz last article they both state that apparently the ATSB is investigating.

However if you refer to the ATSB aviation investigation page or the new investigation page there is no sign that this immediately reportable matter was actually recorded, or that the ATSB is actually investigating. This is despite other incidents being reported and being investigated since the Singapore incident date -     

Perhaps the ATSB is being bloody-minded about this because it is 'that man' making a song and dance about this reasonably innocuous event.

But it also could be that they're otherwise distracted and have gone into a 'bunker' mode because apparently that man Higgins has been doing some more digging on the MH370 front... :

ATSB jumped gun on MH370
12:00amEAN HIGGINS
The Australian Transport Safety Bureau was wrong to say it had consensus on a “death dive” theory for flight MH370.

[img=0x0]http://pixel.tcog.cp1.news.com.au/track/component/author/0573acb566bb47c45e64e4c55a998aba/?esi=true&t_product=the-australian&t_template=s3/austemp-article_common/vertical/author/widget&td_bio=false[/img]

Oh Hoody what a total 'clusterf**k' - but wait there is more...

Two days ago DIPs to the 2nd PelAir cover-up/cock-up?? ATSB investigation were informed by Dr (Beyond-all-Reason) (I've a conflict of interest) Walker that there would be a further public update issued on the progress of the 'RE'-investigation.

Well again without absolutely any recognition (i.e. update to the aviation investigation page, media release or tweep from the twitter guy) the ATSB discretely by stealth released an update eight in what has to be the longest running ICAO Annex 13 AAI in the history of the world??

Updated: 13 October 2016

The collection and analysis of a large volume of evidence for this investigation has taken longer than originally foreseen.  However, the ATSB now has sufficient evidence to establish findings across a number of lines of inquiry.  The ATSB is in a position to finalise a draft report which is expected to be released to directly involved parties by the end of the year.  Subject to comments made during the draft report review process, the final report should be released publicly in the first part of 2017.

    
No further comment required - UDB? No actually totally ducking believable...

Update: Ben Sandilands (Plane Talking) with a summary of the nearly seven year diabolical saga of the VH-NGA Norfolk island ditching:  

After almost 7 years Pel-Air crash scandal lurches toward finality
Oct 14, 2016
Ben Sandilands

How the ATSB expunges the shame of its original and highly unprofessional inquiry into the Pel-Air ditching remains to be seen

The wreckage of the Pel-Air jet which the ATSB originally refused to recover

The ATSB has updated the status of its re-opened inquiry into the Pel-Air ditching of an air ambulance flight near Norfolk Island almost seven years ago.

It says it is now “in a position to finalise a draft report which is expected to be released to directly involved parties by the end of the year.  Subject to comments made during the draft report review process, the final report should be released publicly in the first part of 2017.”

This whole sorry saga has become as much about the honesty and diligence of Australia’s air safety investigator, the ATSB, as well as its safety regulator CASA as it has about a plane crash.

In December 2014 the ATSB was directed to withdraw and re-open its original and much criticised report into the ditching following some very serious shortcomings that were identified by an independent peer review by the Transportation Safety Board of Canada.

It took a Senate inquiry to establish that the original ATSB inquiry ignored a suppressed internal CASA report that found the accident could have been avoided had the safety regulator done its job in relation to the oversight of Pel-Air’s operations of the small Westwind corporate jet that it used for medical flights.

The ditched Pel-Air flight involved a medical transfer from Apia to Melbourne which found itself unable to land in very poor weather conditions for its intended refueling stop at Norfolk Island with six people on board. The jet had insufficient fuel on board to to divert to an alternative airport. It was ditched in the sea adjacent to the island before its fuel would have run out and deprived the pilots of full control of the Westwind.

The evidence given by the then chief commissioner of the ATSB, Martin Dolan, to a Senate committee inquiring into its conduct of the original safety investigation was severely criticised in its report.

The Senate disclosures led to widespread concerns in the aviation industry that two government agencies, CASA and the ATSB had conspired to suppress evidence that the regulator had failed in its duty and that the accident report that was subsequently withdrawn had in effect framed the captain of the Pel-Air flight.

Irrespective of the fierce arguments that the original ATSB report gave rise to, there are few precedents for a national air safety regulator to be so totally discredited for its handling of an air crash inquiry as to have to withdraw its original report and do the job again, properly.

Even though the Pel-Air crash occurred in 2009, the failed regulatory reform process in CASA has not yet fully addressed and reformed the claimed inadequacy of the original rules that applied to oceanic medical flights on the night it crashed, leading to an against-all-odds search by a Norfolk Island fishing boat which rescued all six people who had been onboard the ditched jet.

The ATSB which had resolutely refused to recover the the Westwind’s flight recorder finally retrieved it and some other wreckage from the sea bed last year, after it was ordered to do a new investigation.

(The media was left in no doubt that the ATSB was directed to carry out the new inquiry, even though the current posting on its web site makes it sound like it acted on its own initiative.)

The surviving parties in this crash will now be given a period of time in which to review the draft report and have any comments or responses they may make taken into account before the final document is published publicly next year.

Hmm...Coupled with MH370 questions, I reckon Hoodlum could be in for an uncomfortable (at least) half an hour ...
MTF...P2