[Peetwo]

Follow up to Klanman's Lord Howe bureaucracy gone mad -  

Via the Oz today:  

Qantas sticks by ban on using Lord Howe weatherman’s advice

Weatherman Clive Wilson at Lord Howe Island airport.

The Australian
12:00AM November 10, 2017



Journalist
Sydney

Qantas has reasserted its refusal to allow its pilots to use Lord Howe Island’s only human ­adviser for runway and weather conditions, saying it would continue to follow the effective ban set by the aviation safety regulator.

The Australian Transport and Safety Bureau has also said it will not investigate the hard landing of a turboprop Beechcraft King Air 200 on the island late last month, despite suggestions the banning of civil pilots from acting on advice from the harbour ­master may have contributed to the accident.

The aircraft, carrying five ­people, made a hard landing onto the tarmac, damaging a wing and propeller, after encountering a downdraft.

Experts said the plane would probably have to be shipped back to the mainland for repairs.

The ATSB had found the aircraft encountered no controllability issues upon landing. No one was injured.

The ATSB said it had reviewed the information and was not investigating. Lord Howe Island harbour master Clive Wilson had been providing on-the-ground weather advice to pilots coming in to land at one of the most dangerous airports under the Australian flag since 1956 until the Civil Aviation Safety Authority refused to renew his licence in 2012 unless he spent $20,000 completing a new meteor­ological course.

Mr Wilson, who is a volunteer, has been unable and unwilling to meet that requirement and the ­result is fewer resources available to pilots, which many see as red tape putting lives at risk.

Veteran former Qantas pilot Bill Hamilton, who said he had flown into Lord Howe under the instruction of Mr Wilson many times over the years, said CASA’s action was “mindless bureaucracy” taking over common sense.

“It most certainly affects safety, Lord Howe is a very difficult place to land and I know from personal experience you have to be very, very careful going in and out of there,” Mr Hamilton said.

The ATSB, responsible for ­investigating crashes, said it ­received “over 15,000 notifications annually”, had “limited resources” and would investigate only those accidents “which have the greatest potential for improving transport safety”.

“In this particular case, after carefully reviewing the information provided by the operator and taking into consideration the local conditions a decision was made not to investigate,” an ATSB spokesman said.

Qantas said it was “comfortable” with the weather bureau ­information provided to its pilots, but declined to comment further. CASA said Mr Wilson was “free to make broadcasts” but pilots “cannot rely upon this information”.

Mr Wilson said given the ­extreme weather conditions on Lord Howe, the two BoM automatic weather information service stations at the airport often contradicted each other.

Eastern Air Services, the operator of the damaged Beechcraft King Air, did not respond to ­repeated requests for comment when contacted by The Australian.

Comments of note -   :

Garry

Staggering example of safety compromised by bureaucracy.

Opening themselves up to being legally pursued in the event of an accident.

Would not like to be in that depts. shoes!

MickTheRationalist

No one is ever held accountable in govt depts.

Matthew

@Garry Don't worry, we'll be paying for it!

Alexander

Big part of the problem Mick, not departments; 30 years ago they were turned into statutory bodies and virtually independent. Hence no political control, practically no accountability apart from a few embarrassing moments at Senate Committee hearings. But what the heck the CEO (title Director of Air Safety, up there on $600,000 pa Cloud 9 with baton directing traffic) has a five year contract to spin out, easy enough. Another couple of multi million dollar fact burying enquiries should do the trick. Alex in the Rises.

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graham

Spent a fortune looking for MH370 with very little hope of achieving anything, versus an open and shut case of 'Billy Bureaucrat making a Blue'.

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JELG

Good on ya Clive.  Keep it up and tell the bureacrats to shove it.  The world need good experienced people, not more machines. As a former Delta pilot, I would listen to the AWIS and then give you a call.  And I know which I would listen to more.   Nothing, absolutely nothing, beats local knowledge.

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Andrew

" ...  “mindless bureaucracy” taking over common sense." This extract sums up so much of what's wrong with Australia. You'd think that a real CSIRO type could come up with something like Calici that targets bureaucrats.

Ray

@Andrew add politicians to that list, Andrew.

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Alexander

Thank you Anthony and the Australian for lifting the lid on the scandalous sink hole that is the administration of flying and flying safety in our once beautiful country, now renamed Bureaucratalia. Uncovering the stupidity and hubris of the (Un) Civil Aviation Safety Authority, now it belatedly says the Harbour Master is free to make broadcasts. Let’s pretend that the pilots will hear useful advice but won’t consider the content. Let’s pretend with ATSB that there’s no controllability problem when a $4 million passenger plane on scheduled service is severely damaged on landing at an airport that is known for extreme conditions. Let’s pretend that there’s no winking or nodding between ATSB and CASA to avoid any suggestion of less than perfection from our superb regulators. In particular CASA that’s overseen the destruction of General Aviation through a rule of fear and administrative nightmares and fee gouging that has cost thousands of jobs, reduced flying schools from hundreds to a handful all the while increasing its own numbers and salaries. Alex in the Rises.

David

@Alexander  This is something that Joe public should be made well aware of. CASA have hidden behind the "safety" mantra too long for the uninformed public and spineless politicians to be aware of the damage that they have done to General Aviation, both in a commercial sense and the mistaken belief that they enhance safety. In fact, they are a hindrance to safety. 30 years to revise the aviation regulations and all they can come up with is the current mess that is the dreaded "Part 61" of the Civil Aviation Safety Regulations. Not a hope of an investigation into this latest incident - too much mud on their hands and no one able to call them out as they are a law unto themselves.

Phil

Sadly accurate

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Barry

Find the name of the person that made this decision, bring them into the daylight and ask them to justify the decision (and their pay)

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PR

Ah the Australia I have come to know. The red tape has to be followed. If someone dies, it's all OK because the red tape procedure was followed. After all, we all know the BOM's reputation for accuracy - how can the BOM fiddle the results to fit there models if there is someone taking real actual measurements?



Reminds me of working in hospitals. If some clinical person failed to do all there paperwork, high risk of sacking. If a person spends all there time on paperwork, and there is consequently a patient dies from lack of attention - that is OK because the paperwork was all done!

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Philip

Time for the Minister to earn his pay and sort out his bureaucrats.


Alexander

@Philip; Come now Philip give Minister Chester a break, he told us at Tamworth last year that he knows nothing about aviation. Besides the independent Commonwealth corporate body CASA is full of highly paid experts and if he made commonsense decisions on the basis of industry advice the system would break. He would be responsible ! No no no. Alex in the Rises.

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Botswana O'Hooligan

The bureaucrats concerned in this Canberrain anecdote would be in the bureaucratic version of paradise now so it is safe to write about them. They issued a directive to we coastal surveillance aviation people that we had to complete a radio course applicable to shipping before we could communicate with shipping by radio for our flight radio telephone licences didn't cover shipping. As a person in authority I told the bureaucrats that unless a person on a boat or ship had a flight radio telephone operators licence and could prove it we aviators wouldn't talk to them either. Canberra had a bit of a think about that, must have calculated that it was best to leave sleeping dogs lie, and the matter quietly died.

Phillip

@Botswana O'Hooligan Similar yarn, my aircraft sales company had imported a new small biz jet into Australia with the hope of putting it on the register here and selling a few.

The manufacturer offered pilot courses in the US for company pilots and the CASA flight ops inspectors.

However CASA where not happy with that and wanted my company to send 4 engineering types to Japan and the US over a 2 month period to study that the aircraft complied with Australian engineering standards ( the country that brought you the NOMAD) despite being certified already by the FAA, CAA, JCAB and numerous other knowledgeable authorities. It took 2 years to reach a compromise and the company had lost interest and the aircraft returned to the US.

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Kenneth

Stuff the pen pushers in Canberra I always chat to Clive before leaving the mainland and on the way in to the island (and so do a lot of the Qantas pilots). This is a prime example of the massive over regulation that is encouraged by an ever bigger, bloated public service and which is rubber stamped by weak politicians who do not have a clue about their departments. The waste and inefficiency it causes is killing this country.

Three times yesterday I got picked to do the explosive test at various domestic airports, what a bloody joke. It is an enormous waste of time and money and for what? Anyone who thinks a potential bomber is going to be stupid enough to leave residue on their clothing is a fool.

Wake up Australia, time to take the bureaucrats on!

MTF...P2