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The answer to Australia's ageing fleet might be under our noses, or if not, it may soon be. The biggest contributor is not the age of the aeroplanes themselves, but rather the cost of replacing them. So, let's not replace them; let's re-build them. It seems in the USA there is an emerging business in re-manufactured aeroplanes. The most obvious is Nextant Aerospace's re-built King Airs and Hawker jets. Now, a company called Yingling, who is apparently the oldest Cessna dealer in the world, has started offering completely re-built C172s. These are ground-up re-builds that are presented as largely new aircraft at a significantly lower sell price than new C172SPs. OK, people over here have been doing that on an ad-hoc basis for years, but is anyone doing it systematically? We have an over abundance of old C172s, PA-28s and Musketeers over here that some enterprising company with nous and skill could re-build and put back into service. And we would not have to worry about the cost of getting one from the USA or the fluctuating (read: sinking) Australian dollar. Of course, CASA would need to get on board with the program ...

Speaking of the regulator, CASA turned 20 in July, and in a briefing newsletter to be released very soon, Director of Aviation Safety Mark Skidmore will give us his thoughts about the journey so far. In it, he states that he won't pretend that CASA is perfect. For those of us who have been on the front line of the regulatory battleground for some years now, we understand how huge that statement is. Former administrations would rather have walking into a spinning Hartzell than concede CASA was nothing but a paragon of righteousness. For me, that's an indicator of two things: Skidmore recognises there are problems, and he's prepared to own those problems. Without those two things, any attempt to reform CASA would end up in ditch on the side of the runway.

Former Airservices Australia boss Greg Russell has emerged as the Honorary Chair of The Australian Aviation Associations Forum (TAAAF). Russell is a controversial figure who ended his days at Airservices under some pressure, but he knows the industry, knows the regulators and government departments and knows what needs to be done. This appointment shows that TAAAF is becoming quite a force within aviation in Australia, and adding Greg Russell will only increase their credibility and drive in Canberra.

In May and June we asked readers to participate in an on-line survey to measure how Australian Flying was going against reader expectations. The reponse was excellent and we got a great picture of how both the print mag and the website were going. Several participants made comments, asked questions and gave us general feedback, which for us is just as valuable as the answers to the survey questions. So, I have taken a selection of those comments and provided replies so the readers know we are listening; that their messages are getting through. Many of the comments were similar in nature, and we take that seriously indeed.

May your gauges always be in the green,

Hitch

 

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