Senator Heffernan looks to be on the warpath over protecting GA airports from encroaching development. In the Senate Estimates hearing last Monday night he asked Department of Infrastructure and Transport Secretary Mike Mrdak what guarantees the department could give GA that they would have airports to land on in the future. The answer was worrying. As well as being in time-honoured officialese of the professional bureaucrat, it basically said that the government is committed to preserving the capital city GA airports, but the state governments were not being so co-operative with planning laws. In Victoria, the state government came out and made a supportive statement over Essendon. Perhaps it's time the other states told us clearly what value they put on their GA airports.
The opening question to the CASA group on Monday night was effectively "when are you going to appoint a CEO?" In ways it was pleasing to see that the senate committee couldn't get more info from CASA than anyone else could. The answer was "the next few weeks." CASA has known they needed a new Director of Aviation Safety (DAS) since February and we still don't have one eight months later. John McCormick didn't actually leave until 31 August, so you have to ask if they sat on their hands until then. Eight months is plenty enough to fill any position. Let's hope there's word soon.
It sounds like Matt Hall is going to have a red-hot go at the Spielberg round of the Red Bull Air Race this weekend. The season hasn't turned out exactly as I'm sure he would have hoped. Two podium finishes so far and fifth place would have been well below his ambition for the season. Still, he has a chance to score another one, or an even better spot, on Sunday evening. It sounds like ripper of a course with plenty to challenge the pilots' skills.
May your gauges always be in the green,
Hitch