The Australian International Airshow goes on long after the gates are closed and the last aeroplane has rotated for home. It takes months to analyse what just happened in terms of numbers, dollars, video footage, images, sales to be closed and so much more. If you ask around you generally find out that Avalon continues to have an impact on the industry anything up to 18 months afterward ... almost just in time to do it again. What we do know from this year is that the crowd figures stand to be among the best ever.
There were people absolutely everywhere on the Saturday and Sunday, dragged out into the open via the great weather and the promise of some F-35s. All you have to do is look at the number of complaints on social media about the traffic queues on the way out to know that when the official figures come out they'll be somewhere in the stratosphere. There is talk of it being the best there's ever been. Not everyone agrees with that; the measure is somewhat subjective depending on what you really wanted to see. As for me, I talked flying with heaps of people, did many interviews, crawled over aeroplanes both new and old, went to seminars, manned the Australian Flying stand and walked a lot of miles.
The only thing I didn't do over the entire seven days was watch an airshow.
CASA and the Department of Infrastructure and Regional Development sure got a lot of Fs on The Australian Aviation Associations Forum (TAAAF) Forsyth scoresheet. Two years after Warren Truss tabled his response to the recommendations, only four of 37 have been implemented to the satisfaction of the industry. Mind you, they have given themselves a much better mark on the DIRD website. Honestly, if TAAAF was a teacher and CASA and DIRD were students, that scorecard would finish with a teacher's comment "is capable of much better work but needs to try harder in class." What this slow progress tells us is that reform measures are being greeted within CASA with gnashing teeth, folded arms and turned backs. It has been known ever since the ASRR came out that certain "elements" at middle management level don't respect the reform agenda and if they aren't down-right refusing, then are slowing the process down as much as they can whilst pretending to be on the journey. Think of a person on the back of a tandem bicycle who refuses to pedal: those trying to go forward have to waste energy overcoming the dead weight trying to hold things back. The result is slow progress, which is what the TAAAF scoresheet reveals.
I was very pleased to hear Airservices CEO Jason Harfield make a definitive statement that they have accepted Dick Smith's suggestion to put in a weather cam network. It really was a great idea, and clearly Harfield thinks the same. Too often bureaucracies in Australia of all flavours will greet ideas from the public with a very liberal dose of Not-Invented-Here Syndrome, torpedoing very good suggestions our of pure petulance, so it is refreshing to see the project taken up with enthusiasm. We're going to see a survey soon asking us where we want them, and it's up to us to put in and tell them. Think of all times you've been in the air when you would have liked a bit more info on the weather at a critical destination like Kangaroo Island, Bathurst, the Kilmore Gap or Barrington Tops. You all know the places where we need them, so let's not be be shy when the survey comes out.
Nick Xenophon picked up the baton on airport development in Senate Estimates last week in the aftermath of the King Air crash at Essendon. What has come out is that CASA has no definitive approval over badly-placed buildings on airports, but can only advise. There seems to be no head of power for them to say "not there" or "not that high". They can offer advice, but not give direction, and airport lessees and developers are often loathe to take advice that limits their earning potential. The general aviation community has worn skin off its knuckles knocking on Canberra doors over the past decade trying to get anyone to do something about inappropriate development, but the progress made has been little, if anything at all. The problem is that it takes a disaster to highlight the issue, but too often once the disaster is forgotten, so is the issue ... until the next disaster.
May your gauges always be in the green,
Hitch