The extent to which the bureaucracy has lost the plot on this issue is neatly summarised in AIC H35/22. Here’s part of what it says, with my bolding:
[A Direction issued by CASA] requires operators and pilots in command of Australian aircraft to comply with the requirements of declared restricted areas and danger areas in Australian-administered areas outside Australian territory. The Direction also applies to foreign registered aircraft operated under an Australian Air Operators Certificate (AOC) or a Civil Aviation Safety Regulation Part 141 certificate.
Think about what the bureaucracy has created here: Areas of airspace outside Australian territory which Australian aircraft are
not allowed to use but foreign aircraft
are allowed to use (provided they aren’t being operated under an Australian AOC or Part 141 certificate). Last time I checked, the Kamarians weren’t operating any Australian aircraft under any Australian AOC or Part 141 certificate.
Aussies? Stay out!
Foreigners? Do what you like; after all, you’re outside Australian territory.
So it seems that spoony’s crowd are not capable of separating a package of fast jets in the middle of an exercise against a slow moving interloper if the interloper is an Australian aircraft outside Australian territory, but are capable of separating them if the interloper is a foreign aircraft outside Australian territory.
Call me a low-grade, muck-raking, green leftist, anti-establishment shame group member, but only on planet bureaucrat could that make sense.
Here’s an idea: Instead of continuing to stick more humps and band-aides on the camel, so as to preserve the convenient but unnecessary status quo, just declare PRDs in accordance with the law.
Here’s what the PRD declaration power says, with my bolding:
CASA may, in writing, make a declaration designating an area of Australian territory to be a prohibited area, a restricted area or a danger area.
It’s really not that hard.
The bureaucrats involved in this mess might do themselves and the rest of us a favour if they watched the live broadcasts or recordings of the proceedings of the Robodebt Royal Commission. Putting “the interests of aviation safety” or “the interests of defence capability” in a sentence does not magically ‘legalise’ some normalised deviation said to be in those interests. And mere inconvenience is no excuse for non-compliance with the law.