Well, that should provoke silence for a while, Sunfish.
That is rather the equivalent of a political studio discussion which has brought together plausible sounding experts from everywhere to plug their own agenda, when from somewhere down the back a truck driver's wife yells "how the bloody hell are our kids ever going to afford to better themselves by education?"
Lots of rustling and uncomfortable silence ensues before the inevitable obfuscation starts again and the "rowdy" interjector is shown quietly to the door.
Well done!
I will answer briefly from the point of view of one of the anti-Nas brigade. MY objection was simply that we were being asked to swallow a less safe system with no demonstrable gain. E is not as safe as C, no matter how Dick raves about the U.S. Had the implementation of E over D somehow managed to save millions of dollars, then in our pragmatic world it would have to have been scrutinised closely.
It didn't. Simple as that. It never would have, and all the bleating about fundamentalists etc can't disguise the fact that it was never designed to do any more than make things easier for VFR pilots, who don't pay enroute charges anyway. Make no mistake that this is an ideological argument.
Other aspects of airspace reform should be looked at closely with an eye to a possible benefit for all without a reduction in safety, but it should be fairly obvious to even the dimmest that the presence of Mr Smith is so irredeemably divisive as to prevent any chance of meaningful discussion. For whatever reason, he appears to have the Minister by the short and curlies, and the result is an abysmal and embarrassing abuse of the Westminster system.
Until the unholy duumvirate, the puppet and the puppetmaster, are disposed of no meaningful change can occur.
I will just add here that Smith's latest stunt, telling his puppet to sign an order for full class C radar implementation at outstation towers, is such an outrageous dummy spit as to take the breath away. I could have sworn that outstation towers used to run the equivalent of Class C airspace long before the concept of Class E airspace was ever brought up. And we did it without radar, Dick.
Unless the omniscient dick can explain to my satisfaction what it was I was doing in Mackay tower if it wasn't procedural approach in class C airspace, he will remain beneath contempt for me.
I will tell you, Sunfish,since you profess a desire to learn, that in those days Coolangatta and Cairns operated the same procedural approach system, and had movement figures around the same as Brisbane's. This was before dick even thought about using his money and public image to bitch about not being able to land his helicopter at his luxury Point Piper home, leading him to be placed in charge of the lunatic asylum which was the CAA.
I can't remember exact dates now, but a little research should show you that it took a midair collision at Coolangatta and the career of a bloody good controller to prompt the hierarchy that procedural approach was not designed to handle 8000 movements a month, and Cairns and Coolangatta became full blown TCU's.
To suggest that any other outstation towers now demand full TCU radar airspace is a leap of such Machiavellian content that it has taken me a while to understand just what this madman is attempting to do.
It boils down to this.
"OK, I've been telling you all that Class E is all we need, and all you fundamentalists won't listen to me, you just keep putting up your miserable objections. And now you've succeeded, you've got your poxy Class C airspace where VFR pilots actually have to tell you where they are at all times.
So cop this. I f you think Class C is so fandangled important, we're going to call your bluff! Oh yes indeedie we are, don't you think you can put one over on Richard Smith! Do you know who I am??? I'm going to put one more squeeze on the left testicle of my very good friend the minister and I'm going to insist we spend upwards of $150 million to instal desperately needed class C airspace, because you fundamentalists and union cronies insist that only Class C is safe.
As we all know this involves full radar approach services, so you rabid unionists and anti-GA fundamentalists (have I said that before?) can't whinge about the $150 million it will cost. And when the cost inevitably flows through to the customers, I'll be able to say hahahahaha, told you so! Nyah nah nah nah nah!!!
I'm sorry to appear so cynical, Sunfish. Somebody who has been around in various forms in the industry for 30 years should have something useful to add, but this is the effect the bickie man has had on the industry. Ask the GA people out there what the industry was like in the 70's and 80's before Dick and his cost cutters came on the scene. His hypocrisy simply takes my breath away.