Tocumwal is where Mr Diamond is aiming to set up his new school AATC. He actually started to opperate out of there about a month ago, sending a number of instructors and students down and putting them up in Motels etc, he's even gone to the trouble of renting a house and transporting much of the equipment used by the students at SFTC (such as the sim) down there, as well as thier training files! Of course this was done with out any consultation with CASA, infact they didn't even know until somebody tipped them off - we believe it was one of the local opperators. Of course there was no AOC in place for this new location, and infact there were no facilities. The opperation was being run out of the boots of instructors cars, and also by taking advantage of the local flying club's clubhouse. Needless to say within a week two instructors had left due to not getting paid, there were 2 Liberty aircraft sat in need of service which were not going sorted out and there were 15 students who Diamond had grounded for various reasons, so they were sat by the Motel pool wondering what the hell they were doing in a place which to them was the middle of no-where. These were international students from India and Malaysia who had paid to study in Sydney.
I've been told the reason he was 'dobbed in' to CASA by the local opperator dates back to Diamond having a gentlemans agreement in place to purchase the flying school and facilities when he moved in new opperation down there. Of course gentleman and Diamond don't seem to go hand in hand, so this agreement was forgotten leaving the hoping to reitre owner of the Tocumwal school in the lurch - nobody to buy his business and a competetor on site at the airfield, which obviously would put off potential buyers.
People in Tocumwal hopefully are starting to wake up to the man and learn of his ways, so if you do venture down with luck he'll have been ran out of town!
As for the place, if it's a quiet reitrement you fancy then it's about perfect - Murray River, Golf, a few good little pubs and great flying :-)