The Brisbane Courier Mail has an article in today on the Brisbane Airport debacle... "Air schedules in chaos because Brisbane Airport's two runways can't operate at same time at night".
Air schedules in chaos because Brisbane Airport's two runways can't operate at same time at night | The Courier-Mail
It refers to Brisbane's other roundabout, thousands of passengers circling at night waiting to land. There are many angry and frustrated blogs on the site.
So it appears it's been a problem for sometime now and is nothing short of disgraceful for a modern airport in this day and age.
I came back from Townsville the other week and out over Kilcoy we did a 180 deg turn and headed back but it turned out to be one big holding pattern for about 15- 20 mins.
Apart from the frustration of getting in late, what about the fuel burn, extra duty time, pick up inconvenience etc.
From memory I think part of the problem goes back to the local member, one Kevin Rudd who had procrastinated and held off with the second runway because constituents were worried about noise, the usual nonsense with any airport expansion.
Now we are all paying the price for the delaying tactics.