Folks,
I guess next year will tell the story, and see who is right and who is wrong. Whether it is the same, expanded or contracts next year.
To suggest that Ausfly, this year, was representative of an "industry" is really stretching it a bit, unless it was an example of a sector of aviation in crisis, which is close to the real world situation. The trade presence was sparse.
While the great division between RA Oz aircraft and "the rest" continues, and the "traditional GA" supporters continue to regard RA Oz as not quite legitimate, we have no hope of even having a pale imitation of Oshkosh.
As for being part of the answer, I have made my views well enough known, in all the appropriate venues, over many years, and anybody who actually knows me, knows I am not "part of the problem". It sound to me like a few posters here are a bit short on history, which bedevils this whole issue. And a bit short on the history of how Natfly came to stay and greatly expand at Narromine, before a much changed (for the worse) local council was outbid by Temora.
In fact, the nastiness of some of the posts directed at me, for having the temerity to suggest other that all is not well with the aviation world, just illustrates one of the problems in Australian aviation. You simply do not see such knee jerk vilification on equivalent web sites in NZ or other parts of the world.
On a separate but closely related issue, I am of the opinion that the policy positions being taken by SAAA and some in CASA has the potential to seriously restrict amateur building and take us back to 101.28 like days. The mandatory maintenance qualification, that has nothing to do with actual maintenance of amateur built aircraft, but is all about often irrelevant administration and paperwork, with a hefty price tag attached, including mandatory membership of SAAA is, I fear, the first tangible example of this trend.
We are rapidly departing from the freedoms brought by Part 21 in 1998, and returning to a more regulated environment, all without any justification, other than this is "The Australian Way".
Tootle pip!!
PS: There was more than "one organizer" of Ausfly, and as for the AOPA statement, what did you expect Andrew to say, given the major contribution by AOPA, made with high but entirely reasonable hopes??
As I have previously posted, Ausfly should be regarded as a success for a first up, but future years? We will see.
Who read the SAAA "press release" after the event, AWAL and AOPA didn't even rate a mention ---- what does that tell you??
Last edited by LeadSled; 4th Oct 2012 at 03:08.