I do find amusing the way in which the patent inconsistency in logic is dealt with.
CASA must prove its allegations in court!
OK then.
CASA (actually the CDDP) proves the charge of carriage of dangerous goods in court.
Whoops. Errrrm .... that's inconvenient.
So let's just call it "a minor technical" crime.
Of course, the people best able to judge the seriousness or otherwise of crimes are not judges ...
And are we sure the other charges were "dismissed"? There's a vast, vast difference between charges being "dismissed" (that is, found by the court not to have been proved) and charges being "discharged without conviction" (which can only occur if the charges are found by the court to have been proved first ). Perhaps the other charges were "dismissed", but I've seen enough of Mr Phelan's stories to remain ever-sceptical of their accuracy.
That said, if the extracts of the correspondence from CASA to the operator are accurate, evidently someone in CASA (at least back then) didn't have a clue about what CAR 47 required (or, more accurately, didn't require) in the circumstances.