1930's Tasmanian Airspace
A while ago I was travelling in my friend’s Citation Sovereign as a passenger on a flight from Bankstown to Hobart. Conditions were CAVOK at Hobart however, when we were overhead Flinders Island, instead of getting the direct route to Hobart, we were diverted via Launceston and Clark – 14 nautical miles of completely unnecessary extra distance , flying time and fuel wastage. The pilot was told this route was required because there was a 737 in front of us.
I would presume it’s because the multilateration radar system is not being used in Terminal airspace in Tasmania and even though Airservices claim that procedural separation is as good, that’s clearly ridiculous. Imagine using procedural separation instead of radar at a place like JFK or even Sydney. Everyone knows it’s going to create delays and safety will be reduced.
As we know, the supplier of the multilateration radar equipment issued a press release stating, it was designed to work across Tasmania and to the surface at Launceston and Hobart Airports. They later issued a press release stating that it worked as it was contracted to do.
I’m told the lack of the use of radar at low levels at Tasmania is tied up with some type of demarcation dispute about whether the tower should have the airspace or whether it should be in the Melbourne centre. I presume that’s why we haven’t dropped Class E at places like Ballina, that is en route controllers need to be trained to do approach work as they are in most other countries in the world.
Surely there must be some new controllers coming along who would want to copy the best in the world and operate in a totally professional way, without diverting aircraft unnecessarily and making Australia less competitive.