AusJet Aviation/Australasian Jet in liquidation
 

It has been a long time coming but AusJet Aviation finally went into liquidation yesterday.

Commiserations to all those blameless victims involved, namely the hardworking pilots and engineers.

And to those inept owners, managers and the chief pilot that ran the place into the ground shame on you. You are nauseating homo sapiens to be around. The level of mismanagement and incompetence you demonstrated is truely astounding.

Wasn't the CP there fairly new?

Nothing in the press

https://connectonline.asic.gov.au/Re...tract-icon.gif(505)
Notice By External Administrator/controller-Appoint/cease (505B)
Appointment of Receiver And Manager ()

https://connectonline.asic.gov.au/Re...e=sxzejew6b_15

essendon based company?

Wow.
I presume you have founded, operated and sold a successful aviation business?

Is that a requirement to recognise incompetence?

It is a great shame this once great company is no more.

Special mention goes to a couple of Arnhemland pilots, and you know who you are, hold your head down in shame.

To the rest of the team, best of luck for the future. Stay safe.

Stat8,

Why not ring them up and ask them ? better than any rumour !

Rodney
I often see pilots, engineers, and employees generally having very strong opinions voiced loudly about how a business should be run and how the boss is an idiot. I certainly have been in that position and held that opinion about employers in the past.

Very rarely do the critics have the same information as their employers; quite often the employees do not share their opinions with their employers and often the employer wouldn't listen anyway.
Nor do the employees have the same pressures applied to them, their families or their future as the owner of a small business does.
I don't know the owners of AusJet but it is a great shame. This will not be the only broken GA company in the next 2 years; the new Part 119/135, new Maintenance rules, and new fatigue rules will finish off everyone except Chartair, Corporate and Hardy's between now and 2023.

Once the small guys are all gone, piston GA will collapse because there will be no maintenance shops left, no parts suppliers, no fuel distributors. Watch them scramble to rebuild it once they realise what they've destroyed. :sad:

You got Saturday's lotto numbers to add to that Heratio?

Ausjet haven't had a base in Arnhem Land for over 10 years now. What are you alluding to?

Horatio, I agree that the new parts 119/135/121 will finish off all but the very strongest players. If the fatigue rules apply equally to all, I fail to see how they would finish off anyone who does not deserve to be finished off.
But no one should lament the passing of piston powered aircraft for anything except training and thrill seekers wanting to have a warbird experience.
Meantime, we continue to put the unsuspecting public in 40 or 50 year old relics on charter or RPT. Meantime, we maintain a double standard between charter and RPT, as if one life is worth less than another. If I was CEO or CP of a company operating to these 1950s standards I would be very nervous.
Operators who have been in denial of the need to go turbine will go under. Operators who do have turbines but can't comply with the new rules will incur the wrath of CASA and go under. Operators who operate turbines below cost will stagger along to the next engine overhaul, then they too will go under. Nothing changes.

Hotels don't have the regulator breathing down their necks or airports upping charges or staff to hold ASIC cards and a fluctuation energy cost [fuel]

To an operator doing a bit of Charter and a bit of instructing and a bit of AWK with the same body of pilots, it will be impossible to manage all the slightly different fatigue rule sets and get a reasonable utilisation out of the workforce.
To an operator based in regional areas, that's the only way to survive.
To the people living in regional Australia, piston engine charter in Barons and C206s and Chieftains is all they can afford.

...but mate you go on telling yourself you have all the answers for all the people. You obviously know best.

The fatigue rules, in my case App6, mean that I have basically lost 10% of trading days per year on top of lost days from weather or waiting for parts and those days I do work have to be much more intense...then still have to cancel all lessons and Grade 3 supervision if I run up against that 7th day in the last 28. Nothing but arbitrary numbers that were designed for operators with lots of staff and regular rosters, not a small, seasonal 141 operation.
I've seen so many flying schools that have upgraded to new kit go to the wall while those of us with old hardware that we own and that have paid for themselves many times over are still around. There isn't enough fat to take on massive amounts of finance for new aircraft especially when you are getting quite long in the tooth and not enough working years left in us to be able to pay them off..and not much of a resale market, either.
Every time someone goes under owing money all over the place the suppliers have to recoup their losses from the remaining customers. Yet still we have people thinking it is clever to start price wars.
So we have to muddle on in our relics as best we can.