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You want ATC? Put your hand in your pocket.

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Na, Na, Na, Na, You want ATC? Treat the the airways as the national infrastructure it is. Enough tax is paid, enough revenue is made. There's a very good reason all the government departments associated with this are VERY quiet, cos they're getting away with murder.

Sorry Dick, but you had to be told that 4 x 19 is 76?

You mean the way the Federal Government treats other national infratructure such as rail, road etc, all of which are substantially underfunded, under resourced, and exist in a state of constant catfight with the various State governments over who pays for what? The Federal government may "own" things on paper, but it operates practically nothing (civil) in Australia. It pretty much just provides funding to the States, and they have passion fingers with the money when they get it.

So TIER....

Having articulated one of the structural problems, at least more people are likely to know what that problem is. The problem is actually curable. It just needs more people to understand that it’s curable.

Some states ceded control of aviation to the Feds. The Feds trump state law in those jurisdictions.

I think the Feds have always controlled aviation. Even the larger airports are still federal land, just leased off. The Govt still has a say in aerodromes passed to councils under the ALOP. CASA is Federal. AsA is Govt owned. They've just gotten out of "doing" aviation.

CASA and Airservices and ATSB can be fixed. Problem is: It requires political wisdom and what my dearly-departed granny used to call “gumption” to do it.

(I was told the other day that a manager in Airservices was paid a $100,000 bonus because an external contractor managed to achieve a contractual milestone. If true, that is in my opinion a manifestation of a completely munted management culture.)

The director maybe... not a manager.

Airservices has “directors”? I know it has a CEO and a bunch of General Managers. Haven’t heard about directors. Maybe just a difference in terminology rather than substance.

General Manager perhaps yes. Bonuses are normally at executive level.

Lead Balloon,
Airservices has a Board, see here for details <https://www.airservicesaustralia.com/about/our-governance/our-board/>
Boards do not get bonuses, contracted managers do, supposedly tied to "performance".
Targets are set each year (I think though it should be longer) and if you meet the target the CEO decides how much of the bonus you get.
It is however a flawed concept, particularly in the Public Service where performance is not very important, because the manager then concentrates on whatever generates the bonus instead of other "non-bonus attracting" activities.
From an online document <https://hbr.org/2016/02/stop-paying-executives-for-performance>
"As the incoming Chief Executive of Deutsche Bank, John Cryan, recently said in an interview: “I have no idea why I was offered a contract with a bonus in it because I promise you I will not work any harder or any less hard in any year, in any day because someone is going to pay me more or less."

Do you have a dog called “Toto” and a feeling you’re not in Kansas anymore, Mr Approach? If not, please activate your beacon so we can find and save you.

The technical/operational stuff you post is important.

Thank you for your kind words, Mr Balloon, however what makes you think I need to be saved?
You must be a nom-de-plume for the AFP or CASA :=

According to this https://www.wingswatch.net/accidents the US is running about 27 a month.

Gosh, aviation in the USA must be more than 4 times as dangerous as aviation in Australia. Or is it more than 12 times more dangerous?

Lots of E and lots of ATC doesn't stop you getting killed. They just start the search earlier.

Spoken like a true Austronaut!

Preliminary report is out now.

It doesn't really say much that we didn't already know, except that Mangalore CTAF calls were not recorded, and the ATCO passed traffic info to both aircraft about the other.

JQF only got 2 minutes (if that) heads up before they collided. The report lacks a lot of detail about what was said to AEM too considering JQF hadn’t yet called departure...