Sydney had a jet jam involving thousands of delayed travellers yesterday, both in the ground and in the terminals, just over a year after AirServices Australia promised to fix an air traffic staffing shortfall by the end of September 2008.
The essential figures are that Sydney Airport was supposed to operate on a roster of 10 air traffic controllers, but only three were available yesterday.
AirServices boasts a payroll of over 3000 staff. Why a mere six of them are considered all that are necessary for approach and departure control at such a critically important airport is almost as much a mystery as to what a large part of the staff actually do in terms of productive work.
There appear to be more media managers and image massagers than Sydney controllers on the ASA payroll. Questions asked of AirServices went unanswered this morning.
It is also a mystery why the Minister for Infrastructure, Anthony Albanese, believes anything AirServices says, including its claims last year that air traffic manning issues were really part of an industrial campaign.
There has been industrial peace in the skies since May. But the services remains undermanned according to the union, Civil Air, which has also been critical of AirServices failure to adequately train controllers for both replacement and expansion.
Nor does it represent all controllers. In the last year, air traffic control disruptions have continued across Australia because of shortages of union and non-union staff.
The president of the Civil Air union, Robert Mason, said “four out of ten of 796 controllers will retire in the next five years, and we are 100 short of the minimum needed for certainty of service today.”
The inescapable truth about AirServices is that it has botched the resourcing of the service, and Albanese has been unable to find either the time or inclination within the Infrastructure super-ministry to engage with and resolve the situation.
In the delays near Sydney yesterday, airliners were assigned positions in wide ranging holding patterns to ensure they lined up in a safe order for arrivals, while departures were spaced out along routes intended to give a wide berth to the squadron of circling jets.
None of which would have been necessary when route control is handed over to approach and departure control at busy airports.
Air traffic control was invented because of the uncertainties of self separation. It is a no brainer, just like the administration of air traffic control in this country.
Ben,
Normally I’m a fan of your work… But why so high on the ‘drama’. Whilst I was not on duty, I can presume that these “wide ranging” holding patterns and departure routes were certainly not conducted in an ad-hoc manner; but simply follow the procedures used for minor delays and use those procedures for longer than normal periods of time.
It is a disgrace that ASA has been unable to fix the staffing crisis and it’s only going to get worse. Get yourself a copy of the Civil Air submission to the green paper particularly note the bit about staffing. This document was submitted mid 2008.
Greg Russell CEO of ASA promised to fix the staffing crisis in April 2008, later shifted to June then August 2008. August 2008 has been the longest month on record, it’ now August 379.
The company PR spinners will claim that they are recruiting controllers like never before; up to 100 a year. This number has been significantly reduced in reality due to the lack of staff and facilities to train them. The staffing crisis is likely to get worse not better as new facilities at places such as Broome, Karatha, and numerous others will require ‘extra’ controllers too. This on the back of 320 or so retirements in the next 5 years; where at best 100 trainees a year gives you an additional 300 controllers (due to pass rates) in the corresponding period. Remembering in reality they aren’t training 100 a year…
If the minister doesn’t actually ask the question he won’t know the answer… Commercial decisions have outweighed business continuity for a long long time. It would appear that both sides of politics doesn’t care about ASAs decisions, just as long as they keep getting the $50M+ in company dividends every year (after tax).
Possibly one of the reasons why AirServices Australia has ‘air traffic manning issues’ and ‘services remains undermanned’ is because there is no female air traffic controller. Incidentally, are women as seriously under represented amongst air traffic controllers as they are amongst pilots?