Ben Sandilands
Editor of Plane Talking @PlaneTalking
Ben Sandilands has reported and analysed the mechanical mobility of humanity since late 1960 - the end of the age of great scheduled ocean liners and coastal steamers and the start of the jet age. He’s worked in newspapers, radio and TV in a wide range of roles as a journalist at home and abroad for 56 years, the last 18 freelance.
or every patently stupid rule imposed by the US, there seems to another equally nonsensical one imposed by the authorities in charge of arrangements at major airports such as London Heathrow or Frankfurt.
Serious deficiencies in Qantaslink are understood to have been drawn to the attention of the forthcoming Senate Inquiry into pilot training and standards.
A scathing attack on the management cultures of Australia’s airlines has been made in a pilot association statement to key Senators in advance of a Senate inquiry into pilot training and standards.
A training incident involving an inexperienced pilot and 177 Jetstar passengers at the Gold Coast Airport on May 30 is expected to come under scrutiny at the imminent Senate Inquiry into pilot training and standards.
The "virtualisation" of air travel took another controversial leap forward in Auckland this morning where Qantas subsidiary Jetstar announced an inbound code-share deal into NZ with American Airlines.
CEO of Virgin Blue, Brett Godfrey, last night challenged government, business and the airline sector to scrap the quest for a second Sydney airport and pursue an all new, super-sized Sydney Airport.
It is a reminder how desperate the federal Government is to avoid building a second Sydney airport within Sydney that it refuses to acknowledge that the main reason people regularly use air travel at all is to save time.
The important, but overdue action by the government to preserve airports for aviation, could have seen the Hoxton Park aerodrome turned into a Q400 or ATR-72 turbo-prop hub that would have broken Sydney Airport's monopoly pricing grip on domestic air services.
In a parliament where the safety standards of Australia’s major airlines has been treated as a topic totally above serious questioning or examination since the Ansett-ANA and TAA disasters of the 60s, yesterday’s events in the Senate broke the taboo barriers.
The Airports Amendment Bill 2010 introduced this morning will try to stop developers 'stealing' them for housing estates, shopping malls and nursing homes. Is it a brave bill, or is it too late, or critically flawed?
