[Peetwo]

NOTAM - Danger Area promulgated - ASA Bus Stop

Hmm..look's like JH has taken up Sir A's lead and thrown CASA under the bus...

"..Airservices acting chief executive Jason Harfield last night said its assistance to the pilot reporting GPS problems was in-line with Civil Aviation Safety Authority requirements..."

Q/ Why exactly is the Ag CEO fielding calls on this matter?  I would have thought he has minions better placed, informed & trained to carry out that particular task - perhaps staff cutbacks are taking effect?
By that little bloke from Tassie courtesy the Oz:

Inquiry vowed on near air collision at Mount Hotham

• by: MATTHEW DENHOLM
  
• From: The Australian
  
• September 18, 2015 12:00AM
  

Tasmania Correspondent
Hobart




Former air safety chief Dick Smith fears the inquiry will be too narrow. Picture: Renee Nowytarger Source: News Corp Australia
Australia’s transport safety watchdog has promised a broad-ranging investigation into claims 18 lives were endangered in the skies above Mount Hotham, in the Victorian Alps, but is being urged to also seek overseas expert advice.  

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau vowed yesterday to examine all the events of September 3, when a pilot claims there was a “breakdown of separation” between his plane and another­ that could have caused a disaster.

“The scope of this investi­gation will cover air traffic aspects such as communications and radar coverage,” ATSB media manager Marc Kelaart told The Australian. “We are now gathering information to assess how significant these aspects were in relation to the occurrence.

“The proximity of aircraft to each other will be examined as a part of establishing the facts surrounding this incident.”

However, former air safety chief Dick Smith expressed concern that the ATSB investigation was likely to be too narrow and wrote to its chief commissioner, Martin Dolan, urging it to seek input from American aviation authorities to ensure the Mount Hotham airspace was safe.

As revealed in The Australian yesterday, the pilot of a charter from Bankstown, in Sydney’s west, to the Victorian alpine resort­ on September 3 made an incid­ent report to the ATSB claiming the safety of passengers on both planes had been ­“compromised”.

The pilot’s report says the second plane, part of the same overall charter but from a different company based in Essendon, in Melbourne’s northwest, reported its position as 10 nautical miles to the west of Mount Hotham but later changed this to 10 nautical miles to the east.

In between, based on the initial position given by the second plane, the first pilot had started his final approach to the airstrip.

His report says he was “alarmed at the close proximity” of the other plane implicit in the changed advice and believed the situation could have caused a mid-aid collision in cloud and poor weather.

It is understood the second pilot, who had report­ed trouble with his GPS in the lead-up to the incident, will tell investigators there was no danger of collision.

It is understood he will say he contacted Airservices Australia to ask it to use its Melbourne-based radar to help keep him separated from the four other aircraft involved in the overall charter.

While the area has radar coverage, radar is not used to provide a separation service to aircraft once they descend below 18,000 feet. Below this altitude, pilots must “self-separate” by telling each other their location via radio.

Pilots can ask Airservices to use the radar to help keep them separated from other aircraft in the event of an equipment failure, as the second pilot suggests he did on this occasion.
However, the first pilot suggested in his report that a collision could easily have occurred in the meantime, and that the incident highlighted the need to “identify the root causes, thereby preventing a similar occurrence that may cause an accident”.

Airservices acting chief executive Jason Harfield last night said its assistance to the pilot reporting GPS problems was in-line with Civil Aviation Safety Authority requirements.

By the para in bold it would appear that the VH-OWN pilot has lawyered up, which in the circumstances is probably fair enough, will be interesting to view the transcript of the comms between pilot & ATC? Pound to a penny the CVR recording was not able to be retrieved..

{ Upon reflection That radar track - especially after VH-OWN (presumably after a MAP??) turns towards the NE (presumably for intercept of HOTEC to HOTEI track??) - recording bears some disturbingly similar manoeuvres to the 2005 Chieftain accident see here - AAIR 200503265 }

MTF...P2