September 30, 2010 – 5:02 pm
Independent SA senator Nick Xenophon’s motion for a Senate Inquiry into pilot training and standards has been carried today with the support of the government and opposition parties and The Australian Greens. The inquiry is expected to report by November 17 and has generated very strong expressions of support from Australian pilots concerned at declining [...]
September 29, 2010 – 7:32 am
This article was published in Crikey yesterday, where it is still being debated by readers. It is republished here to add to Plane Talking’s fascination with ‘train’ talking and the emergence of high speed rail as an effective alternative to flying between many cities world wide. If Melbourne and Sydney had similar sized populations and [...]
September 27, 2010 – 3:51 pm
Tiger has found another fee to charge its passengers, this time $6 paid on-line to join a queue to be first to board its flights. It joins the likes of American Airlines, Ryanair, easyJet and Whizz in offering priority boarding, ironically on a day when thousands of travellers are queuing for hours at Virgin Blue [...]
September 25, 2010 – 1:58 pm
Another intensively flown city pair, London-Frankfurt, could gain frequent high speed rail links in the near future. On October 19 a German Railways ICE Inter City express is due to arrive at London St Pancras via the Channel Tunnel to test and demonstrate its compatibility with the Eurostar network that serves Paris and Brussels. This [...]
September 24, 2010 – 9:42 am
No aircraft design in history is going to have such a negative effect on western politics and security as the Lockheed Martin lead JSF or Joint Strike Fighter F-35 project. This is the only conclusion that can be taken from the US Air Force Association presentation (below) by the recently retired commander of the USAF [...]
September 23, 2010 – 9:48 am
The ACCC has given interim approval to one of the two foundations for the new Virgin Blue international services strategy, namely the proposed alliance with Etihad Airways. The interim approval follows a specific Qantas request to deny interim approval. Qantas benefits from similar arrangements to those outlined in the Virgin Blue/Etihad proposal through its arrangements [...]
September 20, 2010 – 4:51 pm
What would make a traveller choose a fast train between Melbourne and Sydney or Canberra and Sydney in preference to a jet? Would it be the superior comfort and space for the cheapest rail seats that exceeds that of flying business class on a jet, never mind being squeezed into economy class? Would it be [...]
September 18, 2010 – 7:45 am
In a society where spin and media manipulation perpetuates myths about airline safety and keeps a lid on disclosures of unsafe practices the commitment of independent politician Nick Xenophon to his proposed Senate Inquiry into pilot training standards might trigger some long overdue reforms. As Senator Xenophon pointed out in his address to the Australian [...]
September 15, 2010 – 5:35 pm
Nick Xenophon, the independent senator for South Australia, says he will move for a Senate inquiry into pilot training in Australia, and seek to remedy airline reluctance to report safety breaches to Australian authorities. In a speech to the Australian and International Pilots Association last night he singled out the failures of Jetstar to promptly [...]
September 15, 2010 – 9:43 am
There is some unsettling information contained in this entry in Jon Ostrower’s Flightblogger site. With only a few months at most to go before promised certification of the delayed plastic airliner, the seventh 787 is being ‘cannibalized’ for parts of the flight test fleet. Has any new jet airliner test and certification program ever ‘eaten [...]
