A sacked local air traffic controller claims a “frightening” lack of experience among former colleagues is causing an increasing number of safety incidents at Queenstown Airport.
Pamela Adams, a controller for 30 years, says she investigated half a dozen incidents at the busy international airport relating to controller inexperience during 2008-09.
“In the six months before I left there’d been an increase in incidents caused by inexperience in controllers. I know this because I investigated half of them. It’s actually frightening.”
An inexperienced crew manning the Queenstown tower is “just as dangerous” as having rookie pilots, she says.
“It doesn’t [bode well], especially when the Air Line Pilots’ Association has black-listed Queenstown as a difficult airport.”
Her warning comes two weeks before the annual influx of light aircraft for Warbirds over Wanaka, which Adams says most tower staff haven’t been involved with.
She claims one controller with 40 years’ experience is due to retire this year and the remaining six average two years’ experience.
Adams also claims to know of three safety incidents – including a “near miss” between an Air New Zealand plane and a hot air balloon in 2008 – “that the Airways safety manager knows about but never investigated”.
Separately, two months ago Mountain Scene reported a light aircraft returning from Milford Sound took precautionary evasive action when a departing Air NZ Boeing 737 flew head-on into the smaller plane’s course. It was close enough for the Boeing’s cockpit collision alarm to sound.
“There are other people on the [Queenstown] airfield who aren’t happy with the standard of controlling. The airlines are [also] concerned,” Adams, now in Haast, alleges.
Adams is fresh from battling former employer Airways Corporation – the Employment Relations Authority last week ruled she’d been unjustifiably dismissed in 2009 for “serious misconduct”.
“My personal opinion is I was sacked because I knew there were safety-related issues at Queenstown,” she says.
Adams was fired after she confronted less-experienced colleague Mike Bishop for not having required clearance between two aeroplanes – an Air NZ turbo-prop on a scheduled flight to Christchurch and a private, similar-sized aircraft descending to Manapouri – on March 2, 2009. She initially feared potential for “loss of separation” between the two aircraft.
Adams says Bishop believed he could use “geographical separation” – relying on a pilot’s visual description of their position – when dealing with an Air NZ plane flying up to 10,000ft.
“He can only legally use it up to 9500ft,” Adams says.
Subsequent Airways and Civil Aviation Authority investigations both found no loss of separation – but CAA found the cause to be a “perceived licence to bend [the] rules”, documents obtained by Mountain Scene reveal.
CAA aeronautical services officer Len Wicks says in the document: “There is no question that the incident was reportable [to CAA] because it had the potential to be a hazard, given the controller was technically not applying separation in accordance with the documented procedures.
“It does concern me that controllers might use geographical separation above [9500ft] because at higher levels it becomes increasingly difficult to ascertain position accurately against a geographical feature.”
CAA spokesman Bill Sommer says CAA has since told Airways to “sort out” its separation procedures.
“It was not in accordance with what they said they were doing. They’ve then followed it up and changed their manuals,” he says.
“We’re happy with that.”
Airways spokeswoman Nikki Hawkey: “CAA has changed the procedure and we accept that.”
She’s unaware of a lack of experienced staff at the Queenstown tower.
“Pamela Adams is attempting to get something in the paper based on emotion,” Hawkey says.
Your say
The Kitchen Needs You
dear o dear Pamela the kitchen needs you, not sure if Pamela was aware but some of the guys thought her controlling was just that..too contolling, things will be just fine without her...
21 Jun 2010 09:06PMjet737
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