Airservices resolves comms outage that delayed flights

Rob Sharp has received praise in the industry for steadying the organisation after it faced criticism it allowed too many air traffic controllers to leave during COVID.

The ambitious system, designed to unite civil and military air traffic control across Australia, was originally conceived after a 2009 national aviation white paper but was later added as a ‘project of concern’ in 2017.

Citing official BITRE data for the month, Airservices pointed to an average of 82 per cent on-time arrivals and on-time departures in April, as well as a cancellation rate of two per cent, in its latest Network Overview report for May 2025.