After being confined to their homes during lockdowns, Australians desperate to travel have found themselves confined to the ground waiting for take-off.
A shortage of air traffic control staff is one of the reasons travellers are experiencing flight delays as Australia’s airline industry recovers from the COVID-19 pandemic.
“It’d surprise many passengers to learn that perhaps the reason for the delay or the cancellation is actually because of air traffic control not being able to staff those control towers,” James Goodwin, CEO of the Australian Airport Association, told 7.30.
With Qantas and Virgin both falling in global rankings on the back of customer complaints, the aviation industry is pushing for more accountability from Airservices Australia for disruptions.
The government-owned organisation is responsible for air traffic control and airport fire services. At Brisbane airport last month, almost three-quarters of ground delays were attributed to air traffic control.
“We’ve got increasing concerns with the operational performance of Airservices Australia,” Mr Goodwin said.
“They’re not up to scratch for airlines, airports, all parts of the aviation sector, but they’re also not up to scratch for the passenger.”
Airservices Australia CEO Jason Harfield insisted airspace never went unmonitored when there was a staff shortage but the organisation had to manage the workload on remaining staff.
“We will always maintain safety being paramount,” Mr Harfield said.
“We will sacrifice efficiency in order to always protect safety.”
Staffing was so tight last month that across seven east-coast sectors, dozens of flights were impacted, with the most scheduled to fly through airspace around Byron Bay.
It is unclear how many of those flights were delayed or cancelled.
“When we have, whether it’s an illness … or a shortage for some particular reason of the controllers for that piece of airspace, we can’t readily just grab somebody who’s sitting next door and operate that piece of airspace because they don’t have that particular qualification and certification for that piece of airspace,” he said.
Mr Harfield said the situation was amplified because air traffic movements were more unpredictable after the pandemic.
“We see traffic spikes on one day where we normally wouldn’t see it and then suddenly, a week later, it will drop off,” he said.
“Passengers can take solace that we are focused on this today.”
Air traffic controller and Civil Air union president Tom McRobert told 7.30 the shortages were taking a toll on staff.
“Me and many others did overtime shifts on Christmas or Christmas Eve,” he said.
“You go into work thinking, ‘Are we going to have enough staff and are we going to be able to get everyone to their destination safely?’
“It does wear you down.”
Like flying over Afghanistan
It is not just controllers feeling the strain. Pilots may be left with the responsibility to communicate with each other in the sky if air traffic services are unavailable.
Mr Goodwin told 7.30 some airlines would choose not to fly because of the risk involved.
“If air traffic control cannot provide its service, it means that other parts of the aviation sector simply have to take up that responsibility … simply aircraft won’t take off and land,” he said.
“That’s a poor outcome for everyone.”
Virgin and Qantas both declined an interview. However, Qantas has raised with the federal government its concerns about the increasing frequency of uncontrolled airspace.
According to the airline, between October 2022 and September last year, there were 236 events where air traffic control services were not available, which affected almost 1,400 Qantas Group flights.
Qantas told the government that it used to be an “extremely rare event” that pilots had to communicate their whereabouts with each other and it generally only happened in countries with “significant challenges providing air traffic control”, such as Afghanistan or in remote areas.
Mr Harfield said a new computer system was being installed which would help overcome some of the challenges.
Airservices Australia is also recruiting staff to bolster its current ranks of 948, but with fewer than 3 per cent of applicants passing the entrance exam and a rigorous training process, it will take time.
According to Jessa Mae, who passed the test, that training takes about a year.
“Once training begins, it’s about two months of theory, then about a month or so learning the console itself, so how to operate it,” Ms Mae told 7.30.
“Then … [for] maybe nine months or so it’s just all about being able to separate the traffic.”
Mr Harfield could not give a time frame for when flight delays and cancellations would end.
Calls for review into failings and culture
Mr McRobert is pleased more controllers are on the way but believes the staff shortage was of Airservices’ own making.
During the pandemic, 140 controllers aged between 56 and 65 were incentivised to retire.
“Many of them were in excess of 30 years’ experience. Many of them are in areas that it’s very hard to pass on that experience quickly,” he said.
Mr Harfield said he believed many of those staff were going to retire soon anyway.
“One in 10 of our air traffic controllers were at retirement age and so 10 per cent of our workforce were going to retire in the next year or so,” he said.
Transport Minister Catherine King declined an interview request but said in a statement that the Morrison government introduced the retirement scheme and that Airservices had been dealing with staff shortages ever since.
She said the government was working to address the issue but Shadow Transport Minister Bridget McKenzie said the government needed to do more.
“Unless the government takes this crisis seriously, nothing will change and families and businesses will continue to be disrupted by higher rates of cancellations and delays than is necessary,” she said in a statement.
Mr Goodwin is calling for a review into Airservices Australia.
In 2020 a report into the culture of the organisation found more than 50 per cent of its staff reported bullying and harassment.
“We would like to see an independent review of Airservices Australia that can look at the staffing … and also looking at the cultural issues,” he said.
“We need to understand why the absentee rates, the unplanned leave is so high.”
Mr Harfield said staff were taking more sick leave and were less interested in doing overtime than before the pandemic, but that was in line with what other industries were experiencing.
He said measures were in place to improve the workplace culture.
