So aircraft noise really isn't that bad...for the majority

[Nigel C]

From http://www.news.com.au/breaking-news...-1225877964201


I wonder how prominantly Sonya McKay features in these figures...

I guess it goes to show the squeaky wheel always gets the oil...

Vocal minority leads the charge on airport noise complaints

By Andrea Hayward From: AAP June 10, 2010 1:42PM

MORE than half the 24,000 complaints made about aircraft noise nationally were made by 20 people, a Senate hearing has been told.

Airservices Australia chief executive Greg Russell said his government-owned corporation had received nearly 24,000 complaints nationally last year from 4400 people.

"There's a large disparity between the number of complaints and the number of complainants at some of these locations," Mr Russell told a Senate committee investigating the effectiveness of his organisation's aircraft noise management.

"Of 24,000 complaints, more than half were from just 20 people."

Two-thirds of all complaints received in Perth were from the same two people, and a third of complaints in Sydney were from one person.

Mr Russell said it was imperative Airservices Australia got the public consultation process right ahead of a rollout of a new navigation system at major airports with the ability to share noise more precisely.

"We need to do a better job, frankly, of talking to the community about what these benefits are," he told the inquiry in Canberra today.

"I think, frankly, if the industry doesn't do that adequately, I see the opportunity for terrific technology that can help not just safety ... not being successful.

"And I think that would be a great shame."

Safety concerns at Perth airport had grown with a sharp rise in passenger traffic, he said.

In the past seven years the number of passengers at Perth airport had doubled, with a 130 per cent increase in the number of aircraft movements.

In 2009 more than 10 million passengers and 115,853 aircraft moved through Perth airport.

"Our own safety management system began to highlight (in 2002) that there was a growing safety aviation issue at Perth airport and in the airspace around Perth," Mr Russell said.

Airspace in the West Australian capital was limited because of the Pearce RAAF base on Perth's northeastern outskirts.

Acting RAAF chief Geoff Brown said any plan to shift civilian aircraft activity to Pearce, Australia's busiest Defence flying base, would severely impact on defence operations.

"The volume and complexity of aviation activity at RAAF base Pearce is generally incompatible with civilian aircraft operations," Air-Marshal Brown said.

"And that requires civilian aircraft either to climb above, remain below or be tracked around aviation activity occurring in Pearce restricted airspace."

Fly-in fly-out rotations of workers at mine sites had contributed to the sharp rise in passengers and planes at Perth airport.

But shifting those flights to the western edge of the Pearce base would demand a large amount of infrastructure and cause security issues, Air-Marshal Brown said.

It would not solve the main issue either, he said.

"I think what you would be doing is shifting the noise footprint from one part of Perth to another."

Civilian aircraft were not excluded entirely from the military airspace. In 13 months, 10,000 civilian flights had travelled through Pearce airspace.

RAAF air controllers worked alongside Airservices Australia staff at Perth airport, and both organisations were looking to harmonise their radar and air traffic control systems in the future.