Airspace unmanned on key flight paths

[Rhys Xanthis]

Originally Posted by news.com.au

PILOTS are being forced to guide planes in NSW this evening because of a shortage of air traffic controllers.

The shortage means an area north-west of Canberra, normally covered by controllers in Melbourne, is unmanned.

A spokeswoman for Airservices Australia, the government body in charge of air traffic control management, said the shortage was affecting flights between Sydney and Melbourne, and Canberra and Sydney.

The area would be unmanned between 8pm and 10pm (AEST).

The Airservices Australia spokeswoman said airlines had been advised of the problem earlier today, and it was up to them whether they continued with their flights, diverted them away from the affected area, or delayed them.

Pilots could guide their own planes through the air space without the air traffic controllers, she said.

The spokeswoman said the area in question was usually monitored by air traffic controllers from Melbourne but tonight there were not enough to do the job.

She did not know why there was a staff shortage, and was not aware of any industrial action taking place.

"I don't have the detail,'' she said.

The spokeswoman expressed regret at the incident.

"We regret that we don't have the full services available,'' she said.

When asked if this was a rare occurrence, she said there had been some similar "outages'' last weekend.

She did not know how many flights had been affected.

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599...-29277,00.html

Interesting...this happened in Perth a few months ago...perhaps we are destined to see more of this happening?