I don’t see what the big problem is. I’ve been flying when the Airways Control Centre has been evacuated. They instigate TIBA (Traffic Information Broadcasts from Aircraft), so all aircraft flying in a certain area transfer across to another frequency that is monitored by a local control tower.

We broadcast our position and intentions and go back to basics and seperate ourselves from the other traffic and land at our destinations. It really isn’t that hard, you just talk directly to the other aircraft to find out who is around you and manage your climb or descent with the other aircraft around you. We get far more complex problems to deal with in the simulator training every 6 months. It’s just that once we land, we can’t depart until things are operational again.

Unfortunately, aviation is a victim of its own success. It has become so reliable that passengers don’t realise the hundreds of things that have to go right to get a flight away successfully. But do notice when one of the big ones fails. As I tell my crew when we start work each day, the schedule is just a guideline, we only depart when we are ready and I’ll put the park brake on and stop immediately if anyone has any concerns. Frankly, Getting you there on time always comes second to getting there alive.

So to those who want to eliminate the whole risk out of Airways, where would you put the control centres? Anywhere South of the Manawatu is a high risk of earthquakes, North of the Manawatu has volcanoes, the Manawatu has farmers and contractors who cut the Airways Fibre Link (that cable has been cut three times in five years, there was one outage where both the primary and secondary cables were cut in different places at the same time, so why don’t be build 3 or 4 or 765 cables just in case they get cut?).