Brisbane in the spotlight

Sydney headlines aside a more critical scenario exists at Brisbane, with high traffic growth and a runway closure bringing things to a head. Traffic growth sees 210,000 movements pa – max 55/hr through Brisbane daily, online “radar” sites tracking 1000 flights in the area some days. Extensive holding occurred, peaking at around 40 minutes Thursday evenings.

Two thirds of the population live outside Brisbane seeing up to100 Qantas and 40 Virgin regional return flights daily. Some FIFO is scheduled or shared RPT but the erratic nature of FIFO can add 50+ more movements. Clermont with no scheduled services sees up to 4 Skytrans Dash 8 FIFO charters operating to/from BNE in close proximity some days – others none. Roma gets from 1 – 5 return RPT flights a day, Moranbah 4 -12. Tuesday to Thursday seem heavy FIFO days. Advice is it simply isn’t possible to smooth out demand by rationalising mine rosters