The Australia Desk

Steve gives a tribute to Gary Bittle, his flight instructor and friend, who recently passed away.

The Pacific Airshow Gold Coast was held over the beautiful beaches of Surfers Paradise, Queensland from August 16-18, and Steve, Grant AND Brian Coleman were there to capture all the action. It was the second year of the event, and crowds were noticeably larger than 2023, with an enhanced and fully loaded flying program comprising local aerobatic performers, military contingents from Australi...

What a difference a few weeks makes.... In our last report, we spoke of the difficulties new entrants to the Australian airline market face, and how it almost always ends in tears. With startup LCC Bonza Air exiting the scene earlier this year, we were full of praise for Regional Express (Rex), who seemed at least on the surface of things to really be kicking some goals. So imagine our s...

Grant & Steve return for an Australia Desk report; the first for 2024, and much has happened in the first half of the year on the Australian aviation scene. Sadly, in a case of "we told you so", new LCC entrant Bonza Airlines has ceased operations after 15 months , entering into voluntary administration on April 30th. Despite numerous reports of a buyer being found for the group, lessors had r...

It's an auspicious episode given it's aligned to the mighty Boeing Triple-7 aircraft (the originals, not the -X :) ) but the main news is that the boys are very happy to report that George Morgan, the surviving co-founder of GippsAero, has purchased the company back from Mahindra Aerospace . His plans are to re-activate refurbishments and rebuilds of the GA-8 Airvan fleet with a goal of reviving p...

Despite saying they'd be back next week, reality got in the way and the boys are back this week instead. They're from Down Under and you know time works differently down here, right? The Indo Pacific International Maritime Exposition (IndoPac 2023) was held between November 7th & 9th in Sydney, and Grant was in attendance, gathering content for Australian Defence Magazine . We take a brief loo...

Steve's recovery continues so the boys dive into the latest stories, kicking off with the realisation that the RAAF (or maybe the government) were listening to Episode 770 as the RAAF have been sent into Israel to provide repatriation flights for Australian citizens wishing to return home. Meanwhile, back at home, Qantas hasn't had the best of years, especially when it comes to reputational damage...

It's been a rather eventful couple of months here in Australia for aviation news and a little closer to home.  Steve returns to the microphone following his recent journey with open heart surgery, the result of a heart attack in early September.  The aviation podcast community was so generous in their support during this time, and we take a moment to speak to that and express our appreci...

Qantas has dominated this week's airline news so naturally this episode is all about them. We start with the news that long-time, and often controversial, CEO Alan Joyce has announced his intention to step down in November , handing the reins to the company's current Chief Financial Officer, Vanessa Hudson. Hudson has been working at the airline in various roles over her 28 year career, and her ap...

This week being episode 747, we decided to have a little fun and look at some Australian Boeing 747 milestones over the years. There are so many to cover, so these are just a snapshot. We highly recommend checking out the Aussie Airliners website for a superb reference on Jumbo's and many, many other types in Australian service. We also include a piece from our friend Owen Zupp who was one of the...

There's lots to talk about this week (no surprise given it's been two weeks since the last Geeks episode) so we're going to try to compress it into less than 10 minutes. Do you think we can do it this time without reverting to compression techniques or gagging Grant? Well, listen and find out :) Aviation pioneer Max Hazelton has sadly passed away shortly before his 96th birthday after quite the ca...

Accents?? What accents?? It may well be a matter of perspective of course, but following on from last week's discussion by the Geeks of Aussie accents vs American accents, we take a quick look at some of the challenges that can sometimes pose, from an aviation standpoint. Suffice to say, not all phonetics work: X for Xylophone, anyone? :) In the news, Virgin Australia has resumed flights this week...

Australia's newest airline, Bonza, continues with the rollout of its new route network with the opening this week of its base in Melbourne, Victoria . The opening comes as figures show they've sold over 100,000 seats since commencing operation two months ago . Will the strategy of offering budget fares for Melburnians to access the warmer weather of Queensland and points north be sustainable in th...

After a busy couple of weeks, the guys are back in the studio as Grant recovers from another weekend of air show commentary duties, this time at Benalla, 130 miles north of Melbourne. We discuss the role these regional air shows play in terms of promoting the importance and fun of aviation in the community. Meanwhile, the Army's fleet of MRH-90 Taipan helicopters has been temporarily grounded foll...

The ATSB releases their preliminary report on the Gold Coast helicopter mid-air collision, providing a high level overview of the facts gathered to date. Straddy Brewairy Tours launch a sight-seeing flight that combines beer sampling with views of Stradbroke Island then lands at the brewery for lunch (and more beers, of course :) ). Suffice to say, Grant is very keen to try this one out, although...

The boys have made it to the Australian International Airshow 2023 (aka Avalon) and have been kept extremely busy recording content for the Australian Defence Magazine podcast as well as the recently revived Plane Crazy Down Under podcast . Woo hoo! The show has featured plenty of military and some GA announcements but not a lot on the airline front as far as the boys could tell. In addition to th...

The boys were a bit cheeky this week as they were able to re-use a big chunk of the content they recorded last week, even though Qantas hasn't had any turn backs this week. Go figure! CEA Technologies will be upgrading the fixed and portable training emitters at the ADFs test ranges while the RAAF's EA-18G Growlers will be updated in alignment with the US Navy's aircraft development projects . The...

February seems to be anniversary time in Oz as it's a cracker time for a Summer wedding, but that's not been the case this week as it's been rather cold and we haven't (yet) seen any snow, and certainly none in Sydney. Snow however, was exactly what greeted a Sydney bound passenger this week as confusion with the spelling of the airport's name (and IATA code) when booking saw him arrive in a rathe...

Steve's a little tired after being recertified as an instructor...not for airplanes...but for trains. We discuss the similarities in approaches to training between rail and aviation, including one of Steve's more interesting sim sessions. Meanwhile, across the Tasman Sea at New Zealand's capital, Auckland, double hassles hit when first an Air New Zealand 777 took out runway edge lights on landing...

After the Geeks asking how long the boys have been producing the OzDesk, they start with a bit of history and how they started submitting news via email, then recording separately until, on Episode 52 in June 2009, the first OzDesk was heard. With almost 300 OzDesks produced, Grant's very happy that he's only had to admit this next bit very few times. Yes, Grant was wr... He was incorr... OK, yeah...

It's been only a week and the boys are back with a new OzDesk which could be setting a bit of a trend, but they had to come back to talk about the big big news. Yes, it was rumour when they recorded last week and it was still rumour when the Geeks released Episode 732, but now it's fact: Bonza has received its Air Operators Certificate (AOC). The boys note that Bonza will be avoiding Brisbane and...

Wow, it's 2023 and the boys are back so hopefully they can get a few extra episodes into the feed this year. Meanwhile, Grant's been loading historical OzDesk segments into the Australia Desk website and hopes to get the full backlog loaded soon. The big news at present is the fatal collision of two tourist helicopters from the Sea World marine park on the Gold Coast in Australia. It was rather ho...

Steve & Grant note that since the last episode we've lost Glen Towler from NZ and Grant's Dad Jim while also noting the anniversary of Steve's father's passing. After a small discussion on how both fathers were influential in the boys getting into aviation, we get into a couple of news stories. Australia's newest airline is called Bonza (IATA: AB). Strewth, right? Bonza 's first aircraft has a...

The boys knew they'd be back with AusDesk episodes in 2022 but didn't think it would take quite *this* long to get one produced. Suffice to say, they've picked one of the busiest times in aviation Down Under to come back with lots of things to cover, so lets crack on with them: We start with the big news from Qantas, but it's not their long awaited purchase of Alliance Aviation I nstead, it's Qant...

There's been a grave disturbance in the Force as another military platform gets retired (but not for long) and Qantas announces it's replacing its Boeing 737-800s with aircraft from the A320 family. You bet the boys will have commentary and opinions on these matters, so here they are: Army have withdrawn their S-70-A9 Blackhawk fleet from service in a subdued ceremony right around the same time th...