Last forecaster off air

Cairns Airport weather bureau to close

THE Cairns Airport Meteorological Office is set to close as the last local meteorologist was made redundant.

Bill O’Connor worked in Cairns for 20 of his 36 years with the BOM and said he was offered jobs in Brisbane or Melbourne before accepting a redundancy package.

While happy with his decision, he said it was just another example of government services moving out of the regions.

“There are no longer any forecasting services for Cairns by people in Cairns,” he said.

“I think it’s wrong taking jobs out of regional areas but they’re not going to change their minds.

“All cyclone forecasting for the last 20 years has been out of Brisbane but we’ve been doing a lot of work with disaster management groups on the ground up here.

“The local knowledge and rapport we have with people through Cape York is important and we have an intimate knowledge of the places.”

But a Bureau of Meteorology spokesman said aviation meteorologists across the country would be moving to two new national Aviation Forecasting Centres in Brisbane and Melbourne over the next 12 months.

The Cairns Airport Meteorological Office would close but the Cairns Observations Operations Hub would remain open with 13 staff.

Another six would join the hub in the near future.

“The Bureau will continue to provide Cairns with the same high quality service as it does all regional Queensland centres,” the spokesman said.

Watson Flying owner Ron Watson relies on forecasts for his flying training business in Innisfail.

He lamented the loss of Mr O’Connor’s position.

“You can look at charts and computer printouts all you like but unless you have local experience, you’re going to get it wrong,” he said.

“(Non-local forecasters) are always on the conservative side, which causes problems.

“Look at the cyclone forecasting, that’s bad, they tell everyone to run and hide when you don’t really need to.”