QantasLink Moving From T2 to T3

[Todd Hendry]

You can board A319's from an aerobridge.

[Kent Broadhead]

Where was anything said about A319s?

[Todd Hendry]

Rumour. Bad one. But a rumour.

[Kent Broadhead]

Maybe if Airbus was giving them away - no other logical reason.

[chrisb]

What happens with Arrivals? Do they 'trust' regional security or will people be dumped landside?

[Ash W]

The rumour of A319's was strong until the top up second hand 717's were annouced. Anyway I would imagine they would have been seen in the west rather than in Sydney. So Dash8/Q400's to stay... Unfortunately...

Chris, depends upon the port. When Qantaslink previously operated from T3 Canberra flights bypassed security but most if not all the other ports the passengers were screened on arrival. At gate 15 which was where they arrived/departed they had an x-ray machine and metal detector at the bottom of the stairs. It wouldn't surprise me to see the same set-up again. The bizzare and annoying thing for passengers who had Sydney as their destination is there was no direct access to landside so you had to get security cleared to then walk to the arrivals gate and out again.

[Hugh Jarse]

Ash, you have to face it that Eastern will not get jets. Cobham, and now Network are the Qantaslink jet operators.

The jet rumour ran for the entire 14+ years I worked at Eastern.

For the whole time I worked at Eastern that security screening was in place, the PAX were either screened in Canberra or Sydney (on arrival). They could not bypass it when going into a sterile area such as T3, whether leaving the terminal or connecting with another flight.

That's the way it is.

[JamesL]

Correct, to add with the government making all trunk regional RPT ports having a security screening point, this practice will be phased out.

[Ash W]

Hugh, I realise Eastern/Sunstate will not get jets, doesn't mean I have to like the Dash8's though. As a regular from Canberra connecting to international the lack of full size cabin baggage in particular is what kills it for me. Sorry if that offends.

Also if you actually read my post you would see that I was talking about Qantaslink in GENERAL and even mentioned if they got A319's they would go west. As it stands Qantaslink got additional 717s which are jets.

In relation to screening in Sydney, again read what I wrote, if I am not mistaken I wrote exactly what you did, just in different wordings. My point about bypassing was for passengers who had Sydney as their final destination. It was a PIA to fly to Sydney only to be screened to enter the sterile area to then walk 50m to the exit and out again, so a bypass would have been good.

[Chris B.]

James, not all regional ports will have security screening. It only affects those ports where the max take off weight of the aircraft exceeds 17 tonnes. So basically anything that a Q400 or bigger that flies into a regional port now requires security screening.