Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to the witnesses here.
I come from a remote region of Canada as well, the Northwest Territories, where of course aviation service is very important to us. With the difficulty with the changing climate we have in the north, we see that weather conditions are proving to be even more of a problem with aviation than they have in the past. If you examine the incidence reports, you'll see that weather-related incidents are probably one of the highest problems you have at the airports.
Nav Canada issued the following directions to their site managers in terms of reduced and low visibility operations. The responsible airport authority managers are cautioned not to enter into any agreement that places responsibility on ATS for keeping airport authority informed of these changing conditions.
Transport Canada has implemented requirements that airports implement reduced visibility operations when visibility is below half a mile. The only source of this information in many cases at all airports in the Northwest Territories and at most airports in Canada is from Nav Canada equipment and personnel. Notification is essential. You receive regular weather observations as part of your normal responsibilities. You receive reports from pilots and note whenever the visibility is below half a mile and a quarter of a mile. So you're not providing this information to the local people.
You have suggested that perhaps you can provide this through phone calls to local offices. Respectfully, many northern airports don't have personnel working at the office 24 hours a day.
So why are you refusing to notify the airport operators of this critical information, which you gather as part of your normal responsibilities and which of course we must pay for?