The Australian Transport Safety Bureau’s safety advisory notice released on 30 August advises operators flying to Brisbane Airport to consider the use of pitot probe covers and, when used, ensure rigorous processes are in place to confirm the covers are removed before flight.

The release of this advisory notice follows the publication of the ATSB’s preliminary report into an airspeed indication failure on take-off of an Airbus A330 at Brisbane airport on 18 July 2018. The ATSB found that local engineering support crew placed covers on the pitot probes soon after the previous landing. Inspections during the aircraft’s turnaround did not identify their fitment and they remained on the aircraft for its departure. This resulted in unusable airspeed information being displayed to the flight crew.