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March 2011 Archives

Europe's no-fly zone

By
David Learmount
 on March 24, 2011 4:15 PM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Thousands of passengers at London Heathrow airport last December were denied travel for a few days because of snow.

They were very annoyed.

Now imagine that all the passengers who turned up to fly from Heathrow for an entire year were denied travel.

Why? Because a report by London's Mayor Boris Johnston predicts that, by 2030, demand for travel to and from London will exceed supply by 55 million passengers a year. That is nearly as many as Heathrow handles annually now. The constraint is absolute: lack of runway capacity in the London area.

London will not be alone in denying millions of would-be travellers the ability to fly.

Eurocontrol's recent report on airport capacity has raised again the spectre of the continent's failure to meet air travel demand well before 2030. By that year, 17% of demand will not be met for the same reason: not enough runways.

Eurocontrol's director general David McMillan is worried that politicians have taken their eye off the ball because the current recession has reduced the pressure on airports. The new report, however, takes the recession into account.

In April last year millions of passengers all over Europe were denied air travel because of atmospheric volcanic ash. The rest of the transport infrastructure couldn't cope and Europe became immobile. Passengers were very annoyed, and Europe's economy lost billions.

Despite this enforced experiment in just how much aviation contributes to national and regional economies, the runways issue is being ignored.

Today the BAA-commissioned report on the snow disruption at Heathrow says disruption need not have been as bad. The main criticism was of lack of communication between the airport, airlines and passengers.

When snow comes again, disruption at Heathrow will still be bad, but passengers will be better informed about their cancelled flights. Disruption is inevitable at an airport like Heathrow that operates at 99% of capacity, because operating all flights at that level depends on good weather. The flow rate has to be reduced in bad weather for safety reasons, so cancellations are certain.

So, in the context of failing to meet the travel needs of 55 million passengers a year to and from London, the snow review is a case of fiddling while Rome burns, or maybe rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic - choose your cliche.

 Book your flights now for 2025 while stocks last.

 

Qantas crew and Travolta

By
David Learmount
 on March 22, 2011 10:34 AM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

 

Travolta 2.jpg

Travolta in the captain's seat of his Qantas-liveried 707

 

Like the Grease star says in the Qantas safety video, there's nobody I'd rather have in charge of my aeroplane than a Qantas crew.

But the crew seem to be taking themselves a bit too seriously, disputing Travolta's use  - in the video - of the word "team" where they think he should have said "crew", and also Qantas' decision to use this extremely well-known 707 owner/pilot to grab passengers' attention for the safety briefing. Some of them say they think it's cringeworthy.

When Travolta refers to the pilots and "the greater team", I hear him talking not only about the onboard crew, but the whole airline.

The Australian carrier has employed Travolta for years as an attention-grabber for the Qantas brand, because of his high profile and impeccable aviation connections.

Travolta 1.jpg 

I can't think of a better use for his talents than persuading the punters to watch the safety video.

Anyway, if you are still one of those who think safety videos can only be effective if they are deadly serious, this one will convert you.

As Nat King Cole didn't quite say, "Lighten up and fly right"!

 

 

Virtual airline, actual risk

By
David Learmount
 on March 17, 2011 3:15 PM | | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Now the Irish Air Accident Investigation Unit has published its initial factual report on the fatal Manx2 commuter crash at Cork, the emerging details reinforce my argument that "virtual airlines" should be made illegal in the European Union.

The AAIU describes the organisation fronted by Manx2 like this: "The operation of the flight involved three separate undertakings; a Spanish holder of an Air Operators Certificate (AOC) that operated the flight, a Ticket Seller based in the Isle of Man, and a second Spanish company that supplied the aircraft and flight crew under an agreement with the Ticket Seller. The Ticket Seller held a Tour Operator's Licence issued by the Irish Commission for Aviation Regulation." Manx2 is the "ticket seller".

At times in this brief preliminary report, it sounds as if the investigators were shaking their heads in disbelief as they wrote their findings. For example: "The experience of both flightcrew members is being examined, as the commander was newly promoted and the first officer had recently joined the operation."

The captain was new to command, and the copilot was new to the airline, its SOPs, the type and the routes.

Scheduling two inexperienced pilots together is not against the law, but it is against responsible codes of practice - and has been criticised in countless accident investigations including the Air Inter A320 Mont St Odile crash in 1992.

This crew was flying without autopilot, autothrottle or flight director, because the aircraft was not fitted with them. All licensed pilots should be able to manage that, but not many are required to. That is an airline choice.

Because of the rather basic level of onboard equipage, the decision height for the aircraft on final approach on this foggy day was Category 1 (200ft), even though the ILS to runway 17 at Cork is Category II (100ft DH). But passing 200ft the captain told the co-pilot to continue. He waited until the aircraft was passing 100ft before calling for a go-around. By that time a warning horn had been sounding for 3sec. The AAIU believes it was the stall warning. The horn continued, as did the descent despite the fact that the pilot flying acknowledged the go-around call, but the aircraft behaviour by that time was indicating a loss of control.

The carelessness that led to this accident is more likely to thrive unnoticed in a "virtual airline" than in one with properly joined-up management. The AAIU must decide whether this type of structure was a contributory factor, or perhaps even causal, and make recommendations accordingly.

The recommendations may not be adopted because, legally, it is difficult to ban devolved organisations. But aviation is different. Like the nuclear power industry, the consequences of even small lapses can be dire.

 

The virtual tower by DFS

By
David Learmount
 on March 16, 2011 11:33 AM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I promised I'd be back after ATC Global to report on the DFS (Germany's air traffic management provider) "Distant Aerodrome Control Service", or virtual control tower visual control room.

DFS plans to install this facility in its Munich tower to enable controllers to manage traffic using the new third runway if it goes ahead. The new runway, 26R/08L, is planned to the north of the two existing parallel runways, and its distance from the tower would be such that, if DFS were to rely on visual control, it would have to build a supplementary visual control room closer to it. DFS has chosen the cheaper alternative, providing artificial visual control in the existing tower, using high resolution video cameras to watch the traffic activity.

So this is an example of what the DACS can do, but DFS's brochure on the subject claims that the solution allows "location-independent control for aerodromes of all sizes".

If that claim is true, and customers decide to take up the option, everything I said in the previous blog item ("What do you need reality for?") stands.

What do you need reality for?

By
David Learmount
 on March 1, 2011 6:53 PM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A generation of kids is growing up who, one day, are individually going to have to answer that question for the sake of their own mental health, marriages etc.

But that's not the subject of this blog story.

German air traffic services provider DFS has come up with a Virtual Tower, but for controlling real aeroplanes at a real aerodrome from somewhere else.

They call it the Distant Aerodrome Control Solution.

Am I just paranoid, or do I see all visual control rooms (VCR) being moved to the nation of the lowest bidder for controllers' salaries and terms and conditions of service?

If that were true, relocating TMA control, and en-route first would make more sense.

To be scrupulously honest, I haven't seen the DFS DACS in action yet, so I'll withhold my judgement at this point, but at next week's ATC Global show in Amsterdam I will see it.

Anyway, this is what the DFS press release says (abbreviated):

"The [DACS] provides the controller with a combination of visual data on the one hand, as well as instrument and sensor data on the other. This combination allows the controller to readily review the air and ground traffic situation at the airport and in its vicinity. High-resolution pictures from video cameras installed at the aerodrome deliver an artificial real-time view. By means of a monitor wall attached above the regular console screens, the controller can track aircraft on the apron and runway as well as zoom in as necessary. The real external view is replicated as precisely as possible."

So Frankfurt's VCR can be located in Chennai, India, perhaps?

Meanwhile, for your information, a couple of years ago a rather more conservative plan for remote aerodrome control for London Heathrow was put into action for a rather more basic reason.

 

DL in virtual twr 2.jpgYes, that's me, pretending to be at the EGLL ground movement control workstation 

UK's biggest ATS provider NATS, which performs Heathrow's aerodrome control, has set up a remote aerodrome control tower, but without the simulated visual. This remote tower - not in a tower, and with no windows at all - is a standby workplace in case of disaster or terrorism.

Its existence means that Heathrow could, following disaster affecting the visual control room, continue to operate.

Unfortunately it could only operate according to very low visibility procedures. But at least a fair proportion of flights could arrive and depart, rather than none.

And where is this LHR remote tower?

Sorry, I can't tell you. After they'd shown it to me, NATS had to kill me.

This is a virtual blog from beyond the grave.

What the hell! Reality is redundant anyway.

But watch this space. After ATC Global I'll report back to you about the DFS plans.

 

 

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