Collaborative Decision Making (CDM) – History and current practice
On 09/02/2010, in CDM, by steve
HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE
The concept of Collaborative Decision Making (CDM) was originally defined in the United States by a group of airlines, led by US Air, in response to what the airlines perceived as inadequate co-operation between airports, the FAA and the airlines themselves. They formed the so called CDM Group, members of which visited several airports with traffic flow problems and analysed the reasons.
Significantly, they discovered that in many cases the reasons were in fact quite trivial. In one case, a missing telephone connection between the FAA tower and the Delta ramp controller was found to be at the root of major departure delays; in another case the “secret” nature of cancelled flights was found to be the cause of unused slots at an otherwise seriously congested airport.
The CDM Group in its original reports had actually established three of the most basic rules of CDM which remain valid to this day even if, unfortunately, in some cases they are being ignored. The three rules are:
• Most problems have simple causes with simple solutions
• Better information sharing eliminates a very large proportion of the problems
• CDM can only be successful if trust is established between the partners as the first step
Although the CDM Group did at first address problems at airports (Atlanta and Philadelphia) when the FAA embraced the concept, they focused on applying it in the en-route environment. This was a natural consequence of the US scene where capacity constraints were present en-route while airports were almost all free flow at the time. Nevertheless, US airports got involved in CDM early as a result of the FAA’s ground-delay concept. The value of information sharing was shown right from the start. Just by being better informed, airlines were able to respond to the restrictions in a much more efficient manner. The initiative in the early 1990s called FAA/Airline Data Exchange (FADE), supported among others by Northwest Airlines, can be seen as the direct forerunner of what evolved into the US CDM project of to-day.
When reality meets your dreams
On 08/02/2010, in Flashback, by steve
Admit it, you too have had dreams of one day coming face to face with a famous actress, or one not so famous but with attributes that made you feel weak inside just thinking about them. Think Pamela Anderson in her early Bay Watch episodes… I most certainly had such dreams but I must also confess that I had dreams also about a different kind of beauty, dating back to the days when the sight of bouncing tits was more cause for giggle than excitement.
I was may be ten when a friend of mine surprised me with a book he found in his grandparents’ attic, entitled “Duel in the sky”. It was a wonderful collection of short stories about aviators in WWI plus a few descriptions of more recent events, among them the story of the historic flight of an Air France Lockheed Super Constellation which was carrying back to Europe the signed copies of the peace treaties terminating WWII. That Super Connie almost ended up in the Atlantic Ocean, treaties and all, due to multiple engine problems… The radio operator on the flight was an ex-pat Hungarian and most of the story was recounted as he saw it from behind his crackling boxes. In the end, they landed safely in Dakar… I do not know how many times I read that story but it must have been hundreds. On each re-read, the Connie crept closer and closer to my heart. We were from different times, never to meet or touch, but she was there all the time.
Then the years passed and, with burning face I have to admit, for a time girls occupied my attention more than airplanes did… Not that much more and only for a time, but still…
Eventually I also learned to accept that those dreams about running into Pamela Anderson on the airport commuter bus were just that, dreams. You do not run into the icons of your dreams in real life. And then it happened…
Interesting people, unusual flight plans…
On 05/02/2010, in Interesting people, by steve
Noemi Kral – “Strive to feel, think and do, so as to bring something good to all”
Noemi is an airport expert at Slot Consulting Ltd., in Budapest
What were you dreaming of becoming when you were a kid?
I hope this is not too disappointing but it was not aviation at all… I was reading books from Gerard Durrell and was fascinated by the way he described the world of plants and animals. Later in secondary school I was attracted to tourism and the work of tourist guides but there were still no aircraft on the horizon.
What moved you to become part of the aviation family?
You might say it was a coincidence really. When I was looking for a University to continue my studies after secondary school, I found a description of air traffic control and this sounded really interesting. Subsequently I enrolled at the Budapest Technical University and some time later also took up hang gliding. The flying world was becoming more interesting every day…
Watch this take off!!
On 04/02/2010, in Life around runways, by steve
The Russian IL-76 cargo plane can lift a payload of 1 million pounds. When she is taking off on a warm and calm day in Australia, every inch of the runway will be needed.
Download this great video, shot from the tower, to see just how fine those Russian pilots had cut it. You can hear the Australian controllers talking (what a lovely accent!) as they “wish” the Vodka Burner into the air…. Don’t miss this one!
Hudson River ditching 3D reconstruction
On 04/02/2010, in Just to let you know..., by steve
It is hard to believe that the historic ditching in the Hudson River of US Airways Flight 1549 was more than a year ago on 15 January 2009. Much has been written about the incident and the captain of the flight, Mr. Sully Sullenberger has given us an interesting book about how he experienced this event sharig also his thoughts about many other things related to the highest duty.
EXOSPHERE3D, a company specializing in technical animation and scientific visualization of complex data sets has recently brought us a very nice photorealistic animation depicting Flight 1549’s movements from take-off to ditching in the Hudson River. The animation is based on the latest, most complete information avaiable about the flight. With ATC radiotelephony and the words of the crew in the cockpit perfectly synched to the pictures, watching this video makes you think you are watching live TV.
Check out the video here.
Order Capt. Sullenberger’s book here.
FAA Call to action on airline safety and pilot training
On 03/02/2010, in SKYbrary News, by steve
News from EUROCONTROL’s aviation safety knowledge base SKYbrary
On February 12, 2009, a Colgan Air Bombardier Dash-8 Q400, operating as Continental Connection Flight 3407, crashed while on approach to Buffalo, New York.
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) conducted a public hearing on this accident from May 12-14, 2009. During that hearing and subsequent congressional hearings on June 10 and June 11, 2009, several issues came to light regarding pilot training and qualifications, flight crew fatigue, and consistency of safety standards between operators.
In response to this information, on June 15, 2009, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and FAA Administrator J. Randolph Babbitt initiated a Call to Action on Airline Safety and Pilot Training for FAA, air carriers, and labor organizations to jointly identify and implement safety improvements, and an action plan was published on 24 June 2009.
The FAA has just published a progress report entitled FAA “Answering the Call to Action on Airline Safety & Pilot Training”.
You can get the progress report here.
29th DASC abstract submittal now open!
On 02/02/2010, in Events, by steve
Authors are invited to submit abstracts of 750 words or less until 19 March 2010. Submit online here.
Student papers and ideas for invited sessions are welcome.
Please avoid the use of acronyms or abbreviations in the title of the paper.
Final manuscripts of selected papers are due 10 August 2010.
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Track and Session Chairs Needed!
The 29th DASC is seeking motivated individuals for roles as Track and Session Chairs. These roles allow you to actively participate in shaping the DASC and provide great global networking opportunities with companies, organizations, institutions, and government agencies (U.S. and international).
Please contact Chris Watkins, Technical Program Chair or Tom Redling, Technical Program Co-Chair if you are interested in assuming one of these roles
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For more information, visit the DASC website.
kulula… what?
On 01/02/2010, in The lighter side, by steve
kulula.com is a low fare airline in South Africa. They are apparently bent on making type certification as easy as possible. Gentle reminders of all important items are available for the crew at all times except in flight. No cheating! Want to see more? It is worth it…
Quote of February 2010
On 01/02/2010, in Famous quotes, by steve
I do not want the peace that passeth understanding. I want the understanding that brings peace.
Helen Adams Keller
29th Digital Avionics Systems Conference (DASC) – Call for participation
On 01/02/2010, in Events, by steve
The 29th DASC will be held on 3-7 October 2010 in Salt Lake City, UT at the Hilton Salt Lake City Center. It is bylined “Improving our environment through green avionics and ATM solutions”. Conference Chair Bob Lyons has this to say about the 29th Digital Avionics Systems Conference.
Concern over the environment is very prevalent in today’s society and being “green” is becoming a product selection decision criterion for many on par with the cost and quality of the purchase being made. This is augmented by legislation in many industries to reduce the environmental impact of commercial product and service offerings. In the aerospace industry, this materializes as noise abatement requirements in densely populated areas, control of emissions from engines and auxiliary power units (APUs), and the disposal of worn out aircraft components to name a few. Digital avionics provide enabling technologies for green aerospace systems. Just as was the case at the 28th DASC, a dual focus will be maintained on airborne and ground systems.
The tower with a soul… 4
On 29/01/2010, in The tower with a soul, by lajos
Wrestling with the “furniture”
The huge control panel for the various ground lights, like the taxiway lighting, was next to the ground controller’s console. The control
panel was teeming with various switches used to turn various sections of taxiway lights on and off. The panel was variously nicknamed Christmas tree and railway shunting-yard. The multitude of small LED’s presented an impressive picture when night fell. There was only one problem with this panel, and also the panel used to switch the runway lights… you could operate the switches only through a very specific movement of your hand, something that needed to be learned separately. Not infrequently, the first attempt had to be followed by a second one… For some colleagues the frustration was too much with the result that we had to call the maintenance crew to restore certain broken parts…
Safety briefing – the missing element
On 28/01/2010, in Battle stations, by steve
This blog is about air traffic management. But, by the nature of our business, we tend to travel more than the average citizen and the pilots among us spend half their life strapped to the aircraft that carry us around. So it is appropriate to say something for once as a passenger rather than the ATM expert I often claim to be.
I am one of those passengers who actually follows the safety briefing, checks the location of the emergency exits and who has actually studied the operation of the damn things. I would hate having to read the opening instructions with smoke filling the cabin… I never take off my shoes until we are at cruising level. And yes, I do check that my life vest is under my seat and yes, I did find an empty container once and complained before we were airborne.
Recently however I started missing something from the safety briefing. If you look at the statistics, the likelihood of needing my life vest is distinctly lower than the need to know what I should do in case the chap or gal sitting next to me turns out to have explosives in his or her pants and decides to use it too.
Blogs, aviation and the rest of the social media
On 27/01/2010, in Viewpoint, by steve
When we started Roger-Wilco, a lot of people questioned the format. For some, a blog was not the right format for dealing with the serious questions of air traffic management. I could see the point in as much as a lot of blogs are indeed little more than a place for certain individuals to air their grievances about all kinds of subjects, many of which are of little interest to the world at large. But who can deny that they too have the right to publicize what is on their minds?
We simply had to make a better blog…
It would be easy to claim that I was always open to things like Twitter or FaceBook, but I was not. Especially Twitter
appeared to me the epitome of uselessness right alongside the male breast. FaceBook was something I could almost like but when they introduced the new “features” enabling users, among other things, to become “computer experts” by answering four or five ridiculously simple questions, I felt like running away. Seeing some of my most respected colleagues becoming such experts left me puzzled but no less determined to avoid FaecBook whenever possible.
LinkedIn was a different proposition right from the start. There one’s professional qualifications, work experience and other “real” things rule and people have actually found work when they were discovered by recruiters of major companies. LinkedIn actually reversed the switch in my mind…
But back to our blog…
The transition from AIS through AIM to IM – What is this?
On 26/01/2010, in Buzzwords explained, by steve
A global congress with this title will make even the aficionados of abbreviations shiver… AIS, AIM, IM… What is next? UR? Well, the funny thing is, the title is perfectly correct and abbreviations or not, it reflects one of the most profound changes ever in the way information is collected, promulgated and used in international aviation.
Let’s have a look at what is meant by those abbreviations and what their significance really is.
What is AIS?
AIS is of course the abbreviation of Aeronautical Information Service. This is the traditional, product based service concept that brings you vital information in the form of Notices to Airmen (NOTAM), the Aeronautical Information Publication (AIP), Aeronautical Information Circulars (AIC), the AIRAC system of information publication and of course the loads of standards and practices that come with them.
Over the years, AIS has grown into a worldwide system of aeronautical information provision that is both indispensable and for a long time was also a hindrance to progress in aeronautical information management.
How come? Well, let’s state right here and now that AIS is a wonder of global cooperation. It went global and worked well decades before the term “globalization” was invented (albeit in a different context). So, as far is it went, AIS was and still is in many respects an example to be followed. The problems came as a result of its product based nature. Raw data is collected, checked and collated, then published in “products” that represent a best-guess of what users of aeronautical information want most. In the simpler world of yesteryear, those guesses were not even so bad.
In to-day’s much more complex environment an AIS that serves everyone does not in fact fully satisfy anyone. OK, there are some really simple operations that are exceptions but they are really a minority.
Why was AIS a hindrance to change? As you can imagine, global AIS was not built overnight and they had had their share of troubles. Also, being State monopolies, AIS offices were not exactly reared to embrace change, even necessary change. So, even when the need for change was staring everyone in the face, AIS in some parts of the world pretended that everything was just fine. Change this well balanced system and face the consequences, they seemed to suggest…
Enter AIM…
Global AIM Congress – 22-24 June 2010, Beijing, China
On 25/01/2010, in Events, by steve
The Global AIM Consortium is pleased to announce that the 2010 Global AIM Congress entitled “Building the Future – The transition from AIS through AIM to IM” will be held in Beijing on the 22-24th June 2010. As usual, workshops will be held on the Monday ahead of the Congress, 21 June 2010. The Consortium is working closely with the Air Traffic Management Bureau of the General Administration of Civil Aviation of China which has generously agreed to sponsor this event.
There are a number of key objectives for the Congress. It will review the progress made in implementing the recommendations of the Madrid Congress of 2006 and then it will begin to explore the future direction of the provision of aeronautical and other information essential for the implementation of the ICAO Air Traffic Management Concept. The aim is to identify the key requirements for the future system which will draw heavily on the work of the European SESAR and US NextGen programmes. Senior managers from ICAO, ATMB, Europe and the FAA have already agreed to speak.
SESAR and multimedia
On 22/01/2010, in SESAR's Palace, by steve
The personal level visual communications facilities brought to us by modern technology have changed how we as individuals express ourselves and to an even higher degree how big companies talk to us. Traditional ads now sometimes resemble animated feature films and the on-screen safety briefing on some aircraft make us wonder whether we were watching a Pixar release and candidate for the aviation golden globe…
It is not surprising then that SESAR, the big European air traffic management research program, also makes full use of what multimedia has to offer…
Go to their multimedia gallery and you are greeted with video interviews (the latest just added is with Florian Guillermet, the Chief Program Officer), cute screensavers and even a number of wallpapers! These latter have also been added to recently so check them out if you fancy having the SESAR logo (and that of the EC and EUROCONTROL) lurk in the corner of your screen. To their credit, the logos are small and discreet.
I have heard people question the reasoning behind this multimedia drive. Personally I find it a new, refreshing way of keeping everyone aware of this important project, an approach to communications that is right where it should be these days.
SESAR will have plenty to communicate and they might as well do it in an enjoyable way.
Interesting people, unusual flight plans…
On 22/01/2010, in Interesting people, by steve
Guenter Martis – The humanist among us
Guenter is Director of European Affairs at CANSO (Civil Air Navigation Services Organisation)
What were you dreaming of becoming when you were a kid?
I wanted to become an inventor, like Marconi. I wanted to invent things with which I could contribute to the well being of mankind. In more concrete terms I wanted to be a communications officer on a big ocean liner. No ideas about airplanes back then.
So what made you become a member of the aviation family after all?
The actual trigger was a job opportunity at Austrian Airlines but the main driver was something else. I hated the idea of becoming electrical engineer number xyz in a big company. I wanted to be different and the airline job seemed to offer that chance.
So you think you understand… Descent.
On 21/01/2010, in View from the left seat, by alex
Continuing my theme that all is rarely as it seems with how aircraft work, particularly when pilots are equipped only with half truths peddled in early training. And pity the controllers who are typically left even more in the dark about such things.
Let’s think about how fast aircraft descend. The ab initio trainers pilots first encounter operate at pretty much the same weight day in, day out. The biggest change is when the instructor gets out for that nail biting first solo, but he (she?) typically accounts for less than 10% of the aircraft mass. The student, if not too terrified to notice, will appreciate a much better rate of climb, and may spot that the aircraft glides a little further than with two on board. Those trainers typically climb and descend at much the same speed which isn’t very far from their best glide or minimum drag speeds. The student doesn’t encounter really large weight changes and wide speed variations until getting into a real airliner for the first time. At some point, perhaps after the descent planning has gone badly wrong yet again, it dawns that at high speeds, light aircraft descend faster than heavy ones.
2010 ICNS Conference – Call for participation
On 20/01/2010, in Events, by steve
The 2010 Integrated Communications Navigation and Surveillance (ICNS) conference will take place on May 11-13 2010 at the Westin Washington Dulles Airport Hotel in Herndon, VA. The conference this year is by-lined as “The challenged of NextGen, new issues for aviation’s future”.
The Conference, jointly sponsored by government, civil and military, and industry, addresses long term research and development and early implementation of integrated CNS technologies needed to Enable NextGen.
The Conference is focused on providing understanding of CNS programs, longer term plans, standards development (RTCA, etc.), research, ICNS technologies, and the New Issues for Aviation’s Future that accompany NextGen.
Each day begins with a plenary session. Tuesday morning is all about Accelerating Implementation and Integration (I&I). Wednesday morning will focus on Interagency Systems Transformations, addressing multi-agency (DoD, DHS, and FAA) information sharing, and policies and procedures needed to insure airspace security while improving the support for each agency’s primary mission. NextGen Beyond 2018 is the topic for Thursday’s plenary.
Every afternoon, parallel technical sessions will be held on specific ICNS topics.
Is the industry ready for this?
On 19/01/2010, in Environment - Without hot air, by steve
The northern hemisphere has just gone through its snowiest January days in 40 years and polar temperatures reached as far South as Orlando in Florida. Sure, this is not abnormal some may say… but what if we do not have to wait forty years for the next episode?
An Air France flight en-route from Brazil to France encountered so severe turbulence that they issued a Mayday call but subsequently they completed the flight without incident. As we all know, AF447 was less fortunate.
Over the past 18 month or so, there were several incidents where unexpected severe turbulence caused passenger injuries…
And now the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) says, as reported in Aviation Week, that “climate change could be contributing to more extreme weather conditions at high altitudes that have not previously been encountered by aircraft”.
Make no mistake, although the current investigation of the crash of AF447 talks a lot about the problems with pitot tubes prone to freezing, there is a much more sinister implication here. Pilots are trained to handle situations where pitot tube data is lost or is unreliable… You cannot however train pilots to fly an aircraft with a wing or stabilizer gone. This is the point… who says extreme weather can only come in the form of extreme cold and not also as extreme turbulence?
The tower with a soul… 3
On 18/01/2010, in The tower with a soul, by lajos
In memoriam…
Luckily, this subject can be kept short. Our tower is only 25 years old so most of us have not yet had the time to get old… Unexpected tragedies have also mercifully spared the tower crew with the only exception being KG, who left us prematurely. But he made his name originally as an area controller and was active in the tower only for the last few months of his career.
Our colleagues of the met office one floor down did not fare so well… In the 25 years we are talking about, several of their colleagues flew west
into the sunset. The first to go was Guszti, I can’t recall his full name any more. He was of Bulgarian origin but spoke Hungarian without an accent. He was a relaxed, quiet chap with a ready smile and he came up to the tower cab regularly to chat up on things. He was the last person you would expect to have a stroke.
Two decades later, two met guys transferred to the heavenly observation post almost at the same time. UZ was only a little older than me and he too had been in the tower right from the start. He was a section chief when the note came that his time was up. Though he never complained, it was evident that he went through great suffering before finally being released from duty in this world. Just a few months later KJ left us so suddenly, we all shivered at the news. He was my age and he was a guy who worked out regularly. He actually died while exercising…
Sanyika's original vehicle
I left the story of Sanyika to the last, not because it is less important but because it is so extraordinary. Sanyika was the permanent driver of the van allocated to the tower. He was a very interesting character, it was impossible not to like him. It was his duty to transport us all over the airport, from the personnel entrance to the tower, from the tower to the company restaurant and to the offices in Terminal 1. He drove some 300 km per day, the Barkas van sort of becoming part of his body in the process. He was not at all offended when we started calling him our Centaur, part Barkas, part Sanyika… Well, Sanyika the upper part, Barkas the lower… you get the picture. In time, the old Barkas was replaced by a Ford minibus and the “operation” left Sanyika thoroughly unhappy. It just did not feel the same! And here comes the incredible part. Not much later, he passed away while waiting in the minibus. He died as he had lived… an inseparable part of our airport.
May peace be with you my dear friends, we will always remember you.
To be continued…
Station calling – Visiting Jeppesen
On 15/01/2010, in Station calling, by steve
Introduction
Elroy B. Jeppesen
In the aviation business, like in any other business, certain names rise to the top to be there for decades serving as beacons of progress and hope. Then some of them disappear, never to be heard of again. New generations grow up and for them names like Curtiss or Douglas or McDonnell do not mean anything any more. It is the sign of the times that in recent history we had to witness what was probably the biggest mass extinction in aviation history taking the likes of Pan Am and TWA with it…
Fortunately, others endure and continue to prove that by adapting to the changing environment, survival is possible. Jeppesen is such a company.
Perhaps best known by their aeronautical charts, often referred to by pilots as “jepps”, few people actually realize just how broad an offering Jeppesen has to support all kinds of aviation activities and probably even fewer people know where it all started or where it is all going for that matter. Visiting Jeppesen is like a voyage into the past and future of the aviation support industry.
I was a passenger on the A380
On 14/01/2010, in The lighter side, by andrase
Although Singapore Airlines is expecting to welcome its one millionth A380 customer in February (just 15 months after the inaugural flight), it is still not every day that you get to meet someone who has enjoyed this new travel experience. Our contributor Andrase is such a person and he sent us this report.
Let me share my experience of A380 travel by Singapore Airlines. SIA was the first airline scheduling daily service between London and Singapore using the 380.
At the beginning of November I travelled between that city pair and was lucky enough to be booked on the gigantic, biggest ever passenger airplane, the A380.
I was so excited when I walked through the checking gate and got my boarding pass. When I made the online booking earlier, I selected the upper deck. I was placed in the last section, just in front of the galley and the staircase, right behind the emergency exit to gain extra legroom. And extra legroom there was! Even if I had 2 meter or 3 meter long legs, I would have had no problem stretching them out straight ahead…
Who is in charge here?
On 13/01/2010, in SESAR's Palace, by pbn
Those of us who have served the airline industry know full well that what may appear as a monolithic industry (all airlines fly aircraft after all, do they not?), is in fact a multitude of differing business models, interests, attitudes, readiness to invest in new things, inertia, vision and what have you. Even within the group of legacy carriers or the group of low cost folks, the diversity is immense.
In the past, the airline industry booked its most significant successes in influencing the political scene as well as air traffic management when it was able to speak with one voice. That voice on the world-wide stage used to be IATA. The most spectacular flops were booked when dissent in the family silenced the common voice. Just think of the Mode S Enhanced Surveillance debacle if you want to have proof.
Is being blown up part of my human rights?
On 12/01/2010, in Battle stations, by cleo
It is bad enough that aviation is the target of people hell bent on blowing things up. It is even worse that there are others in pretty high places who will help them… even if unwittingly.
Violating human rights?
There is no point in denying that the aviation security system, including the extensive and supposedly fool-proof US elements, have failed miserably when it allowed a Nigerian guy with explosives in his underpants to board several planes on Christmas day. I can only surmise what his dad is thinking about all this when his noble act of warning the US embassy about his son’s activities went totally unheeded… Will he, or other dad’s in a similar predicament, raise the flag in the future or just shrug their shoulders? But there is worse…
Body imaging technology is a proven tool to discover this kind of plan. True, no scanner will (for now) see explosives tucked in body cavities but that will surely come one day. Or not…
The good ladies and gentlemen of the European Parliament maintain that full body scanning violates EU citizens’ human rights. In some EU states, the problem arises only if “sensitive” body parts are also displayed. Great! So what have the same nice, caring EU persons done to make aviation safer?
They decided that it was not their business!
While in the United States aviation security is seen as an important government task, in Europe security and its related expenditures are thrust squarely onto the shoulders of the flying community. Airline passengers pay through the nose for the privilege of not being blown up while politicians sit back contentedly… Would they be so relaxed if the threat was the same against the underground or the railways? Hardly!
Airline security does not bring votes… passenger rights and emission trading schemes do. So, focusing on the latter, Europe has never bothered to build a comprehensive, effective and cost-efficient security infrastructure for aviation.
Shooting their mouth off about protecting human rights and so eventually blocking the introduction of full body scanning is nothing short of being misguided on the grandest scale possible.
I would dearly like to know whether the MEPs really consider it preferable to be blown to kingdom come in the knowledge that no screener has seen their willy to arresting the one guy who is behind all the mischief. Makes you almost wonder: what is in the parliamentarians’ underpants?
The tower with a soul… 2
On 11/01/2010, in The tower with a soul, by lajos
Envy and other incomprehensible things
We were off to a turbulent start when the “old-timers” discovered that our starting salaries were the same as the salary of a controller after one year… we were certainly not to blame for this disparity but took all the flack nevertheless. Some of the more senior colleagues from the approach control unit had a few axes to grind also… it took a few years for me to find out why.
Flack or axes, we loved the tower work. There were four teams and I was in Team C, together with my friend ZG. This was a good arrangement, it was easier to make time pass together and we made fun out of just about everything. There were things most controllers hated to do. Like for instance having the flight progress strips torn off and inserted in their holders.
This had to be done the night before the strips would be used and the complement was for the whole day (we did not have just in time strip printing back then). So we started the night shift with attending to the strips while the “big” guys worked. Why they hated doing this so much was a mystery but for us it was a perfect opportunity for a fun competition. Who was the fastest at tearing the strips and inserting them individually into the holders? We timed everyone and we had everything from individual records to world records… Another activity apparently below the dignity of more senior colleagues was exchanging the soda bottles. The tower was supplied with a few crates of sparkling water and the empty bottles had to be taken to the terminal where they were exchanged for filled ones. This “catering” duty was just one more occasion to have some extra fun, for us anyway. Some colleagues back then would not be seen dead with one of those crates. Why I could never understand.
Interesting people, unusual flight plans…
On 09/01/2010, in Interesting people, by steve
Kathleen O’Brien – Houston we have a problem…
Kathleen O’Brien is an Associate Technical Fellow with Boeing Commercial Airplanes in Seattle.
What were you dreaming of becoming when you were a kid?
I loved to read and becoming a librarian looked like a good choice. You know how it is, little girls did not have that many options to choose from.
What moved you to become part of the aviation family?
I went to Houston with my husband at the time and graduated from the University of Houston with a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering. Unfortunately I found Houston a horrible place and wanted to get out at any cost. I was really desperate and would have taken just about any job that helped me to escape. As it happened, Boeing had an opening and they hired me.
What were the most significant sideways jumps in your professional life?
I have been with Boeing all my working life but inside the company I had a few moves right and left that qualify.
I started as a design engineer on the 777 and when the plane was ready things were a bit slow for a while until I moved into CNS/ATM. This was more avionics related and I was able to get the bigger picture… On the 777 I was dealing with the landing gear, brakes, tire pressures… it was just a piece of the overall product. In CNS/ATM a whole new world opened up for me.
Who said being serious has to be boring?
On 08/01/2010, in SESAR's Palace, by steve
In a refreshing new way, the SESAR JU seems to have cut the ties with the old fashioned way of communicating only in a somber and boring fashion. After updating their web site, they are now bringing us two SESAR theme screensavers and a number of wallpapers.
Who said being serious has to be boring?
I am not sure all the wallpapers are really suitable for the purpose, especially for those of us who keep a lot of stuff on the desktop. Some of the photos themselves are a bit too “busy” and finding things against that busy background becomes a tad difficult. But this is a personal thing and I find the initiative a very good one.
Screensaver 1 tells you the why...
But the two screensavers are really cute. One of them brings home some salient facts of the SESAR project and having all that data repeat on the screen while you drink your coffee is a good reminder why we are doing this in the first place.
Wings of Opportunity: The Wright Brothers in Montgomery, Alabama, 1910
On 08/01/2010, in Bookshelf, by steve
By Julie Hedgepeth Williams
Publisher: NewSouth Books
ISBN-13: 978-1588381682
When stepping aboard an aircraft these days, few passengers spare a thought to the many visionary people who have made the wonder of safe and affordable air travel possible. Even giants like Orville and Wilbur Wright are fading in people’s memories.
Stretching the matter a bit further, even student pilots will be hard pressed if asked when, where and by whom the first flight school was established in the United States?
Readers of Roger-Wilco will of course fare much better. Our recent post in the Anniversaries section gave tribute to the Wright brothers for setting up the first US flight school a hundred years ago in February 1910, in Montgomery, Alabama.
Now comes a must-have book commemorating the centennial, entitled “Wings of Opportunity: The Wright Brothers in Montgomery, Alabama, 1910”.
Published by NewSouth Books, the 176 page volume describes how the Wrights had set up shop on a cotton field a few miles from Montgomery in their search for a climate more hospitable to their flying than snowy Dayton, Ohio.
Forward-thinking Montgomerians welcomed the Wrights and heralded the school as a way to rise above the shadow of the Civil War. Local businessmen offered timber, vehicles, land, hotel rooms and even water to help the State’s effort to entice the aircraft pioneers to settle there.
Visiting Djibouti… 4
On 07/01/2010, in Battle stations, by krisztian
Sweating it out…
Everone had to have their temperature taken...
The heat didn’t seem to bother the locals, and especially not the people working with the national health service. As a welcome gesture from the land trapped between Eritrea and Somalia we received a thermometer in the ear and a H1N1 leaflet in the hand. Every passenger entering the Djibouti International Terminal went through this thorough inspection to make sure we were healthy. I still wonder how the thermometer registered normal body temperatures whilst I was sweating like a turkey at New Year.
Anyway, we were cleared of any illnesses and entered the small terminal, allowing us to start filling in the immigration forms. As fully trained professionals, we sought after a calm place to bow our heads and answer the questions while trying to write sensible sentences on melting paper. Ok, enough about the heat already, but trust me, it was really hot.
NOTAM goes digital
On 06/01/2010, in SWIM, by steve
What is a NOTAM?
A NOTAM...
There are a few things in aviation that have survived over the years with so little change as the NOTAM, in spite of its numerous, known shortcomings. NOTAM is a quasi-acronym for Notice to Airmen, a system of providing aeronautical information introduced well over 60 years ago.
NOTAMs… we have all seen them, worked with them and think we know them. But do we really?
...and the cranes it refers to!
A NOTAM is a text message, constructed using a code defined by ICAO and distributed via the Aeronautical Fixed Telecommunications Network (AFTN). It informs the recipients of immediate or temporary changes to the air navigation infrastructure, both airport and en-route. As an example, if a runway or part of a runway is temporarily closed, this will be announced in a NOTAM. There are several types of NOTAM but their essence and purpose is the same: provide vital information to airmen in a timely manner. In fact, the NOTAM is the middle part of the layered legacy system of information provision: the AIP (Aeronautical Information Publication) describes the big picture and the permanent situation; NOTAMs bring information about sudden/immediate changes and temporary changes that will exist for a short time only; and the operational radio, including broadcasts like the ATIS (Automatic Terminal Information Service), that announce sudden changes and continue to do so at least until the information is also available in a NOTAM.
The NOTAM offices of the world’s States are a legendary bunch of very independent minded experts, who know very well how important their job is and who tend to be slow with changes, however useful, lest the carefully thought out system fail in its purpose. Frustrating on occasion, it is hard to blame them for being careful.
The tower with a soul… 1
On 05/01/2010, in The tower with a soul, by lajos
Preface
The "new" Ferihegy tower
Having held an Aerodrome Control rating in my ATC license and having actually worked as an aerodrome controller, I have this “thing” for the most spectacular air traffic services unit of them all, the Aerodrome Control Tower. Not only is their role vital in running airports efficiently, they are also for the most part magnificent architecture objects, lending their beauty to the whole of the airport they serve.
A particular tower in Europe is even closer to my heart than the rest. Although I started my career in the old tower at Budapest Ferihegy airport and never actually worked in the new one, I did contribute to the airport expansion project which included construction of the new tower as you see it to-day.
Reading the above, you will not be surprised to learn that it was no accident that Ferihegy Tower was the second in our series on the towers of the world. Why not the first? That is another story I might tell you in the future…
What you are reading here is a new series, based on informal chats I had with Lajos Molnar, an aerodrome controller who, unlike me, has been there in the tower at Ferihegy from day one. We talked about many things but the focus was always the tower… its people, its soul, its essence that makes it special for those who work there.
This is the story of a tower with a soul as told by Lajos Molnar who has been touched by that soul and whose soul is part of that tower.
Glossary of Air Traffic Management terms and definitions
On 04/01/2010, in Bookshelf, by steve
Ever since my first tentative steps into the world of ICAO provisions and the hard learned lessons about the need to use terminology properly even to a fault, I had this thing about texts that were lax and inconsistent in terminology use. To put it bluntly, I hated them. Not only do they fail to convey the intended message properly, they can potentially confuse the reader and may in fact result in requirements being defined erroneously. True, in the end things tend to sort themselves out but not before a lot of extra, totally unnecessary effort has been expended and with no guarantee that every instance of incorrect terminology use has been taken care of.
Descriptions that call everything a system, where information is down-linked or up-linked instead of being shared or published, where the vertical distance from the aerodrome’s elevation is called an altitude, etc., etc., still abound unfortunately and I am in the process of writing an article expressing my displeasure and suggesting some steps to remedy the situation.
When my attention was called to a new glossary of Air Traffic Management terms and definitions produced as part of the Episode 3 project deliverables, I went to have a look right away. Obviously, the new ATM environment will be generating its own terms and definitions and proper terminology use starts with having wide agreement on the meaning of the terms we use.
Anniversary – First US flight school, established by the Wright brothers, opens
On 03/01/2010, in Anniversaries, by steve
100 year anniversary on 15 February 2010
Seven years after their historic first flight at Kitty Hawk in 1903, Wilbur Wright was scouting locations suitable for a flight school. The idea was to train a number of pilots who could in turn teach flying to the wealthy individuals who were expected to buy the airplanes manufactured by the Wrights. Perhaps it is important to note how the commercial aspect of aviation was already rising to the surface just a few years after the success of the Wright Flier…
Orville Wright and his students at Montgomery, Alabama, 1910
Wilbur was looking for a place with mild temperatures, not too strong winds and a flat surface. He visited several cities in the South, including Augusta, Ga. and Jacksonville, Fla. before coming to Montgomery, Alabama in February 1910. Frank Kohn owned a cotton farm just northwest of the town and this turned out to answer all of Wilbur’s requirements. The location for the flight school had been found.
The State of Alabama went out its way to offer incentives to the Wrights to settle there. They were offered land, lumber for buildings including a hangar, cars and trucks, hotel accommodation and even water.
Energy, the environment and hot air
On 01/01/2010, in Environment - Without hot air, by phil
The book. Free!
Protecting the environment and using energy sustainably are both of great importance for Europe and the world. The SESAR Programme for ATM has, as one of its business objectives; “Reducing the environmental impact per flight by 10%”. Other European initiatives such as ACARE and Clean Sky aim at improving the efficiency and reducing the environmental impact of aircraft and engines. And Europe as a whole has set itself some very tough targets for reducing CO2. But what technologies should we be developing and what is physically possible? Far too much hot air is being talked by politicians and companies with vested interests who either don’t know the basic numbers, or who wish to become rich by selling their own pet projects.
Aviation is often victimised as one of the main offenders. Yet without aviation how well would our modern economy function? Transport is essential to the way we live, but what technologies should we use – biofuel, hydrogen, electricity or continue to burn hydrocarbons? We also need energy to heat our homes, our commercial buildings and to generate electricity, but should we use nuclear, solar, gas, clean coal, hydro-electric, wind, tide or wave? And in what proportion should these be used if we wish to live sustainably and as comfortably as we do now?
Quote of January 2010
On 01/01/2010, in Famous quotes, by steve
The optimist proclaims that we live in the best of all possible worlds; the pessimist fears this is true.
James Branch Cabell
New series on Roger-Wilco. The tower with a soul…
On 31/12/2009, in The tower with a soul, by steve
If you enjoyed reading the sometimes incredible stories in Same Time, Same Place, Same Level…, keep your seatbelts fastened! The last part of Same Time having just been published, we are bringing you a new series under the title: The tower with a soul. This will be the story of the first 25 years in the life of the new control tower at Budapest Ferihegy airport.
Presented in several chapters covering the professional as well as the human interest aspects that characterized the first 25 years of the new tower, the series is not trying to be an official history of the edifice or the control unit it houses. It will be the picture as seen through the eyes of a controller who has been there right from the start. Factual, often moving, sometimes a tad subjective… but at all times a real life rendition of life in a tower with a soul.
Part 1 will be posted in the first week of January 2010.
Same time, same place, same level…22
On 30/12/2009, in Same time, same place..., by steve
Epilogue
We have come to the end of this irregular overview of the life of air traffic control. If it told you anything new, very well, if not, you must be a controller yourself… I hope I have not frightened you away from flying, on the contrary, I trust next time you step on board an aircraft you will give a thought to the controllers who, in spite of the human failings they might have, will be watching every move your flight makes, to make your journey as safe and quick as is humanly possible.
My time with the microphone is over, but there is a new generation of air traffic controllers working the airways, and I haven’t the slightest doubt, they will carry the flame as high as we did, and probably higher still. And in time, they will have their own crazy stories to tell….
Same time, same place, same level…21
On 29/12/2009, in Same time, same place..., by steve
Flying to freedom
This chapter had been written well before the fall of the Berlin wall and the famous opening of the border by Hungary, allowing thousands of East Germans to flee to the West. It is a nice quirk of history that the place where this story took place is just a few miles East of the place where the mass escape happened several years later.
That with a bit of ingenuity a small airplane can be used to beat an oppressive regime was amply demonstrated by the crew of the West-German Cessna that came visiting one Sunday afternoon.
Hungary had long been the gate to freedom for some of those poor souls whose fortune (or rather misfortune…) had left them east of the Iron Curtain after WW2. The trick had been fairly simple. Meet your West-German friends or relatives in Budapest, do a bit of surgery on their passports and off you go. The real nationals of the Federal Republic, who a few days later reported having “lost” their passports were promptly issued temporary papers and after one more goulash at beautiful Lake Balaton, they too would make their retreat. Of course, these earthbound souls did not have friends with an aircraft handy.
Only heroes and luck stop terrorists today
On 28/12/2009, in Battle stations, by krisztian
It has been a long time ago since the media last brought us news concerning the airlines and terrorism. Until Flight 253 of Delta Airlines departing Amsterdam bound for Detroit came in the news. Second day of Christmas brought us back to reality. If you want to know what happened, you can read all the news items concerning this event. What interests me more, is what went wrong and why. Even more interesting, how can we prevent this in the future.
A lot of comment has been given concerning the fact that the passenger who now is labeled as a terrorist, was on Terrorism Watch lists, that his father had warned the US government about the activities of his son. People pose the question: how could such a passenger board a US bound flight? But why try to find the blame in a paper carousel that is so far away from the operations on the ground and the true security measures that have been put into place.
Consider the following. All US bound passengers have to go through profiling. Passengers coming from connecting flights from anywhere must at some point before heading towards US territorial airspace go through the profiling process. This process was set up to filter passengers with evil intentions. Airport security, the x-ray people, are there to filter all equipment which might be dangerous for the flight. So, what happened?
