HungaroControl modernises its operations
On 14/05/2012, in ATC world, by steve
Hungarian air navigation service provider braces up to face Single European Sky challenges
Hungarian air navigation service provider HungaroControl has launched a complex modernisation programme to meet new challenges presented by regional integration in line with the Single European Sky. The Business Process Reengineering project and the introduction of an ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) system will help HungaroControl continue to successfully provide its services under the new business and financing conditions and contribute to successful cooperation in the Functional Airspace Block for Central Europe (FAB CE).
Europe’s air traffic control system is about to be transformed and the functional air space blocks will be put into practice from the end of this year. The new financing model, which requires air traffic service providers to bear risks related to both costs and traffic volume, also calls for significant modifications. All of these changes will bring about new conditions for ANSPs involving not only navigational services but the operations of the company as a whole.
For this reason, in cooperation with KPMG consulting HungaroControl has launched a Business Process Reengineering project to further improve its operational efficiency targeting its back office and operational support functions (IT, legal and regulation, HR, controlling, finance and accounting, strategic planning, investment and procurement, technical services etc.).
The goals of the BPR project also include the introduction of a controlling system, which will support planning and decision making at executive level and quick responses to changes in the industry. The developments enhancing efficiency will be supported by a modern ERP and management information system.
The improvement of operational efficiency of the company and the preparation for challenges to be entailed by the integration process are key elements of the 5-year business strategy adopted by the new management taking over leadership of HungaroControl in 2010. The key modules of the new ERP system will be put in operation as of January 1, 2013.
Croatian airspace simulation starts in Budapest
On 08/03/2012, in Simulator world, by steve
As the first international project since the opening of the Center of Research, Development and Simulation (CRDS) of the Hungarian ANSP (HungaroControl) a real-time simulation started for the Croatian ANSP with the aim of validating airspace proposals for capacity increase.
Being the most significant research, development and simulation center of its kind in Central Europe CRDS represents the latest technology and provides skilled expertise for the implementation of the SES initiatives.
The key objective of the Croatian simulation project run at HungaroControl’s CRDS in Budapest is to validate new geographical sector configurations to be implemented by 2013 in the Croatian airspace. In addition, the simulation is intended to validate ATC procedures and new working methodologies. The simulation project partly deals with the gradual transition of the service provision to the BHDCA. The transition of the service provision is also foreseen to be implemented by 2013.
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Decennium of HungaroControl – Anniversary in the spirit of development
On 01/02/2012, in Anniversaries, by steve
HungaroControl celebrated the tenth anniversary of its establishment by handing over professional awards and holding a large-scale reception. The Hungarian Air Navigation Services appreciated the work of Anne Kathrine Jensen the CEO of Entry Point North, Qatar Airways and Thales Air Systems.
Hungarian Air Navigation Services became an independent company 10 years ago. During the preceding three decades, it was the Air Traffic and Airport Authority that performed the organisation and control of Hungary’s air transport as well as the operation of Budapest International Airport. In order to divide these two functions, HungaroControl and Budapest Airport were established in January 2002, and in this way, aviation in Hungary also involved three participants. During the past ten years, HungaroControl Pte. Ltd. Co. became a top-ranking service provider of international air traffic control, and one of the most successful state-owned companies in Hungary.
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In Place of Praise
On 12/01/2012, in Tower chronicles, by lajos
The end of 2011 is in fact the end of an epoch in the history of Hungarian air traffic control. I do not want to qualify this epoch, future generations might do that in the fullness of time. The fact remains, an important generation of controllers have retired. I call them the “beat-generation”. About 40 people have, willingly or reluctantly, chosen for retirement in 2011 mainly to avoid the consequences of the altered pension rules kicking in this year.
They were lucky in this also, like in so many things during the past 40 years. Our generation will miss out on any favorable terms of retirement, exactly because of the huge numbers in the “beat-generation” causing the strain on the State retirement fund to grow exponentially. This is why the age limit for retirement is being raised, a fact that affects our generation especially hard since the age limit is climbing in front of our very noses.
The “beat-generation” was lucky also in arriving at the airport at just the right time. With low traffic, they did not take long to learn the tricks of the trade. I have heard from them many times that they became air traffic controllers more or less by accident, they were working at the airport where they heard that aircraft could not only be flown but also controlled… Of course as time passed by, they grew with the traffic. They had another ace up their sleeves. In those decades, controllers were still a team, they knew how to stand together and protect their interests. This was the case when we came home from the ATC course in Riga after almost three years. They knew that our knowledge was superior to theirs (not only because of Riga) and they responded by simply closing ranks. At the courses held on home base they were present as instructors and they did their best to make us hate this business and to discourage us from trying to be more clever than they were.
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Emergence – Chapters from the history of Hungarian air traffic control
On 21/10/2011, in Bookshelf, by steve
By Jozsef Torocsik
Publisher: Athenaeum
ISBN: 978-963-293-123-4
We usually only review books written in English but every now and then an exception is warranted as in the case of Jozsef Torocsik’s wonderful book about air traffic control in Hungary. I hope an English translation will be available soon because it is simply unfair that non-Hungarian speakers should be denied the pleasure of reading what is arguably the most enjoyable account of ATC in Central Europe.
The beauty of this book is that whether you have an aviation background or not, you will understand every detail Jozsi is talking about as he takes you to the secret world of air traffic control and the wider pastures of ATC training in Hungary.
His own background in air traffic control comes vividly alive and we travel with him to Riga for training and get tears in our eyes when he relates the inevitable tragedies that are also part of life in this otherwise superbly safe industry.
The title of the Hungarian version of the book is of course not Emergence… this is just my attempt to translate the cute play on words the original Hungarian title represents. They took the Hungarian equivalent of “Emergency” (Veszhelyzet) and removed the V whereby it became Eszhelyzet, something that could best be translated as a “Mindful Situation”.
I know the environment Jozsi is writing about well and I can tell you, his stories are spot on.
If you are a Hungarian speaker, get a copy. If not, check back often, we will tell you when the English version becomes available.
In the meantime, why not read some more stories from Hungarian ATC in the Same time, same place… category of Roger-Wilco.
HungaroControl cooperates with Scandinavian Air Traffic Management academy
On 24/06/2011, in Training world, by steve
The Hungarian air navigation service provider and Entry Point North owned by the Swedish, the Danish and the Norwegian air navigation service providers are opening a joint ATM training academy in Budapest named Entry Point Central. Starting in September 2011, the future generation of Hungarian air traffic controllers will be trained according to the world-class Scandinavian training program and methodology. The new academy will also be open for other air navigation providers.
HungaroControl and Entry Point North have founded a joint venture. This long-term, cross-border partnership has been created with the purpose of increasing the level of initial air traffic controller training in Hungary, with the help of one of Europe’s most renowned ATM training center. In the long term, this partnership will contribute to the development of air navigation services in the region and the improvement of the competitiveness of Functional Airspace Block Central Europe (FAB CE). The first training course will begin in September 2011 with 16 Hungarian students at the joint academy in Budapest, named Entry Point Central.
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HungaroControl has opened its Centre of Research, Development and Simulation
On 11/05/2011, in Simulator world, by steve
Central-Europe’s only simulation centre is operating under the aegis of HungaroControl from 10th of May in Budapest. The centre, equipped with state of the art technology, was opened by Mr. Pál Völner, Secretary of State responsible for infrastructure, Mr. Joe Sultana, COO of Directorate Network Management of EUROCONTROL (European Organization for the Safety of Air Navigation), and Mr. Kornél Szepessy, CEO of HungaroControl (Hungarian Air Navigation Services) in the presence of the leaders of Air Navigation Services in the region. The aim of the Centre of Research, Development and Simulation (CRDS) is to aid the regional cooperation and the establishment of the Single European Sky.
To make European air navigation more effective and competitive, the airspace presently segmented along the borders will be organized into functional airspace blocks within the Single European Sky implementation program. The integration requires unprecedented cooperation from the Air Navigation Service Providers and controllers and it makes changes necessary to numerous procedures and processes, also the shortening of the air navigation routes. HungaroControl’s innovation centre opened today enables the testing of newly developed theoretically secure processes and air traffic controller procedures before their actual usage.
“Hungary does its very best to enhance the establishment of the Single European Sky, and for the successful operation of the Central-European functional air space block, the treaty of which we signed last Thursday together with the countries of the region” – said Mr. Pál Völner Secretary of State responsible for infrastructure on the opening ceremony. “The Hungarian Air Navigation Service Provider invests great efforts in the advancement of the whole Central-European air navigation and the regional cooperation. A great example of this is the CRDS, an innovation centre which is open for all service providers” – added the Secretary of State.
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Winter season survived at Ferihegy
On 11/05/2011, in Tower chronicles, by lajos
It would appear that we have survived the 2011 winter season without major hiccups. Events arose only when a bored office-bug decided to fabricate an elephant from a flea… Luckily either they were not bored enough or there was a lack of fleas but the number of overblown events were also thankfully low.
What was completely unique in my 28 year career (my goodness, 28 years?) is the fact that we had not a single day of freezing rain, this great enemy of controllers and pilots alike. Freezing rain makes the snow clearing brigade shiver also, making their work totally useless. When freezing rain strikes, they can spread all kinds of miracle substances on the runways and taxiways but the effects are short lived and within 10 minutes or so they can start all over again. But luckily we did not have any of this during the past winter season.
What we did have was a meeting of the group leaders, we practically started the year with that. Two noteworthy items were on the agenda: one concerned the reduction of paperwork the other an effort to achieve more uniformity in our work. In respect of the former we got the usual promises from our bosses who stated that the “project” was shaping up nicely… A bit more patience and it will be the end of paper journals, daily reports and paper incident reports (of which there are at least three kinds), everything will be done electronically. After two months I took the liberty to enquire: how was the project progressing? Because we always get briefed about everything except the important things, I mean the things important for us… And I think this is where the problems are, in Hungarocontrol ATC has been relegated to the peripheries. The office bugs who know nothing of the trade are working (?) so hard, they have practically overshadowed the real stuff. Even in higher management the number of real professionals has dropped to almost zero and the few Indians still holding out seem to have some difficulty in remembering where Ferihegy Tower is… But we do have scores of projects… As expected the reply to my question was, please have a bit more patience, the project is advancing but there are still a few administrative obstacles to be eliminated.
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CRDS Rising from the Ashes
On 09/02/2011, in Just to let you know..., by steve
Few of our readers will still remember the original goal of EUROCONTROL… It was to have been THE European air traffic control organization. Nice dream it was and we all know what happened. More recently there was CEATS, the Central European Air Traffic Services Program which was a bit like a Phoenix, the original EUROCONTROL idea rising from the ashes to integrate ATS in Central Europe. After years of effort and a lot of money, this idea also died.
Scattered in Prague and Budapest were remnants of the CEATS elements that had been set up as the first step in realizing the ill-fated project. Prague had the CEATS Strategy and Development Unit, Budapest the CEATS Research, Development and Simulation Centre or CRDS. This latter was renamed in 2009 to EAVU (EUROCONTROL Airspace Validation Unit) no doubt in an effort to reflect the fact that the CRDS was a viable proposition even after the disappearance of CEATS as such. EAVU or not, the fate of the Budapest simulation centre was sealed when EUROCONTROL decided to close it once and for all.
But HungaroControl, the Hungarian ANSP had other ideas.
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From tragicomedy to tragedy
On 10/09/2010, in Tower chronicles, by lajos
Earlier on I called the history of the Ferihegy control tower a tragicomedy. By the first half of 2010 it seems we have been left with tragedy only. There were so many sad and somber events that even a guy with an essentially optimistic outlook like me is left wondering… Why have we deserved all this? Are we such a hopeless people that natural disasters are not enough for us, we manage to add our own to it, lest anyone feel good and happy.
The first half of the year brought two new cases of colleagues flying west into the sunset, never to return. In the spring, Gyorgyi Kardos joined the ranks of heavenly met forecasters and more recently Miki Hamori left us suddenly, after having enjoyed only three short years of retirement. I knew Miki well, we worked a lot in the same shift. He was one of those rare controllers who returned to the tower from approach control and carried shift Charlie on his back for at least 15 years. I consider him a bit my forerunner. He too was mostly not listened to by our managers when in fact they should have listened. He was so full of professionalism paired with modesty that he should really be an example for the younger generation. It was impossible to get bored when he was around. He was full of stories and his metaphors were without equal. Not all his similes were for the faint hearted but they were all spot on and from him even the rougher metaphors were somehow acceptable and never offensive. Consider this: you are lacking like grunts in the Bear brand cheese. For aircraft descending unusually slowly, he had this: he was descending like a pebble in thick shit. Sorry for the rough example but it is hard to find another metaphor that would be more fitting. His wife was also an aerodrome controller and they retired at almost the same time. Sue, our heart goes out to you!
It is probably inappropriate to call a funeral nice but Miki’s funeral was both nice and perfectly fitting for a man who had dedicated his life to aviation. Light aircraft with Miki’s ashes and close relatives on board took off from Dunakeszi Airport near Budapest and they flew to Ferihegy where the ashes were dispersed over the grassy area alongside runway 31L together with the flower seeds people were asked to bring to the fare-well ceremony instead of flowers. It was hoped the seeds would take and bloom, bringing back memories of better and nicer times past. The airport supervisors formed a cross on one of the taxiways with their vehicles while this was going on, a gesture of note and nice sensitivity.
The area where Miki's ashes now rest
I will not qualify the rest of the happenings. I trust the reader to do that for us.
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Who shall be boss?
On 29/07/2010, in Tower chronicles, by lajos
The story started back in 2009, on 20 April to be exact. As you will see the dates are important, this is why I am trying to remember them exactly. It was on this date that I completed the usual yearly proficiency test and I was so pleased with my 92 % result it never entered my mind that it would some day prove inadequate. In any case, it is only normal that a tower supervisor should achieve at least 90 %, so I was satisfied with myself. You must know about this proficiency test that a simple ground-pounder has 50 questions to answer while a supervisor gets 60… One thing was sure, I could continue to work as SV. (Supervisor or SV in Budapest is the deputy boss of a given shift. DSV or Duty Supervisor is the boss of the shift – Ed.)
A while later on a quiet, December day shift an old student of mine (who is now the boss of the training section but to keep his ATC license he works a certain number of hours in the tower) turned to me and said:
- Lajos, the time has come, here is your chance to become DSV!
- What gives? – I asked emerging from the Supervisor station.
- TC is retiring next year and the bidding is open for his position. Are you interested? – my ex-student asked loud enough for the others to also start listening.
- Rex Lajos, what will become of us without you? Who will they send to torture us? – came the chorus of the colleagues.
- I have no clue. This is the first time I have heard of this. I will think about it. – I replied and returned to the SV station to finish whatever I had been doing in the first place.
But the bug had been planted in my ear. I was thinking, this would be the same group I originally became an SV in… the group where they had that great sphere of companionship, the group that was on good terms even with the colleagues from approach control. True, only two people remained from the original crew but I knew also the young people, if nothing else I met them during their training period.
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The tower with a soul… 18.
On 10/06/2010, in The tower with a soul, by lajos
Approaching the present day…
What a strange folk we are, we Hungarians! We complain when we have to work with an obsolete system and when it is replaced with something new, we complain that we are forced to learn new tricks when we had actually grown used to the old ones. This was the situation with the introduction of the MATIAS system that followed Eurocat2000 and whose introduction was anything but smooth. As I heard from “inside”, the new system was simply too complicated for many an experienced colleague and they were actually quite happy to profit from the announced cut in personnel. They retired and my generation had a chance to follow them up in the Supervisor positions. Their place was in turn filled with new hires and those youngsters showed in short order that controlling the terminal area was not such a difficult task after all.
All of a sudden traffic became much more fluid and they turned aircraft on final with a flair never before seen. This was a revelation for us in the tower. Wow, it can be done like this also! We saw the change clearly since watching traffic being handled by the old guard we often shook our heads in amazement, especially when the odd aircraft flew all the way down to the town of Kecskemet for a bit of sightseeing as a result of being cleared for descent and turn to base leg far too late…
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The tower with a soul… 16.
On 27/05/2010, in The tower with a soul, by lajos
9/11 and other events of consequence.
11 September 2001 started like any other late summer day. Unlike most people, I do like September. The stifling heat of August is gone, allergens are also mostly gone, and so I breathe easier. So, for me fall is not a reminder of passing but of a new beginning. May be there are others who think the same… Anyway, on that fateful day we were on day-shift. One half of our group was working in the tower from 7 to 9, the other was downstairs having breakfast or just drinking coffee. Switching TV channels, they happened on a channel showing one of the World Trade Center towers in New York belching smoke from a gaping hole in its side. At first they thought they were watching an action movie, except that this was a news channel… Paying more attention they soon realized that this was no action movie, they were watching the real thing! A passenger aircraft flew into the very building I too had visited a few years back. Soon the news arrived also in the tower cab and it gave me the creeps followed by a feeling of emptiness in me. After 9 it was us who watched the news and saw the second plane crashing into the other tower. We were not even surprised… But in each of us the question arose: what now?? Aircraft were still coming and going at Ferihegy airport but the news spread like wildfire and was soon everywhere. With this, a new chapter was opened in the life of the airport. A very dark chapter.
The years since have convinced me that the whole story was not what we at first thought it was, or rather how others tried to make us see it. I have been to the part of the world where they thought the enemy was hiding and getting to know the people there, I started having my doubts. I am afraid that behind this whole horrible event one will find capitalist interests and the push for world hegemony. What better proof do you need than the fact that since the change of leadership in the US, there are far fewer terrorist acts in the world.
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The tower with a soul… 10
On 29/03/2010, in The tower with a soul, by lajos
New politics, new hopes
The miracle happened in 1989-90. Hungary became independent, a sovereign State with free elections and a multiparty parliamentary democracy. That this also brought with it the darker sides of capitalism did not concern anyone back then. An omission we came to regret later. In short order we had to realize that it was not Paradise that had arrived but unemployment and the world of capital. The cadres who had a comfortable place under the old regime transformed themselves into capitalists, flashing in new guises while they divided the spoils of the transformation among themselves. In other words, the old party apparatchiks allowed the peaceful transition into a new system because they saw a stable future for themselves. They did co-opt a few new faces to make the rest of the population believe that a change had indeed taken place but the old cadres were very much present in the leadership of all the new parties.
There was only one good thing about it all, the Russian occupation force left the country (of course nowadays there are many more Russians in the country but they are tourists).
Completing the Russian withdrawal
The trouble was, in their new-found freedom the Hungarians dismantled most everything that actually worked well under the previous regime, something they should have thought over a bit more. We found out that our nation is better at destroying than building things.
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The tower with a soul… 7
On 22/02/2010, in The tower with a soul, by lajos
The great escape and some unintended consequences
With the future of the tower work no longer being really promising, a lot of the younger guys “escaped”, some of them going all the way to Canada! When three of them left within weeks of each other, we had no other choice but to reorganize the shifts so that each still had the required complement of bodies. I had to move to another shift, the first such move which was followed by no fewer than ten shift changes in the following 25 years.
I spent three years in the original shift when the orders came to move. This meant saying good-bye to my friend Geza with whom we weathered the difficulties of the first few years. It also meant starting in a new group composed of people I had never met before. But I tried to look at the bright side of things: new group, new people, new customs, things that can actually make such a change exciting in everyday practice. And excitement there was aplenty. I saw the sour faces of the others who were also forced to change shifts and this made me even more determined not to make the same mistake. In the end I found myself settling in quite well into what was then Shift B. I was glad to see that there were also humans in that group and even while the days passed with a bit less merriment than before, it wasn’t so bad at all.
As it turned out, my settling in was even more successful than I realized… I met my future wife in Shift B. She was a Flight Data Assistant in the Approach Control Unit. I will not dwell too long on this part of the story, let me juts say that I experienced first-hand the wisdom of the saying: don’t ever hunt domestic rabbits. The only joyful outcome of that particular exercise is my daughter who is now 22 and with whom we continue to have a very close father-daughter relationship.
Everyone and no one in charge
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The tower with a soul… 6
On 15/02/2010, in The tower with a soul, by lajos
A ship without a skipper
The first two-three years in the life of the new tower passed in the fever of newness and building experience. For us newbie’s everything was new by definition but even the older colleagues had to get used to the numerous new taxiways and the methods of using two runways. But everyone was enthusiastic about their work. Even the approach controllers who were attached to us for a few months at a stretch seemed to enjoy themselves. They discovered in short order that there was work to be done even in the tower and aerodrome controllers did more than just sit around the place. Slowly, very slowly a vision for a possible future started to take shape in which we saw ourselves as approach controllers coming out to the tower for regular rotations as a matter of course… What a nice dream this was!
When SG left, the dream went with him. As a young guy I had no idea why he opted to go back and once again work as a simple approach controller. I assumed the tasks and problems to be solved were simply too much for him and his health was also less than perfect, more then enough reasons for not wanting to stay as the tower boss.
His departure was a watershed event and it marked the start of the darkest period in the history of the tower. We were cast adrift, without leadership and things took a direction that was anything but European. There was nobody left to represent our interests unless you count the few division chiefs stationed in the main building who did occasionally show their faces in the tower to enquire how things were. But there was no point in telling them about our problems. By the time they negotiated the 6 kilometer distance back to their offices, they had forgotten everything we said. Once back behind their desks, they were immediately issued some kind of top priority matter to solve and so our petty problems always ended up falling by the wayside.
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