Dropline wrote...
I couldn't agree with you more. The flight crew I deal with would much rather have a proper flight dispatcher who understands weight and balance and can make on the spot decisions without having to refer to CLC than an untrained paper runner who can't even read a loadsheet, let alone check it!
On a practical level, it also takes me longer to send fuel figures to CLC than it would to enter them and produce the loadsheet myself...
I understand that using CLC saves money, but I do not agree with the way the role of a dispatcher is being deskilled, and IMHO it's only a matter of time before an untrained TCO or dispatcher fails to spot a CLC error and an accident happens as a result.
Unfortunately that is the nature of aviation safety. It is a tombstone industry. I for one am happy in the knowledge that all of our dispatchers, whilst not necessarily system trained, are ALL manually weight and balance trained so I can send someone out to a flight knowing full well that they know what they are doing. Dispatch used to be such a respected position. I remember a day not that long ago when flight decks looked to us as THE decision making authority whilst at the gate. Now the position is so watered down that flight decks these days just assume that every person who enters their flight decks claiming to be a "dispatcher" are in fact just paperwork monkeys.