Track vs. heading - an ATC Q for you pilot-types
Question for you. Our published noise abatement requires climb to 3000 feet "straight ahead" after dep. After asking why one his aircraft ended up almost 1 nm north of the extended C/L at 3DME, one operator's fleet tech. capt. (modern'ish twin jet) tells me it's because they can't set "track" on the FMS/flight director and hence it defaults to "heading mode". He takes me to task for not publishing a SID (answer: no continuous controlled airspace=no SID) nor publishing a point to which his FMS can take him on the C/L immediately on dep. Sorry-that's no good to me one little bit when Mrs. Angry phones in yet another noise complaint that departing aircraft are "off the flight path, going over her house (sic)". Is "straight ahead 3000 feet before turning" not easy enough to fly"?
Now then, when I learned to fly, I was taught that track and heading are NOT the same thing, a fact that has done me proud in almost 30 years of the ATC game. In order to track the extended C/L in a X-wind and with no "track mode" available on the automatics, why can't flight crews lay off the drift by a simple DR by heading, say, 5 degrees heading into wind, to make good the track required. Too simple? Does this not come down to basic "airmanship"? Or am I just a simple ATCO who doesn't understand company procedures these days and the way modern FMS/flight directors have to work? Your comments would be oh so welcome, pilot-people...