(I hadn’t seen Feather#3’s post when I wrote this.)
What no one seems to have touched on (or at least not in anything I’ve read to date) is the one huge difference between the use of RVSM in NATS (Transatlantic) airspace and European airspace: in NATS airspace, everyone is going in the same direction (with a few – a very few – in the opposite direction), so there’s little crossing traffic and almost no opposite direction traffic. In Europe, you have mucho-multiple tracks from all over the compass rose repeatedly crossing others.
Also, in the first case, there’s one ATC agency that issues the airways clearances to all traffic, (OK, I’m simplifying the situation slightly), AND all that traffic is on parallel tracks, whilst in the second case, you have a total mishmash of both different national ATC agencies issuing clearances and co-ordinating with each other - and to confuse the issue even more, (very) frequent crossing points for many if not most airway tracks. In this situation, given the volumes of traffic, RVSM or no RVSM, my hat goes off to the European ATCOs for the indisputable fact that they get it wrong as seldom as they do.
Spare a moment to consider that RVSM is being introduced in much of southern Asia in November. At least the traffic levels aren’t nearly as high as in Europe, and the vast majority of traffic is more opposite direction rather than crossing as in Europe.
I just wish someone in authority would bite the proverbial bullet before RVSM is introduced in south Asia and tell us all to fly offset enroute so that most errors – (when, not if they are made – the recent accident in Europe has just proven that) – would be ho-hum Traffic Alerts requiring no pilot intervention rather than Resolution Alerts requiring both pilots to act instantly AND correctly, something the recent tragic accident in Europe has also shown us cannot be relied upon to occur.
I know that such a suggestion would not have anywhere near the same impact in Europe and can even accept that it might complicate matters for European ATCOs with the many crossing tracks they have to deal with, but it would offer an improvement in safety in an environment where most traffic is opposite direction as it is in Asia.
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As 410, (the one who’s pushed this barrow the hardest on Pprune), has said here many times in the past, couldn’t we ‘bolt the stable door’ just once before ‘the horse bolts’ rather than wait for another couple of hundred people to die to prove that there’s a problem? RVSM’s going to reduce reaction times in any such error scenario by half. Why not stretch it hugely with this incredibly easy and no cost solution?