I know I’m oversimplifying, but for the life of me, I can’t understand the drama about second runway usage and the rest the points being debated on this thread. To me, commercial considerations come a very distant last to damn near everything else when ever diminishing fuel in tanks is on my mind.
As a line driver, Heathrow, (and most of Europe), whilst demanding in some ways is absolutely wonderful to operate into because 99.9999% of the time it has remarkably reliable weather reporting (what’s reported is what you get) and – most importantly – an ATC system (read ATCOs) you can trust implicitly to do the best job it’s possible to do if something unforeseen should occur causing my pucker factor to rocket to Warp Factor ‘n’.
As I’ve mentioned already on this thread, fuel planning for Heathrow – like any port – isn’t rocket science, and I daresay 99% of pilots would agree and have a very similar system to my own which avoids any semblance of an ‘edge of the seat’ operation, even when they are short on fuel. The magic word is ‘planning’. If you’ve planned correctly, there should not be any nail biting involved.
Before I commence descent, I calculate and write down my minimum divert fuel to all my nominated diversion fields in order of preference. If holding, I add to these figures whatever fuel I believe I’ll burn between the holding point and the threshold.
Fact 1: if still in the hold, once I go below the sum of those two figures for an individual diversion field, that field is no longer an option. So, if there’s no second runway at the destination, or the second runway isn’t suitable to nominate as an alternate because of weather or other considerations, it’s simple – I divert when I reach this fuel figure.
Fact 2: unless I reach my min diversion fuel at the very instant the aircraft crosses the threshold at my destination and then I’m forced to go around and divert to my alternate, I will arrive at the diversion field with more than final reserves – sometimes quite a lot more, even if I remain in the hold right up to my last diversion time. Particularly if I divert from the holding pattern at altitude, (say 7000’), I will not have burned the fuel I would have burned between the holding beacon and the threshold. (For my type, at Heathrow, that’s at least 1.1 tonnes – (I allow 1.3T, ‘cos I’m a wimp) – between Lamborne and R/W 27. I allow 1.5T if 09 is in use.)
I will also not have burned the quite large amount of fuel a missed approach from the minimums would have cost me. At Lamborne, I’m also quite a bit closer to most of my diversion fields, (particularly Stansted), than I would have been if diverting from the threshold. So, even holding at destination right up to the last possible moment, in most circumstances, I’ll have quite a bit of fat to play with upon reaching my alternate.
Personally, if holding, I tell ATC quite early in the piece what my last divert time will be. I amend that as required, (the frequent descents in the hold as I move closer to the head of the queue usually save a few hundred kilos of fuel, allowing me to stretch the last divert time somewhat). If I haven’t been cleared from the hold as my last divert time approaches, I’ll tell ATC I can extend my hold until time ‘n’ nominating the second runway as my alternate – and make it clear that I will have no other diversion options. This gives the ATCO the opportunity to tell me whether he’ll accept that. (On one occasion, he told me that he expected the EAT to stretch beyond that time, so that option wasn’t available to me.) If for any reason he won’t accept my nomination of the second runway, I’m out of there.
If he accepts my use of the second runway as an alternate and I’m approaching my final reserve plus what I’m going to burn to reach the threshold, I’ll give him a ‘heads up’ to say that I must commence my approach by time ‘n’. If that time arrives and he hasn’t cleared me to commence the approach, there’s no discussion – it’s a MAYDAY. (I can’t see that it’s anything less than that. In my opinion, there’s aren’t too many situations that come to mind that are more pressing in a big jet than running out of noise.)
Similarly if I get to my alternate and for one reason or another it seems I’m going to land with less than final reserves, it’s a MAYDAY.
I look forward to hearing from others with different – and quite possibly better – plans of attack.