PPRuNe Forums - View Single Post - 4 Ryanair aircraft declare fuel emergency at same time
Old 1st Sep 2012, 12:28
  #281 (permalink)  
Dan Dare
 
Join Date: May 2000
Location: SE England
Posts: 687
Received 1 Like on 1 Post
From an ATC angle I find multimple fuel Maydays rather chilling too. As airports start scheduling to maximum runway capacity there is often no slack in the system to make up delays. We are expected to sterilise the runway for about 5 minutes for the arrival of a fuel Mayday - increasing the chance of further fuel emergencies. Multiple simultaneous Maydays would perversely seem to delay each other - maybe we then have to break the rules and reduce sterile runway time, but that tends towards giving the Maydays no special treatment.

Airlines seem to be increasingly arriving with minimal holding fuel. Throw unexpected weather (and reduced landing rate) in to the mix and you get days like I have had where the special treatment of one Mayday has a domino effect so that you get multiple emergencies and practically no special treatment allowed for any of them. It is particularly uncomfortable to be on my side of the radio, but you can really hear the fear in a pilot's voice as they are approaching with insufficient fuel to go around in LVPs.

One day the regualtors and airlines will have to justify why they have done nothing about the reports of close calls when it does not end with relief.
Dan Dare is offline