I think that the investigation has been very thorough and I am expecting to receive a letter from NATS management explaining it in detail. I am very impressed by, and grateful for, how seriously senior NATS management have taken this.
I think that we all agree that the fundamental issue was that the Class D zone itself was undermanned, in that one position was dealing with two zones and an area.
Thus, I could not get access not because there was not "room" in the Zone, but because the individual position was too overwhelmed by unrelated traffic to provide service in the City Zone and had been instructed not accept pop-up traffic, as a matter of procedure and principle, rather than based on airspace capacity.
The question, and I do think that this is a question for the CAA and DfT rather than NATS, is whether that's "OK".
I think that the GA community feels very strongly that access should be provided if the airspace has capacity, and that the duty on the controlling authority is to ensure that the lack of capacity is not limited by controller workload.
So the question moves on from what happened last Sunday, which cannot be changed now, to a matter of policy.
The GA community is already aware of one Zone/Area where agreements have been made to bandbox APP and TWR to the detriment of Zone access, and we are acutely aware of the threat to GA in the South East if the Farnborough airspace comes into being and then access is limited by anything other than physical airspace and IFR/IFR and IFR/VFR separation.
If there is a move towards, on the one hand, undermanning zones and, on the other, over prescriptive VFR/VFR separation resulting from "Duty of Care" considerations, then this must be a matter of consultation and debate, not of a gentle slide of culture.
I do understand that Thames/Heathrow has acute problems arising out of training for the LL Class D reclassification, and the wider adoption of SERA, and, under those circumstances there are bound to be periods of thin staffing, but I would say that if that is a case a NOTAM should be promulgated announcing that there are service reductions.
I have done my personal bit to mitigate future problems by filing an NSF, but that is not the principle issue. We must have a robust mechanism for dealing with reasonable pop-up requests as well.
The person I do feel sorry for is the controller at the time.
We've all done it. We know that the employee we are dealing with at the time...the call-centre operator, the waiter, the nurse, whatever...is powerless themselves to provide a better service, being tied down by company policy and procedures, but, nonetheless, we have flown off the handle at that person because they are the only point of contact with the organisation and the only possible source of an immediate remedy, as opposed to a long-term solution, which doesn't ameliorate the situation at hand.
And, later, having had the encounter, and having calmed down, we are all sorry that we have flown off the handle at someone who is not to blame.
It is that sorrow and apology that I would like to extend to the individual controller, whichever end of the bargepole he wishes to sit...so either this is my apology, or it is available by phone...his choice
