GATWICK
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Lisbon
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and least my driving is better than Joua from Portugal and his fellow Countrymen)
In the past, I was a semi professional rally driver
These days I just like to drive slow and safe, but skilfully.
This guy was my hero Hernando da Silva Ramos - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia and this is the supply of my 'handle', unfortunately I was not good enough for race cars, but rally was good for me.
Join Date: Mar 2008
Location: Newcastle NI
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Cut them some slack
I am 100% sure that the staff are working flat out to get LGW (and EDI/LBA & so on) open, the UK is a funny place snow wise and the like of GVA & PRG know they will get a dump of snow every year and are therefore geared up for it.
Perhaps the UK & not just the airports need a rethink on the issue of snow, most modern cars run on low profile tyres that great on dry and wet roads but way too wide for snow, in PRG & GVA and most snow prone European countries they have a set of winter tyres that go on from the first of November and stay on until the end of April.
We have spent years in this country making anyone who drives a 4 wheel drive car feel like a leper and now tax them accordingly!!
This with weather will have a huge impact on Easyjet and i guess Jet2 will be praying that this isn't a sign of the winter to come up at Leeds, i can remember years ago at Leeds multi day closures due to snow, but there was only a few flights a day back then!!
Perhaps the UK & not just the airports need a rethink on the issue of snow, most modern cars run on low profile tyres that great on dry and wet roads but way too wide for snow, in PRG & GVA and most snow prone European countries they have a set of winter tyres that go on from the first of November and stay on until the end of April.
We have spent years in this country making anyone who drives a 4 wheel drive car feel like a leper and now tax them accordingly!!
This with weather will have a huge impact on Easyjet and i guess Jet2 will be praying that this isn't a sign of the winter to come up at Leeds, i can remember years ago at Leeds multi day closures due to snow, but there was only a few flights a day back then!!
Join Date: Feb 2010
Location: cardiff
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How many snow ploughs/blowers?
Anybody know how many snow blowers and ploughs Gatwick has quick access too - and qualified/experienced drivers?
I read last year that Heathrow had access to 75 snow ploughs which sounds like one hell of a lot of machinery to keep servicable on standby year after year and presumably under cover.
Then there's sweepers and anti-icing rigs - the list goes on. Its a staggering amount of expensive kit to have around for once in a blue moon - although three years on the trot now sounds like this is normal, it isn't.
I read last year that Heathrow had access to 75 snow ploughs which sounds like one hell of a lot of machinery to keep servicable on standby year after year and presumably under cover.
Then there's sweepers and anti-icing rigs - the list goes on. Its a staggering amount of expensive kit to have around for once in a blue moon - although three years on the trot now sounds like this is normal, it isn't.
Join Date: Feb 2010
Location: cardiff
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Just read a news item that said Gatwick only has eight ploughs - that's ridiculous! If true, then BAA must have nicked a load when they flogged the place and taken them off to Stanstead or Heathrow!
No longer snoclo according to latest weather -
2010/12/02 20:50
EGKK 022050Z 03008KT 9999 -SN BKN009 M02/M03 Q1009 582900//
2010/12/02 20:50
EGKK 022050Z 03008KT 9999 -SN BKN009 M02/M03 Q1009 582900//
Join Date: Dec 2000
Location: Horsham, England, UK. ---o--O--o---
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MON300P (GMAJS) is on short final for 08L.
We are 2 miles from LGW and we have 14 ins of snow in the garden!
We have had no post for 2 days and i am waiting for 2 courier deliveries and it is too bad for them to get here
The roads are awful locally and with no trains and no buses LGW would have had a job getting staff in
HOPEFULLY things will improve tomorrow!
We have had no post for 2 days and i am waiting for 2 courier deliveries and it is too bad for them to get here
The roads are awful locally and with no trains and no buses LGW would have had a job getting staff in
HOPEFULLY things will improve tomorrow!
Living almost by Heathrow, there hasn't seemed to be the same amount of arrivals or departures and we've just had a smattering of snow, at most 2 inches, and that quickly melted.
I do have an early flight scheduled out of Gatwick Sunday morning, so it's reassuring that it seems as if they now have something flying.
However, faced with an early morning drive, what are the road conditions on M25 and M23, so I can plan at what ungodly hour I need to leave. And I'm told ".....Due to changes in security measures, we strongly recommend all passengers arrive at the airport 2 hours before your departure to ensure you allow sufficient time to get to your boarding gate."
So can someone sensibly give me the latest motorway road conditions, as it's all very well if the planes are now flying, but still impassable to get to the Terminal!!
TIA
I do have an early flight scheduled out of Gatwick Sunday morning, so it's reassuring that it seems as if they now have something flying.
However, faced with an early morning drive, what are the road conditions on M25 and M23, so I can plan at what ungodly hour I need to leave. And I'm told ".....Due to changes in security measures, we strongly recommend all passengers arrive at the airport 2 hours before your departure to ensure you allow sufficient time to get to your boarding gate."
So can someone sensibly give me the latest motorway road conditions, as it's all very well if the planes are now flying, but still impassable to get to the Terminal!!
TIA
LGW is using 8R-have just read that NAX are ferrying some empty a/c out this evening-poss what i heard depart a while ago!
hopefully all will be ok for tomorrow-meant to be -10c here tonight!
hopefully all will be ok for tomorrow-meant to be -10c here tonight!
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: United Kingdom
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I'm 7 miles due west of Gatwick as the planes fly in (directly overhead here when they land from the west) and we have only had 6 to 7 inches of snow. So as a lot of you seem to agree on 15 inches at Gatwick they must have picked up a lot more snow.
However It does seem very strange the airport has just been closed for days as this snow is like powder snow and is easily shovellable. It hasn't been compacted and hardened in to a huge thick ice blanket.
Even if the new management of Gatwick have taken a disturbingly short term view on snow clearing equipment I would have thought all the airport terminal employees could have been put to work with shovels and cleared it in a day (but I obviously forgot that health and safety no longer allows the staff to do this without a 6 week training course first
).
I would also be suspicious that for Easyjet it is probably much cheaper for the whole airport to simply close completely each day as they then simply tell all their own pilots and cabin crew not to turn up and I would expect don't have to pay them for the day, whereas if they try to get the airport open for a few hours they have to pay all the check in staff and cabin crew to be there even if only a handful of flights get away and may well also avoid contractual liabilities to put anyone up overnight if it has been well announced in advance by the national media that Gatwick is simply totally closed until further notice. Also the equal incompetence of Southern Railway and/or Network Rail in not having adequate equipment to clear the most important line on Southern's network (Victoria to Brighton) doesn't exactly give the airport much incentive to bother opening until that problem is also satisfactorily addressed.
Surely BAA must have nicked a lot of the snow ploughs (or rather the new operators weren't willing to pay the price they were asked) as up to now its only been Luton of the London airports that has had these kind of problems with a prolonged snow caused closure.
However It does seem very strange the airport has just been closed for days as this snow is like powder snow and is easily shovellable. It hasn't been compacted and hardened in to a huge thick ice blanket.
Even if the new management of Gatwick have taken a disturbingly short term view on snow clearing equipment I would have thought all the airport terminal employees could have been put to work with shovels and cleared it in a day (but I obviously forgot that health and safety no longer allows the staff to do this without a 6 week training course first
).I would also be suspicious that for Easyjet it is probably much cheaper for the whole airport to simply close completely each day as they then simply tell all their own pilots and cabin crew not to turn up and I would expect don't have to pay them for the day, whereas if they try to get the airport open for a few hours they have to pay all the check in staff and cabin crew to be there even if only a handful of flights get away and may well also avoid contractual liabilities to put anyone up overnight if it has been well announced in advance by the national media that Gatwick is simply totally closed until further notice. Also the equal incompetence of Southern Railway and/or Network Rail in not having adequate equipment to clear the most important line on Southern's network (Victoria to Brighton) doesn't exactly give the airport much incentive to bother opening until that problem is also satisfactorily addressed.
Surely BAA must have nicked a lot of the snow ploughs (or rather the new operators weren't willing to pay the price they were asked) as up to now its only been Luton of the London airports that has had these kind of problems with a prolonged snow caused closure.
Join Date: Jan 2006
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I see that this morning's partial reopening of Gatwick (limited services etc) coincides with National Rail/Southern finally having got their act together to also begin operating train service to the airport as of around 4am this morning on a half hourly basis.
Call me cynical if you like but it would appear that the Gatwick management seemed to think there was little point in reopening the airport if the rail service connection also did not exist.
Its also interesting to speculate why it is that the only flight Easyjet seems to be managing to operate today is the one to Ivalo. Is this because that particular pilot is used to landing on and taking off from an ice covered runway.
Call me cynical if you like but it would appear that the Gatwick management seemed to think there was little point in reopening the airport if the rail service connection also did not exist.
Its also interesting to speculate why it is that the only flight Easyjet seems to be managing to operate today is the one to Ivalo. Is this because that particular pilot is used to landing on and taking off from an ice covered runway.
Join Date: Sep 2006
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Good to see Gatwick is open again. I know for a fact that Gatwick has bought new snow clearing equipment this year, I also know that a neighbour who works on the snow clearing team left for work on Monday and has not returned since.
I'd guess the issue was that it was snowing all day on Wednesday and off and on on Thursday which meant that as the surfaces were cleared they were covered again.
The inability of the railways and highways to maintain a service to the airport would not have helped getting staff and passengers to the airport.
At least closing the airport will have provided certainity to passengers and staff not to bother trying to get there. After all theres little point in providing a service where outgoing passengers cant get to the airport, and incoming passengers can't get away from it.
What we have to remember is that the sort of weather experienced in the south east of England this week is very rare, and for it to happen twice in a year is even more unusual. It wasnt long ago the climate change people were saying we would never see snow in the south east again. It would appear they were wrong!
I'd guess the issue was that it was snowing all day on Wednesday and off and on on Thursday which meant that as the surfaces were cleared they were covered again.
The inability of the railways and highways to maintain a service to the airport would not have helped getting staff and passengers to the airport.
At least closing the airport will have provided certainity to passengers and staff not to bother trying to get there. After all theres little point in providing a service where outgoing passengers cant get to the airport, and incoming passengers can't get away from it.
What we have to remember is that the sort of weather experienced in the south east of England this week is very rare, and for it to happen twice in a year is even more unusual. It wasnt long ago the climate change people were saying we would never see snow in the south east again. It would appear they were wrong!
Join Date: Apr 2004
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A crumb of comfort maybe for Gatwick seems Geneva has had its problems too.
All of Switzerland’s major airports are now open again, heavy snowfall forced most of them to close Wednesday evening. The airports in Lugano, Basel and Bern reopened this morning—as did Geneva’s Cointrin airport, which had been closed for nearly 36 hours. Zurich’s Kloten airport was able to stay open throughout the worst of the weather, though dozens of flights were cancelled because of problems at other airports.
All of Switzerland’s major airports are now open again, heavy snowfall forced most of them to close Wednesday evening. The airports in Lugano, Basel and Bern reopened this morning—as did Geneva’s Cointrin airport, which had been closed for nearly 36 hours. Zurich’s Kloten airport was able to stay open throughout the worst of the weather, though dozens of flights were cancelled because of problems at other airports.
Join Date: Feb 2007
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I'm sorry but I don't buy into managements' excuses that 'it doesn't happen that often'. Factor in passenger volumes. Factor in the revenue that they have available to play with. The sight, on the news yesterday, of those three forlorn old snowploughs attempting to clear the runway was risible.
Take a look here at how a considerably much smaller airport (Oslo) with proportionately less in terms of passenger numbers, flights and revenue can keep their runways clear within an hour and every fifteen minutes thereafter.
Snow Patrol - Airport Technology
Perhaps the owners of Gatwick are too busy diverting money into shopping malls 'to enhance our travel experience'?
Take a look here at how a considerably much smaller airport (Oslo) with proportionately less in terms of passenger numbers, flights and revenue can keep their runways clear within an hour and every fifteen minutes thereafter.
Snow Patrol - Airport Technology
Perhaps the owners of Gatwick are too busy diverting money into shopping malls 'to enhance our travel experience'?
Cleverly disguised as a responsible adult
Join Date: May 2007
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of those three forlorn old snowploughs
Gatwick Airport FINALLY reopens after two-day closure due to heavy snow | Mail Online
Yep there they are!