Punch-up in Another Place

[Antigua]

Hello People

For those of you who (like me) tend to avoid 'Rumours & News' owing to it's high 'anorak' attendance, I'm involved in a bit of a fracas there, the results of which will be of interest to my fellow pilots.

I had no idea after 30+ years in this game that there were myriad types of emergency that you (ATC) can declare, even if the a/c doesn't.

We pilots need to know this sort of stuff, so I'll attempt to publish any points that come up in the 'discussion' internally.

It's my company that's mentioned, and I tried to get Pprune Radar to move the discussion here, but I think he's 'off for maintainance'.

http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=163201

Thanks

Antigua

[Big Tudor]

Antigua,

IIRC there are (where) 4 levels of emergency that could be declared by MIL ATC:

State Disaster = An aircraft accident on or in the vicinity of the airfield when ? or more casualties are expected. The casualty number is dependent on the normal medical services available on site.
State 1 = An aircraft accident on or in the vicinity of the airfield.
State 2 = Aircraft airborne with emergency which could result in State 1 outcome.
State 3 = An aircraft incident off the airfield when the location of the aircraft is undetermined.

I think that is the definations, although I'm sure more recent military tin pushers will correct me otherwise.

[Lock n' Load]

Local Standby - attended by airport fore service only. For minor problems which are unlikely to prevent a normal landing, i.e. failure of LESS than 50% of engines, partial flap, etc.

Full Emergency - attended by outside services in addition to AFS. For more serious problems, such as failure of 50% or more of engines (so for a twin that would be one donk u/s), flapless landing, etc.

Aircraft Ground Incident - full attendance. For something that has happened on the ground though generally when taxiing rather than during take off or landing roll. Includes brakes on fire, vehicle striking aircraft, etc.

Aircraft Accident Imminent - full attendance. Something bad is about to happen.

Aircraft Accident - Something bad has happened.

There may be local variations on this, and on top of that will be bomb warning states and the like.

[Evil J]

And probably the most common Full Emergency cause, and I would venture the one that the crew least expects to see a full turn out for is hydraulic problems...I think an AtSIN (or similar) came out a year or 2 back that stated that any mention of hydraulic problems from the a/c should be treated as a Full Emergency...personally consider this an over simplification and would appreciate some pilot input on this.

I would guess that as ATC we are not expected to know the ins and outs of a/c hydraulic systems (nor would wish to really!) so its an attempt to make sure that we dont "under react" when a hyd problem is potentially serious...again an area where jump seat rides were extemely useful to get a better understanding