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bsal
5th Jun 2008, 13:58
Heard earlier on the news that Dublin lost Radar for around 30 minutes yesterday evening. http://www.rte.ie/news/2008/0605/air.html They still don't know what was the cause.:uhoh:

Sam-MAN
5th Jun 2008, 14:03
Noticed that at about 2145 yesterday there was a lot in the hold round the irish sea and didn't know what the problem was, thanks :ok:

EGAC_Ramper
5th Jun 2008, 15:33
Well we've just had a 1hr 40min slot going to DUB due radar. Oh the joys :sad:


Regards

jumparound
5th Jun 2008, 17:28
Sorry about the delays guys that's what happens when you buy something the makers promise won't fail(Titanic) as its got four back up modes before complete failure but still manages to fail .

This is actually the second time this week its collapsed on us.

We still don't know what the fault is and it can still collapse at any time so hence the flow rate to protect us and you.

Basically it went into emergency mode and everything decorrelated mean we only saw Sq codes andwere not able to interact with the system in any form. No new data was coming into the system. The next stage is a complete failure of the system.

So basically this can happen again at any time. As the fix takes ages i.e. as long as Thales take to sort it it could be around annoying us for a good few weeks if not months !

bsal
5th Jun 2008, 20:43
I'd say all the radar controllers will be feelling a bit sick :yuk: and nervous :\ coming to work for a while then. Typical what the Irish do..spend loads of money on something that doesn't work, just like the M50!

Dublinflyer
6th Jun 2008, 08:42
It's been a bad week in in DUB, lots of computer problems as well due to some upgrade they did.....

HighLow
6th Jun 2008, 15:46
I can understand safety of course is an issue
but the controllers in Dublin know what kind of traffic is arriving.....by Callsign.... Stick a note on the ATIS for pilots to announce their SQ Code, would bring things pretty much back to normal.

I would ask the controllers / management there to trust your staff,
and stop giving the pilots 1 to 2 hour slots,


Yes it gets busy
but STICK ALL Aircraft on STARS and leave them on the STARS
this giving pilots Headings might seem to help the situation but only clogs up ATC and complicates the situation

So Pilots to announce SQ Code when contacting Director Frequency
, and more adherence to STARs at DUB

NO MORE SLOTS
and should the situation for SLOTS arise, management please stop throwing them out like confetti.

and before posters get a chance,
SAFETY is the most important thing at the end of the day
but look at these suggestions above,
it will help everybody get on with their work..



HighLow

PIK3141
6th Jun 2008, 18:36
I can understand safety must come first.

If slots can be avoided then, as a passenger yesterday, may I illustrate why.

PIK - Dublin due to depart 0915 was held on the ground for nearly an hour, then travelled. Not a big deal.

Dublin - PIK due to depart 2115 departed at near 2300, landed 2345 ish, and returned then to Dublin. A Dublin based aircraft doing its last rotation of the day.

If these Dublin based delays continue, how close does it get to that final rotation of the day being cancelled ? That is a big deal, because we all know what happens when our favourite airline cancels flights !

jumparound
6th Jun 2008, 22:26
I can understand safety of course is an issue
but the controllers in Dublin know what kind of traffic is arriving.....by Callsign.... Stick a note on the ATIS for pilots to announce their SQ Code, would bring things pretty much back to normalYou comments are noted but its not that simple in the situation that has been experienced ALL safety nets on our side fail i.e CA's think Uberlingen. We're back to T sheets (Callsign and SQ). But thats no help if you get locked out of the computer. But its a start.

Think of it this way.

Throw in 25 planes all showing SQ's that are in Dublin's airspace now throw in another 25/30 aircraft overflying or VFR's that you have to constantly filter but don't know who you are working it gets very complicated very fast.

No strips and possibly no computer lists of aircraft and assigned codes you have to be very savvy to figure out who is yours and who's not.

Now throw in one or two pilots not paying attention and you have one hell of a party on your freq.

Throw in split tracks and angels, coasting signals and our favorite this system makes aircraft disappear if your flying a very similar track to another aircraft i.e in a hold if the traffic below is just ahead of you in the hold so the system cannot see a difference between the two and it erases one track and then swaps the labels when you move slightly away.

Flying SIDS and STARS is done a lot more now than it was 2 years ago but there is still a good few people who think vectoring traffic is safer than letting them fly on the procedures:ugh:.

That and when your delayed we get more requests for corner cutting to save time after all you are our customers and pay our wages so why not help you out if we can.

There are only inbounds slots no outbound as its quicker to put a ground stop on traffic than on planes in the air.

The issue has been described as a slow wind down to complete failure, its just been lucky that they have been able to restore it before the screens go BLANK. Then were all screwed.

I imagine that serious money is being thrown at this problem to make it go away so hopefully the slots will go away very quickly.

I do appreciate the pain this is causing you and your customers but its not our fault and certainly wasn't foreseen.

These things happen in Aviation sure look at the A330 issues last week at Aerlingus.

Captain Greaser
7th Jun 2008, 00:48
Having an interest in radio,computers, and a proffesional aviator it sounds like Dublin could do with an sbs-1. Dont know what that is?? Its a passive decoding system for a laptop that decodes lat/long from mode ads-b transponders. It ends up displaying a radar on a laptop. Total outlay including aerial £500.

HighLow
7th Jun 2008, 08:32
Jumparound,
you have raised some interesting points there in your last post. I have the disadvantage of not being their in the tower. The only people that can appreciate how busy it gets are the controllers themselves. Dublin is getting busier by the day. I see some controllers doing a very professional job. All the controllers are safe and look after us well, however I would like to raise a few points, and your comments would be appreciated.

Having 30 SQ codes flying around Dublin Controlled Airspace I would imagine if no strips etc were available could be a very stressful situation. So I take your point that some restrictions have to take place. Can you confirm that the controllers at the moment with the problems being experienced by the radar, do NOT have strips detailing flight information of a particular aircraft once handed over to them by London for example. This would seem a very unacceptable situation if this were the case, I am sure you would agree.

The majority of controllers are doing a great job, but as you mentioned some seem not to trust Instrument Rated Commercial Airline Pilots to stay on published tracks when approaching the field they instead chuck us off on a radar vector towards Wales, slow us down to minimum approach speed, gear down at 20 miles, fuel dripping out the back of the a/c for so reason...

Gatwick is a great example.
The controllers can get A/c to land,another airborne, and the next to land all within 4 miles. A very efficient operation altogether. And to be honest I DO see some very capable controllers at Dublin doing the same. It is great to see. Where it falls down a bit is where you got the "other" controller chucking out instuctions for A/C to reduce, one day it might be to reduce 210 another day reduce 200 and another 215, turn right a bit turn left a bit, no info of track miles etc..

For GODS SAKE .... Keep us on published inbound tracks :ugh:
Sod the aircraft who is looking for sneaky shortcuts,
in saying that if its not busy at all that is a different story, direct centre fix happy days, but for the majority of the time, the pilots MUST understand and maybe the controllers to a small extent.....DUBLIN is getting so BUSY...and with this increase of traffic, semi-rigid approach procedures must be in place. Not once in all my years flying have I completed on STAR at Dublin. Could you and your management maybe try it out for a month or so and see how things would improve.

Regards
HighLow

jumparound
7th Jun 2008, 11:03
Can you confirm that the controllers at the moment with the problems being experienced by the radar, do NOT have strips detailing flight information of a particular aircraft once handed over to them by London for example.Confirmed and not acceptable should have been the first thing to return. But i think there is not enough room for a proper strip bay and not enough strip holders as they went to Africa with the old radar(clever).

Not once in all my years flying have I completed on STAR at Dublin.You must be the only one. Never completed a VATRY2T or ANY of the other southside STAR's. It's tactical at times to turn you off the SID at 3000ft to get you past the BAL->KLY cross over point ahead of the inbound traffic so we can keep both climbing and descending. Just like its tactical at times to cut a corner on the STAR. It's very hard i imagine to build up a full picture at times in a cockpit of whats going on around you but believe me a lot of calculations and thinking goes into the decisions made to keep traffic flowing.

Its rare on the northside to fly a full STAR as they are NAV aid based and therefore involve some strange unpredictable turns. So direct the hold is the name of the game there.

But that will change later this year when the Northsides airspace is finally fixed so expect new SIDS/STAR's and holds yay a useful DINIL hold(to be moved northwest). Plus a wider P600 through GELKI that will be unidirectional so expect a four lane airway with two lanes to service the much busier EGAA-EGAC dep's/arr's.

Keep your comments and questions coming as its good to hear what were doing right and wrong and where we can improve. :ok:

Robot1
7th Jun 2008, 19:29
"Confirmed and not acceptable should have been the first thing to return."

There have been some mutterings about reintroducing strips, but this enviroment can not just 'return'. All our procedures are stripless based. Some controllers have never worked with strips. We don't even use strips to control the hold. Some of the older controllers may be able to botch together some ad-hoc system using strips, but I wouldn't touch strips without clear procedures of how and when they are to be used.

ock1f
7th Jun 2008, 22:11
And as the stripless works so well in dublin it has been introduced in shannon as well!

Just throwing it out there folks

Just a spotter
8th Jun 2008, 01:16
jumparound:
Throw in split tracks and angels, coasting signals and our favorite this system makes aircraft disappear if your flying a very similar track to another aircraft i.e in a hold if the traffic below is just ahead of you in the hold so the system cannot see a difference between the two and it erases one track and then swaps the labels when you move slightly away.As a regular passenger into and out of Dublin and as a result someone who while "sitting in the back" has gone around more than once at ROKNA, I find this very, very disturbing.

JAS

jumparound
8th Jun 2008, 18:25
Known issue with a work around.

Unfortunetly there is nothing that can be really done to fix it its part of most Radar systems and the computer processing thats done.

ItsAjob
8th Jun 2008, 20:10
There is no way this carry on would go on at Heathrow!
Why dont Dublin send some of their lads down to Heathrow to see how they operate, and even get on some of their training courses to allow reduced separations?

jumparound
8th Jun 2008, 20:30
Why dont Dublin send some of their lads down to Heathrow to see how they operate, and even get on some of their training courses to allow reduced separations?

What learn how to go down to 2.5nm sep when were at 3nm already. I would love to see us utilize the dep sep they have of takeoff clearance on rotation of the previous.

We are hamstrung by rules and regs. By an idiotic airport operator. This summer we are going to run 48 ops per hour off one runway with poor RET's and poor airfield design.

There is no way this carry on would go on at Heathrow!

T5 fiasco.:ok:

+

Did NAT's not have serious issues when they introduced there Radar system.

ItsAjob
8th Jun 2008, 20:37
Not having a go, just suggesting that a lot could be learnt by others and their past mistakes.