Check the ATC: India

[jimmygill]

Dear All,

This is a thread to bring to common notice any ATC activities during which pilots flying in India felt that ATC conduct was less than professional.

We have set up a group which will follow the reports with Airports Authority and will bring out the ATC communication recordings for particular incidents using Right To Information.


I hope we all understand that such audit will help increase ATC standards of service.

In India ATC tapes are kept for 6 months only and all the information can be accessed using Right to Information Act.

Cheers All

[Wannabe Flyer]

Jimmy RTI is several years old. Could not help noticing your sudden liking to use it. Something we missing here????

[jimmygill]

Yes Sir its almost 4.5 years old, I had been using this in other fields ever since it came in. In good hands its very effective. But requires hell lot of patience and constant follow ups. Results do come but take time.

I just came back here after a 2 year vacation. Thats what is new.

[IndAir967]

In General.. Never had a problem with ATS in India
(except BOM HF over Arabian Sea:mad:)

[jimmygill]

Nice to know, but in case anyone notices any problem just report date approximate time and location we will get the tapes and put it on web, I hope it will help better communications.

I don't mean to exclude pilot communications also, everything which helps improve safety is welcome, we will just get the tapes.

[Captain Dart]

I have been flying in and over India for over two decades with my east Asia-based airline. Indian ATC was a 'shocker' (to use my Australian vernacular) for most of that period but I have noticed an improvement over the last few years and, in patches, some extremely competent ATC.

If Indian ATCOs reduced the speed at which they talk in their transmissions, stress and workload would be greatly reduced for a lot of us foreign pilots. While I appreciate it may be a cultural thing to speak quickly, I would like a dollar for every time I've had to say 'say again' in Indian airspace.

And why can't India and Bangaladesh coordinate between Dacca and Kolkata and remove the requirement for the multiple calls at their common FIR boundary? The shambles of working Kolkata on one radio, Dacca on the other, then shouting at Yangon, working IFBP on 128.95 and often avoiding weather has been going on for at least twenty years. It's not as if airlines haven't been paying money to overfly your countries; what about putting some of it into equipment and service for the customer?

I appreciate the efforts of the individual ATCOs in India who are trying to improve their service. Regards from the cockpit,

Capt. Larry Dart

[itsbrokenagain]

Jimmy, after reading your other posts I ask you : What is the point of this fruitless exercise ?

You are obvioulsy an out of work 200hr CPL holder, fine, but why waste your time with this BS ....

Anyway good luck, and have fun!

PS, my experience is that Indian ATC are pretty damn good considering the resources they have to work with. Maybe you should be looking more into that, I am sure they would rather have your attention directed in getting them better equipped.

[profsx]

no probs over RT , but they make ur life hell on the ground, airline guys probably dont kno cause they have a dispatcher to do the dirty work, but this is on the non-scheduled side....

[Capt Apache]

There were a lotta expats on other forums who couldnt stop bitchin bout ATC in India....I am sure they would like to pitch in here...

[rdr]

Indian ATC has improved considerably over the years. These are my observations though.

The ATC could read out the callsigns of the target a/c clearly and then pass their message. Many have a tendency to mumble/distort the callsign, leading to repeated calls.

The, pilots could be more attentive when a message is passed. There are many missed calls, which have to be repeated. This is a major problem.

Also, many pilots have incorporated a confirm into all their atc clearance readbacks as a matter of habit. They are not aware that their readback itself is a confirmation.

i.e. listen out & readback once, and treat a missed call or a readback as an issue of poor airmanship.

[NephewBob]

It is rather sloppy.

Many Controllers outside of India (Gulf etc) interpret the readback ending with "confirm?", that the pilot forgot how to say "say again" or didn't fully understand. Accordingly they (rightly) state the whole clearance over again.

Bob

[avionimc]

A problem I often witness at smaller airports with only a handful of movements a day (or many more) is the reluctance of controllers to actually separate traffic.

Even with radar, controllers try to handle only one flight at a time.

For example, asking a non scheduled flight to hold at 25 DME while the only other aircraft is already established on the ILS. All in beautiful VMC.

Or, not permitting a request to take off because a single incoming flight just reported 35 miles inbound (the one who was denied the immediate TKOF having to hold short until the other lone flight intercepts the DME arc, flies the ILS, lands, makes a 180 and, eventually vacates the RWY).

On another beautiful day with no clouds and 6000 m visi I heard a Citation pilot asking for a visual after he reported he had the runway in sight. Instead the controller forced him to fly the full ILS procedure. The pilot questioned the controller twice, but to no avail.

On that particular occasion, it was my turn to hold short until the Citation landed, turned around and vacated. There was no other traffic.

A separate problem, in my opinion, is the lack of AWOS or ASOS installations, leaving visibility reporting of smaller airports subjective to the prescription glasses or mood of the weatherman.

Once, while I was sitting in a tower, an incoming A320 was denied the approach because the visibility was reported to be 800 m. That morning the WX was clear, no haze and it was obvious from the tower and from the runway that the general visibility in all quadrants, as well as the horizontal visi was far more than 5 km. The A320 captain did enter a hold for 35 minutes; he even reported he had 20 miles visibility and stated he would file a complaint.

Still the weatherman would not change his reporting, the A320 could not start the approach (1200 m required for that particular ILS) and the flight had to proceed to its alternate 100 NM away. Even thought it was a perfect VFR day.

What a waste of money, waste of Jet-Fuel and waste of time (for the PAX)! In this particular case the controller was very helpful, the weatherman should have been fired.

Many are probably apprehensive of the bureaucracy (and of their superiors) and want to play it safe; most likely some lack situational awareness, judgment and training; or maybe they do not want to work because they are not paid enough?

[Luke SkyToddler]

The Indian controllers aren't too bad, considering they spend most of their lives getting stepped on by the rude, aggressive, ignorant and pushy local pilots who so often over transmit themselves 5 at a time on the frequency, that nobody can get a word in edgeways for minutes at a time :ugh:

[itsbrokenagain]

I found its the AWOS system thats in error a lot of the time, once we were in to VEBS, for once you could see for miles, we reported vizual with runway in sight, we were told to report our minimums.... mmmmm . So we read off the ILS minima, then get told viz is being reported as 800m and say intentions...

A jet lite and a KF joined us in the hold that perfect day.... as we waited for the AWOS to get to 1200m viz... 55 min later in the hold it rose to the ILS minima. Jet lite was fuel low, they clear us in, even though we volunteered to hold to let the airliners in , and we even told them we would rather remain in the hold until they were on the ground.... nope we were first we had to land first... f'en stupid idiots. So we flew the ILS as fast as possible, I think we were 250kts until 3nm final that day...

[Elmer_mt]

India!!!!....truely horrible and shocking place to fly as far as ATC is concerned... to all of you who say there's no problem in Indian ATC... you could all be Indians... all the rest who doesn't have Indian accents... I believe you'll find it a pretty harsh environment... I know this coz I've flown there for about 2 1/2 years of my 3 year contract. Truely HORRIBLE:sad: INDIA.

[fatbus]

most days you are on you own. as someone said "the only pilot that thinks there is no problem with ATC" is an Indian pilot that has not operated outside the region. Years behind the rest of the world.

[IndAir967]

I would slightly differ... I have operated in north american , indian, middle east and far east airspace..

Yes indian airspace is definitely not that advanced.. but considering the equipment the have and the traffic they handle.. it aint a joke.. they re doing a good job.. things are indeed changing.. lets give these guys some time .. :)

IAC967:ok: