Heathrow EFPS failure 9th Jan

[Murty]

Full marks must go to NATS press department that managed to hide all reference to the distrubtion on Wednesday 9th Jan,caused at Heathrow the fact the engineers could not get much help from the Canadian supplier was not a great help but may not have been of much help


because....:ugh:.wait for it their EFPS system was unable to process the new ICAO code for Jo'burg (changing from FAJS to FAOR) on the flight plans

The flights dep on 9th SAA235 plus the BAW flight,to Johnnesburg as FAOR came in at 10/0001 the flight plans were filed with Destination ZZZZ (either an IFPS change or filed as such by SAA at JNB code not changed !!)

The Swanwick NAS system accepted the code by manual input.

Temporary fix to input all Johannesburg flights into NAS as ZZZZ ,with remarks (Field 11 in NAS carrying the correct ICAO destination.

Not sure exactly how Heathrow's EFPS takes its full info as we have also had issues with Saudi Arabian (SVA) flights not populating a proper destination on the EFPS

[Ninja Controller]

So what you are telling us is that there was a minor technical issue which was addressed with an interim fix until a permanent fix could be introduced?

The horror.

[DaveReidUK]

wait for it their EFPS system was unable to process the new ICAO code for Jo'burg (changing from FAJS to FAOR) on the flight plans

Sounds like there is more to this than meets the eye.

Agreed, yesterday was an AIRAC update, but didn't the change to FAOR happen in the 26/07/2012 (1208) AIRAC ?

[chevvron]

Funny I thought from the OPs title that there had been a major failure of the EFPS causiing reversion to written or printed FPS. Obviously I was wrong.

[eglnyt]

They didn't hide it completely it was reported on ITV.COM. The delays reported there suggest a fairly significant issue.

[DaveReidUK]

Meridian News Wed 9 Jan 2013:

Thousands of air passengers were delayed at Heathrow tonight after technical problems with the air traffic system stopped flights leaving the airport.

The computer glitch means passengers have faced delays which are now easing.

Currently some flights are an hour late. Services should be normal in the morning. National Air Traffic Services has just issued the following statement.

[eastern wiseguy]

National Air Traffic Services has just issued the following statement.


Apropos nothing...how much did we spend on that re branding $hit for us to be known as NATS and not "National Air Traffic Services"