Fire Cover?

[Hartington]

Having read the thread about the A319 at Heathrow this morning (24/5) I was surprised to see the suggestion that the reason why both runways were closed was that the deployment of emergency assests to the incident left insufficient cover to maintain ops on a single runway.

I accept that someone has done a risk assesment and decided this is acceptable but, as a passenger, I feel this results in 2 issues. First it means that passengers are inconvenienced and second that if the closure results in a prolonged closure (I've seen 30 minutes mentioned re today) won't that result in aircraft in the hold having to divert which simply increases the workload in the air.

Thinking about it, I suppose part of the problem is that even if you keep the airport running on one runway you may have aircraft waiting for a departure slot blocking stands and, until the issue is resolved, there's probably a sterile area around the affected aircraft which halts use of surrounding taxiways.

Maybe I'm getting somewhere towards answering my own questions but I'd like to hear from professionals.

[DaveReidUK]

Maybe I'm getting somewhere towards answering my own questionsYou are.

First it means that passengers are inconveniencedIn such circumstances, passenger convenience rightly comes a long way down the list of priorities.

if the closure results in a prolonged closure (I've seen 30 minutes mentioned re today) won't that result in aircraft in the hold having to divert which simply increases the workload in the airThe closure did indeed result in several diversions. A diversion is not a dangerous procedure; landing without adequate fire cover, on the other hand, is an unacceptable risk.

[Level bust]

I may be wrong, but didn't Healthrow in the past have enought fire crews to allow single runway operations to continue with the required fire cover even if there was an incident on the other one.

It will still result in delays but at least everything does not grind to a halt.

[diginagain]

Having read the thread about the A319 at Heathrow this morning (24/5) I was surprised to see the suggestion that the reason why both runways were closed was that the deployment of emergency assests to the incident left insufficient cover to maintain ops on a single runway.
Equally, it might be suggested that the reason why both runways were closed is because one had bits of Airbus on it, while the second may have had other bits of Airbus on it.

[Phileas Fogg]

First it means that passengers are inconvenienced

Would it be less of an inconvenience for you to perish in an aircraft incident due to insufficient fire cover?

[Hartington]

The point of the question was to allow me to learn from the professionals.

One thing I hadn't identified was the need to sweep 27L. Except, between the time the stricken aircraft took off and it declared an emergency how many planes had already departed 27L?

[Gonzo]

Hartington,

The professionals who witnessed this will wait for the official report to be published.

There are more considerations than just the available category of fire cover.

Nobody involved in these situations wants to cause delay, but the prime, and only, consideration will be to do what is safe.

Although I wasn't working at the time of this incident, I was in the tower when BAW38 came down.

[DaveReidUK]

between the time the stricken aircraft took off and it declared an emergency how many planes had already departed 27L?None.

There was only one departure in the hour after BAW762 took off at 08:17, and that was from 27R at 08:38 (BAW165 to TLV). The first 27L departure after that was BAW758 to Bergen at 09:23.

You can see them on WebTrak although, as a previous poster has mentioned, for some peculiar reason all Friday's flight have been anonymised.