Sabre meltdown Oz

[UnderneathTheRadar]

Virgin in Sydney have just told everyone to go home or get a hotel. Sydney airport seems very quiet so assume its a general issue...

Good thing they paid to upgrade the system from the old unreliable one....

[Jabawocky]

How is that speedy twin rocket thing going?

Why are you flying RPT still?:E

Bugger on two fronts hey :{

[Eastwest Loco]

I don't think it is Sabre as such.

Just logged in and it was showing full functionality and direct connect access with Virgin.

To me it sounds like an overlay system such as checkin or a front end that doesn't belong to Sabre that allows you to not spend money training staff on how to operate in the "black hole" using real inputs not pull down and click boxes.

If that is the case - serves them right. Overlay systems mean that you save on 2 weeks training but wind up with a chimp that knows nothing with regards to how their request actually impacts the system they are using.

Probably not a person in sight that can drop a manual load and trim sheet either.

Oh - Brave New World:ugh:

Best all

EWL

[Ejector]

Pleaze Explain More EWL?

[UnderneathTheRadar]

Probably not a person in sight that can drop a manual load and trim sheet either.

Amen to that - VA888 SY-MEL got boarded (with the 30 odd passengers who'd ignored the instruction to go home) about 9.30. By 11.30 when finally confirmed no dispensation for the curfew, they'd:

- had to figure out what to do about the bags
- do another load sheet
- do another load sheet without the bags
- wait some more when the system crashed again
- get the wrong fuel load; and
- move passengers around the cabin.
- gotten a dispensation but for the wrong rego

[Eastwest Loco]

Hi Ejector

Sabre itself is working just fine as far as I can see. Full connectivity, all systems seem to be go.

Airlines these days use "front end" systems that overlay all the operations that a GDS can perform with another compuiter system that puts up fluffy and easy pull down box menus that allow you to use click on and select menus to perform normal booking or special service actions.

The reason these menus exist is it lessens training time by hundreds of percent.

The down side is that the staff that have been trained in a day instead of a week have no understanding of operating the "native" system by using standard AIRIMP inputs. For instance, they pull down a menu box for special meals and click on Lactose Free Meal, where in the black hole we enter 3LFMLA - 3 for general airline facts, LFML for lactose free meal and A for all sectors. The current system operator would just click the meal required and have no idea of the input the front end has generated into the IPARS or Unisys system their Airline uses.

My staff only operate in the base system as I do not allow pull down boxes. They are the old fashioned professional crew.

Basically the home system can be operasting beautifully but if the overlay systems cack themselves then if you have no fully base system trained staff who can go into the "black hole" then you basically are stuffed.

Checkin systems are a slightly different animal as they are a bolt on. Chuck me a load and trim sheet, the relevant aeroplane indicies and data and I can tim out the aeroplane and get it under way. That is a rarity today. The systems are all automated but with nobody trained for the manual backup.

It may be the overlay system that is at fault such as the checkin/loco system. You can actually have an IPARS based system for reservations and run a Unisys checkin/load control system.

Despite recent fare quoting problems that Sabre has had with a certain Airline, I would not point the finger there for now.

More likely look for ghee stains on any IT contracts.

Happy to explain further if my opinion is relevant.

All the best

EWL

[emeritus]

Surely the drivers up front can do a load sheet or is that another skill down the drain. In my day if I recall correctly, W & B was a 100% pass req.

Emeritus

[LeadSled]

The reason these menus exist is it lessens training time by hundreds of percent.

EWL,
A most interesting concept. As 100% reduction would be zero training, are you actually performing a "knowledgectomy", and extracting other pre-existing knowledge. Is it de-training or un-training.
Given some of the counter staff I have encountered recently, common sense seems to have been surgically removed.
I wonder why the tech. crew can't do a manual load and trim sheet?? Or is that something else that has fallen by the wayside as part of normal operations.
Tootle pip!!

[BPA]

All pilots can do manual load sheets, however they need the required information ie number of pax, freight etc. if the system goes down this information may not be available.

[Eastwest Loco]

LeadSled

You have hit the correct button there.

No training required. Don't think - just read the boxes and click the one that looks right. The staff aren't allowed to know anything. Maybe they would want more money if they were allowed to think.

I have talked Agency level operators into the "black hole" and given them the formats to get the info I required and they have nearly been in shock. Nobody told them.

Most systems are an IPARS operating suite with a few carriers nusing UNISYS RES as their base. Wghatever the airline, there a common inputs for output of which less than 40% are known by the front end operator as they are operating in the "need to know" environment.

emeritus

The guys up front even back in the 80s had done the full loco course, but probably had not done a manual load sheet since that course. Todaythe same applies to the load controllers who sit in a remote location using a computer program. they would hopefully have been trained on manual load sheets but somehow I doubt it.

All you need to keep the ball rolling is a manual load sheet and a seat allocation sheet.

Not hasrd to have that all to hand, but who the hell will drop the trim?:ugh:

Best regards

EWL

[Capetonian]

Eastwest Loco
You have highlighted so much of what is wrong with the travel and airline industry today (and others of course.) They 'train' youngsters on clicking and pointing and dropping down clickboxes without giving the slightest concept of what they are actually doing or why.

Having spent a large part of my career working on airline distribution, DCS, and inventory systems, I saw this daily and am vehemently opposed to it. It may be fine for the public to book and check in this way, but it is not appropriate for airline staff to do so, and these front end systems are truly a double edged sword. I have always encouraged my clients to go the full training route, and many do so.

I imagine that to some extent the automation of cockpit controls and fly-by-wire is analogous.

Training is expensive. Ignorance is far more expensive and can be catastrophic.

[nitpicker330]

As you may know CX have centralized load control in HK.
However the staff at HK and outports were required to do manual load sheets for practice just in case. I'm not sure if that's still the case now though??

As for me doing one??? It's been a long long time and we only have to know how to check one and not compile one!! :eek: thank god:E

[rammel]

At QF as a load controller we were trained to do manual load sheets from day 1. Though some are better than others at them. Since the Melbourne Load Control office was closed and the Sydney one expanded, I'd say that this may be a skill which has diminished within load control.

The experience I had when dealing with flight crews was, that they were either on the ball or had no idea. Unfortunately there wasn't much in between.

[Abe Froeman]

Va have centralized load control and being CASA regulated manual trims must be performed on each aircraft type once per month to remain "current" for each LC staff member. Although manual just takes a lot longer.

[Eastwest Loco]

Abe

I don't understand why manual load sheets should take longer.

If we had an Ansett aeroplane fall over and a dozen or so extra passengers to accommodate with their baggage a new load sheet could be dropped inside a minute. The same appied for the Ansett boys if the East West aeroplane cacked itself. AND we could usually get it trimmed to zero stab setting - you know - clean aeroplane = fast aeroplane.

Capetonian

The old science is nearly dead. I can't see a way to provide it with life support either. Quel domage.:sad:

Oh - by the way I was correct. It wasn't the Sabe system that cacked itself but the overlay checkin/loco system. Have to get on right occasionally!

EWL

[Tidbinbilla]

Rumour has it thattheir DATA provider let them down. Apparently Google and Vodafone were affected to some extent as well.

[john_tullamarine]

I don't understand why manual load sheets should take longer.

If we had an Ansett aeroplane fall over and a dozen or so extra passengers to accommodate with their baggage a new load sheet could be dropped inside a minute

I'm with you. The problem is practice and familiarity.

For instance,

(a) I can recall the old Track Trips where the FO, necessarily, was a whizz at this and that, including loadsheets. Including time out for a cup of coffee, the typical sheet could be run up in 30 seconds or so. I have no doubt that the TAA folks were every bit as talented.

(b) all the "other" crews, likewise, knew how to run a sheet but would be hard pressed to run one quickly solely due to being out of practice. That didn't matter as the frequency of requirement was such that a few minutes taken to get it right once in a blue moon really didn't impact the operation.

What did concern me on the jets, though, was that so many had not done a sheet for SO long that they had no idea of what was what and some of the strange ideas which arose were, to say the least, interesting.

Easy enough for me to talk, I guess, as I spent a lot of my time designing sheets so running them was second nature for me.

Your guys took a minute ? Sounds like you spared the birch far too much, methinks ..

[rammel]

The main thing that slows you down doing a manual trim is every man and is dog phones up asking when it will be done. Starts with the gate lounge, then operations, then the duty manager, then the crew, then because a minute has gone by it all starts with the gate calling again. Like all things in aviation, it goes in a circle.

[STN Ramp Rat]

don't forget its not just the loadsheet, if the system cannot transmit API data and if this is a required element then the flights cannot depart. I know of at least two airlines that have phased out manual load sheets from their processes because of this.

and as for every flight deck crew member being able to do a load sheet, a lot of them could no more do a loadsheet that I could fly an aircraft.

[nitpicker330]

No offense to EW Loco but I hasten to suggest that a 777-300 ER loadsheet may just be a little bit harder than a F27-500 :} just a little bigger with lots of zones cargo holds fuel tanks etc etc etc....

[What The]

Have done a number of manual 744 and 767 loadsheets over the years due to ferry flights/diversions. It takes a little bit of thought but is certainly not rocket science.

[Capot]

All pilots can do manual load sheets, however they need the required information ie number of pax, freight etc. if the system goes down this information may not be available
Am I the only oldish ex-handler who found this hilarious?

(PS - not the bit about pilots doing loadsheets, of course they can, or at least they have been shown how to do it; it was the bit about "the information not being available" that made me laugh.)

[john_tullamarine]

Why do I fear that we old pharts are rapidly being consigned to the scrap heap of archaic practices from the pre-battery and microprocessor world ?

Good God ! ... before you know it there'll be a move afoot to get rid of aircraft ship's radio operators .... whatever is the world coming to ?

[Capn Bloggs]

get rid of aircraft ship's radio operators
That would obviate the need for standard calls! Bit of peace and quiet for a change... :}

[dirty deeds]

The load sheet is not the problem for the flight crew, it's the right information from the ground staff to correctly fill in the load sheet that is the problem.

Funny when I read these threads, sounds like the first post of this thread is a journalist fishing for information and a certain few fall for the same tactic.

S$%T happens, Reservation systems fall over, their computers, it's going happen from time to time.

Just goes to show how reliant people are for air travel.

Maybe time to increase airfares by a few dollars, they seem to be able to pay for parking?

[Eastwest Loco]

nitpicker

The F27 was apparently a harder aeroplane to trim than larger jet equipment but as it was what we cut our teeth on it was 2nd nature.

In the endorsement courses I did the jetport boys and girls had massive froblems trimming the prop equipment with the F27 QC freighter and the Twotter driving them to distraction.

By comparison the DC9, 727-76 & 276 as well as the A300 were quite straightforward.

John Tulla - I did say UNDER a minute:E

Best all

EWL

[Old 'Un]

John Tulla

Don't look now, but I think "they" have removed the Morse keys already... :uhoh:

Le Vieux

[john_tullamarine]

removed the Morse keys already

.. another hard won qualification shot to pieces and worth naught ...

[Weapons Grade]

Am I also getting to that stage of my career? What ever happened to:
a. Flying boats
b. Fountain pens, and
c. The Mass in Latin?

I still pull a slide rule out of the nav bag for fuel (and other) calculations.
Good thing is that it requires no batteries, chargers, can be taken through checkpoints without upsetting those who are easily upset, and (the best part) the XOs invariably ask "what is that thing you are playing with?"
Hopefully they are enquiring about the slide rule.

From the JT performance/navigation classes:
TI/60 = D/GS = FBO/FF (just plug them into the C and D scales)

I must be getting to old for this stuff.