Fog at Dhaka

[chippy63]

I've been out to Dhaka a couple of times recently, fog delays each time on arrival, and knockon effects on departures. I was told it was pretty standard to have foggy conditions in the morning, sun burns off the fog, planes landing late, at this time of year.

Noticed that BA 144 inbound from Dhaka will be 3 hours late today, and I've noticed the outbound flights being delayed when in transit through T4.

It's not just BA, my EK flight was delayed for the same reason, which meant a missed connection at Dubai. Must be quite costly for the airlines. I think both BA and EK have quite a bit of connecting traffic at LHR and DXB respectively.

My question is, does anyone know why the airlines schedule flights at times when there is obviously a good chance of a delay?

[asianflyer2]

No, but the Thais have their Bangkok flight around the middle of the day when the fog has usually disappeared - and they are less constrained than some other airlines by departure and arrival times at the other end.

[rsoman]

Same problem in Delhi. The airlines wont reschedule mainly becuase they would use the peak time slots for the more lucrative european and transatlantic services.At the same time the respective governemtns in India and Bangladesh does not consider investment in an advanced ILS (CAT III) cost effective!And i would agree on that!

Domestic airlines like Jet Airways in DEL reschedule their flights hower during this period!

Moral of the story, try to fly out of other airports (BOM) or othjer airlines like TG (DAC) during these times as these have been happening year after year for some time!

[scanscanscan]

Imho... It is a good idea for pilots to reserch the months their destination and alternates are affected by fog, its normal max duration etc. also ask about other adverse weather or any other events affecting visibility.
We found inbound Manila airport at 03.00am on New Years Day excessive firwork activity had caused reported visibility to be 50 meters.
Also the Ils was off the air as most airport staff went awol to celebrate their New Years as no planes would be landing.
American Computer flight plan fuel services can hardly be expected to cover such events.
Luckily prior to departure a local stewardess had told me "Flights always diverte from Manila early on New Years day"
Sometimes such communications and a healthy disrespect for cfm fuel can keep you alive and avoid a heavy pucker factor legal dry tanks situation.
Diversion to other parts of the Phillipine islands in the wee hours of New Years day she said can also encountered similar visability problems.
So probably a good idea to consult a local cabin crew member if you cannot check with the destination met officer.
Cheers Scan

[rsoman]

ScanScanScan
Good point. Another example is in Madras (South India) where ona particular day around Mid January(I dont remember the exact date), there is everychance that the airfield will be closed until around 8 am atleast. Again the reason is not the vagaries of weather, but due to a local holiday the previoous day, the celebration of which also includes burning of whatever rubbish any one cat get hold of the previous night! (unbelievable but true!).
Now this is a very well documented occurence of MAN MADE SMOG and prediction is not difficult as the previous day is a public holiday! But still, last year while very other airline including intenraitonal carriers like Oman Air and Emirates rescheduled their flights for that particular day to reach around 10 AM, Saudia which was operating into Madras longer than the other two still decided to explore the probabilty of the sog l;ifting earlier and got diverted to Colombo as expected (by everyone except Saudia I guess!)!

Cheers!