NATS drops Heathrow in it
 

"I am very concerned that NATS made this change [to the routing of aircraft using the CPT SID] without informing the airport or affected communities about its potential impact, particularly given its effects on some of the same areas to the west of the airport that were affected by the airspace trials we ran last year. Because of the assurances we received, we in turn told residents in good faith that no changes had occurred. That is unacceptable and I unequivocally apologise to local residents.

At my request, the Chief Executive of NATS has agreed to urgently review his company's processes to ensure that NATS shares this information with the airport to prevent this happening again in the future."

(Heathrow CEO John Holland-Kaye)

Air Transport News

"Procedural changes made by to the control of aircraft above 7,000 feet do not involve airports and there is no suggestion that NATS did not follow the current agreed process. Nevertheless where procedural changes occur that may have a discernable effect to the noise experienced by residents, we would expect NATS to make us aware of the changes and their potential impact so that we can answer questions from local residents."

The CPT SID on easterlies was always radar controlled after take-off so presumably that has changed?

Hopefully someone still working in TC can enlighten us.

It seems there is no change in the 09R CPT SID itself but there is apparently a change in where the aircraft are being vectored when heading towards the CPT area. This has resulted in noise complaints from Ascot and Bracknell. As the NPR ends at 4000ft I don't see what all the fuss is about or are they seriously proposing restrictions on vectoring below 10,000ft?

Graphic here showing the effect of the changes:

http://www.heathrowairport.com/stati...after_maps.pdf

The OCK stack didn't present a problem, it's after the inbounds have left OCK that work is involved. Those maps from Dave's post don't look any different to when I was doing it 13 years ago. Usual procedure was for the outbound to be given a heading of around 240, then the INTS controller would turn it towards CPT or tie up a heading with TMA SW. Whatever happened, the outbounds basically went west when clear of Heathrow inbounds.

A little investigating would have found that the CPT 4K/5J SIDs haven't changed since 2013, and the last change was a final altitude added to the SID so not even a route change (see here and scroll down to find Compton SIDs chart). The graphic posted by DaveReidUK just shows that the aircraft of 09 are now following the SID more often rather than being vectored off passing around 4000', so the locals are just getting more of what could always happen anyway. Can't see any NATS or public investigation will change anything! Or why NATS needed to consult this with anyone in the first place :ugh:

Have a look here to see how the locals are looking at it. Bear in mind this is an area that has benefited. :ugh:

NATS reveals changes! | Aircraft Noise Lightwater, Windlesham and Bagshot, Surrey

Looking at the maps these changes are occurring above 4000ft so no problem with the NPR and not really HAL's concern either. In fact, as another poster pointed out, the aircraft are now following the actual SID route much more closely than before!

HAL's problem seems to be that when they asked NATS if there had been any changes apart from the trial RNAV SIDs they were told "no".

Which is roughly where the NPR ends, in fact.

This issue is a complete cock up by HAL and NATS when they introduced a trial set of changes to the MID and SAM departures last year without telling anyone except the communities adjacent to the airport who of course aren't affected anyway as the initial departure segment remained exactly the same.

In response to numerous complaints from the Surrey Heath and Ascot areas they arranged a couple of meetings one in Bagshot one in Ascot. I attended the Bagshot one and it was woeful performance by the 'suits' of both organisations getting their facts wrong and generally appearing rather untrustworthy. Thus creating climate of concern where none existed before among people who are generally well disposed to LHR and its expansion as many residents work there or use it regularly or recognise the benefits it brings to the area.

What it showed was:-

If you make changes to established patterns people will notice

Although its not precise FR24 allows people to double check what they are told and compare routings

Do not try and blind people with science when many of the audience are expert /work in the same field -example, man from NATS ,' most departures over your area are at or above 7000 ft; Man in audience, 'I am BA captain and its been mostly 6000 or below for 20 odd years'.

If you represent NATS and HAL check out what might happen while you are at the meeting- at one point a succession of 4 'heavies ' lumbered directly overhead illustrating the concerns perfectly.

Try and keep some control so the time isnt taken up by people saying 'I am kept awake all night by noise' well of course there really isnt any. i was woken up at 3 am last week etc etc

So I can see why this more recent event caused some concern and indeed as someone points out here with a link there is now an active noise lobby in an area where there wasn't much of one.

Any from the ATC fraternity here a have any idea how the super long 27R/9L LHR expansion proposal would affect this area, I imagine planes would be lower both on departure (27R) and landing(9L) as the effect of this idea is to move the runway 2-3 miles westwards.

PB

Pax britanica -
Part of the PR problem is that the NATS contribution was handled by a guy whose expertise is environmental issues. He has never been a controller and has therefore never worked in the airspace/routes concerned. He may be a senior manager but just doesn't have the background knowledge to deal with questions. There was a big risk some of the audience could think he was being evasive, poorly informed or he inadvertently provided misleading answers.

But there haven't been any changes, aircraft are just following the published route closer and more often, so NATS were telling the truth!

east of koksy

Thanks

I think thats a very apt comment- Ihad a chat with one of the HAL guys before the meeting and he seemed ok-it was the problem/nerves of facing a potentially hostile audience and I am sure factors like the one you mentioned which people would obviously not be aware of that made the whole process appear rather evasive rather than people deliberately being like that.

Live near a large international airport expect some aircraft noise, simple really.

One quote that I couldn't quite believe from those meetings was (from the NATS man) 'My radars measure the altitude of the departing aircraft and uses a completely different system to FR24'.

I did wonder how his radar measured the altitude of aircraft. I always thought the aircraft measured its own altitude and reported it to his radar... Same as FR24 via ADS-B then!

Cough,

Aircraft broadcast their level with reference to a 1013 pressure datum. In the London TMA that is converted to altitude at 6000ft or below using the Heathrow pressure and then displayed to the controllers. Depending on the pressure, an aircraft could seem higher/lower on FR24 than it really is. So strictly speaking the NATS guy was correct but I think as far as Joe Public are concerned it could be semantics!

"My radars "

Does he actually own the radars?

And that can be by a significant amount.

For example a couple of days earlier this month saw the Heathrow QNH hovering around 1040 mb, so uncorrected altitudes would be out by around 750'.

And parts of the Surrey Heath area are close to 500 ft above Heathrows 80 feet amsl' elevation so it would seem theres quite a bit of scope for misunderstanding and perception of height/noise etc.

The whole issue here is about HAl and NATS not doing themselves any favours ahead of the decision on new runways -there was no serious concern about aircraft noise in this part of the world until recently-if there were issues it was noisy low flying machines converting fuel directly to noise which I believe are called helicopters and which can largely go where they like.