Strange atc request
 

Recently I was taxiing at my local international in a C-172 and was asked to taxy all the way to the end of a taxy way instead of a intersection departure which I could have made, the reason given was "For test purposes"???
Any idea what this was in aid of????:confused:

Testing your patience? :E

Sorry.....

Surface movement radar being tested ? Why didn't you ask they wouldn't have bitten you. :O

strange attitude to take 7P....whatever u call yourself. ATC are there to serve you...???!!!??? So ATC are some sort of butler to the pilots now?!? Not the sort of attitude I'd expect in this day and age.

Vamps,

Quote: "ATC are there to serve you...???!!!???"

7P may have come across a bit stroppy, but he has a point. ATC work to the Manual of Air Traffic SERVICES, controllers work at an Air Traffic SERVICE Unit, and provide a number of Air Traffic SERVICES (Approach Control SERVICE, Aerodrome Control SERVICE, Radar Advisory SERVICE, Radar Information SERVICE, Flight Information SERVICE). One word does seem to crop up fairly regularly!

While I'm not advocating a Master/Slave relationship between pilots and controllers, maybe you should reconsider which is the tail and which is the dog.

Without one you wont have the other, so whats a tail and a dog got to do with anything?

Could the response have been "for VORTEX purposes"?

A light departure from an intersection following anything larger from a full length departure requires 3 minutes separation. A departure from the same point i.e. a backtrack, only requires 2 minutes. Therefore in certain circumstances it can be more expeditious to back-track or at least take advantage of the wait to gain a bit more runway in front of you.

Just a thought.

Maybe they wanted to test to see if the pot-hole at the end of the taxi-way was big enough to swallow a 172? "I bet you it's not.............oh look, where's he gone?"

360BakTrak "Without one you wont have the other, so whats a tail and a dog got to do with anything? "

OK mate another metaphorical way of looking at it my be "who came first the chicken or the egg?"

In the case of aviation it was aircraft and then after a while we got ATS, no aircraft - no ATS, no ATS - no...... well actually there would still be aircraft but ops in many ways would be severely reduced, so it is without a doubt an essential service but not a prerequisite for flight. Imagine the Wright brothers being told "Nice contraption lads but this is transponder mandatory airspace so none of yer hopping about"

So in essence ATS units are there to serve pilots, if you dont like the expression serve try assist, big difference.

Finally as The Rev Bob Marley said No women - No Cry

I can't see why everyone is getting so stressed about this.

As I read it, FlyByWit was requested by ATC to do something in order to help them out. He made the decision that their request would not adversly affect his flight, so he complied with it. He didn't have a problem with it at the time, he doesn't have a problem with it now, and no one is accusing anyone of ordering anyone else around.

But FlyByWit's curiousity has caused him to wonder what the purpose of the request was. And, apart from a few tongue-in-cheek replies, this bickering is preventing him from getting any answers :confused:

FFF
--------------

7p317lot - "You are in charge of your aircraft.......They are there to serve you NOT the other way around."

Pathetic!!!

radarman - Another word crops up regularly as well - CONTROL!!!

Variable_pitch - "not a prerequisite for flight."

True, but a prerequisite for SAFE, orderly and expeditious flight. Wouldn't be a very long flight without it!!! (And I know which one I'd rather be on, particularly if 7p317lot was 'in charge'!

Guys and Gals,

Come on, we're on the same side now. Let's stop the "who is who's bitch" and play nice now.

We all know pilots are just glorified bus drivers, and ATC are just glorified "table tennis bat wavers".

Were they possibly testing a ground radar?

Just a thought from a passing layman... :8

I am guessing the radar test option to be the best, I of course did not have any problem with this, as an intersection departure can mean a much longer wait for me compared to lining up with the rest of the commercial traffic at the end of the taxy way.
If however there was no C-172 there that day would they have asked a jet to do the same or would they have used one of the security jeeps????

Wit,

You may be correct that it was a ground radar test. On the other hand, your statement that there was a line of commercial traffic at the end of the taxiway makes me wonder if wake turbulence didn't have something to do with it.

At my airport, if there was a line of commercial jets waiting to at the departure runway, you might well be better served by getting in that line, than going to an intersection, where you'll get at 3 minute delay after each jet departure. And I'm going to keep rolling jets from the end that don't have/need a delay. Far from getting you out quicker, going to an intersection might get you out much later!

2nd guess from a layman:

maybe they wanted to test a small target on their ground radar as opposed to large jets to test against a Linate scenario? :ouch:

Which airport btw?

"For test purposes".... or " (for) vortex purposes"? Could you have mis-heard?
In which case ATC have saved you a minute, although you've wasted 5 wondering why they said it!

True. When the early mail runs got caught in IMC, they'd close the fuel, switch off the mags and jump over the side. When the fog lifted next day, they'd hunt for the wreakage, salvage the mail and get on their way.

Fancy trying that today? ;)

Ah, but so very glorious we are in our bat waving. :O


I've beaten this to death before, but will take this opportunity to kick it again: We provide a service. That's what we do.

The chicken/egg argument is worthless. When I was in the Air Force I was told that my job (aircrew) was the most important job in the service because without me, nobody else would have anything to do. Although certainly true in my case ;) as it turns out, that argument can be made for damned near any job. My son is now a computer programmer in the Air Force and arguably, without him and his co-workers there'd be no computers and the Air Force would come to a grinding halt. Cooks? Same deal. Sky cops? Yup. You name it. Each one of them is the "critical" member of the organization.

In our world aircraft operators are the customer. They pay (some places more, some places less) for our services, and our services are what we render. When we provide those services we enter into a safety partnership with the aircraft operator, and we're very important in the highly specialized field of anti-death. We're not slaves and they're not the masters. However, we are service providers. We "control" aircraft/airspace because, under our agreement with the operator (who, as we all know, remains the final authoirty when it comes to that aircraft) a portion of the operational control of that aircraft is ceeded to us. Sure, we've got government regs to back us up and the system is highly structured, but that's the deal. I think perhaps there is a problem with this because the whole thing has become institutionalized. This is to say, if you want to land at Heathrow you're going to have to talk to a controller. However, that fact arises from a government-mandadeted construct which forces "service" upon all operators in the interest of safety.

If I want to fly from Rock Springs, Wyoming to Rawlins, Wyoming (85 miles of sagebrush and rocks) I can call up Salt Lake Center for RADAR flight following service, but I'm under no obligation to do so. This is an easy one... I want it and they agree to provide it. It's a service.

Now, I want to fly from Rawlins, Wyoming to Wendover, Utah. Same sagebrush and rocks. Same uncontrolled airports. But this time I'm flying right over the Salt Lake City airport. Guess what? I'm going to have to talk to somebody, but the fact that I'm forced into doing this (or altering my route) doesn't detract from the fact that ATC is providing me with a service.

God help you if you're my student (or sitting at a scope within arm's reach of me) and forget that. Don't get me wrong... I'm proud and cocky and I think I'm pretty damned talented. What's more, I'm no less an aviation professional than the chap in the driver's seat of that Airbus. But when I work I provide that driver a service. That's the deal.

Rant temporarily suspended.

Dave

To get back to the main point - I am pretty convinced this was for 'vortex purposes'.

We use this quite regularly at my airfield. By asking someone to backtrack for a full length departure, you can often get an outbound airborne ahead of an inbound confortably rather than sweating on having to wait for 3 minutes. If you say 'NO' then then you will probably have to spend another 3-4 minutes at the holding point burning precious fuel.

I cannot quite understand why any pilot would refuse such a requst -the phrase ' there is nothing so useless as runway behind you' comes to mind!