SQ221 Air Med One?

[fourgolds]

Lead Slead , well said . Again my point exactly.

[BuzzBox]

I completely agree with fourgolds. International operators wouldn't necessarily know what "MED1" means. They operate all over the world and can't possibly know every local procedure and phrase used in every country they fly to. It's about time certain controllers (and ASA) in Australia made allowance for that reality and applied some common sense. All the confusion could have easily been avoided if the controller had asked "are you declaring a medical emergency?"

[KeepItRolling]

Fourgolds et.al.

See Ferris' post regards ASA culture: it is spot on.

Common sense has very little application in ASA and the controller, by applying local procedures was not only covering their behind, but following the training provided.

[fourgolds]

OK , so as controllers and professionals you agree. As always its easy for us to identify where the problems are. Lets be sollution orientated. I can only hope that professional conduct and common sense will prevail and I hope that we all know when to call the line and when to throw away the books/ beraucratic arse covering and get the job done.
Striving for mediocrity is not the sollution.
Air Crews are not exempt from this mediocre behavior either. I continue to see exactly what is being discussed manifest itself in flight decks , as crews also make decisions in favour of covering their arses rather than allowing common sense to prevail. The "Fear culture" and "Big Brother" culture that is modern aviation is a very real threat to safety in itself.

The worst example I have heard of this is of a well known Australian Airline (that occured a few years back) was preparing to ditch off Perth as the city was fogbound and below cat 1 minima and they had no fuel to go anywhere else. Had it not been for a positioning crew member who told them to Autoland off a Cat1 ILS beam( without any protection and certification and breaking every bloody rule in the book) we would have had a ditching!!!

Blindly following rules and procedure is a huge threat. Common sense is the professionals burden. Doctors , Architects , Pilots , Controllers etc fit into this group for a reason. They are accountable people, may common sense prevail.

[Moniker]

Blindly following rules and procedure

just a devils advocate comment here - isn't that what all the sim and drill stuff is for though? So that when in an emergency your focus is 'automatically' narrowed down to a particular course of action, which makes anything peripheral that much harder to focus on (think of?) .

[Keg]

Hard to make an assessment without all the information but it's serious enough to warrant an ambo but not serious enough to warrant a diversion. Can't have been that sick which would normally indicate to me that a slow down of ten minutes isn't going to be a major drama. What was the weather like in ADL and MEL? Reasonable for a diversion?

Another day in aviation I guess.

[Condition lever]

idb

Perhaps you might provide some further guidance from MATS.
I've just looked through AIP with no real luck in finding anything relevant.
Personally I think the ATC really confused the issue.
From my limited knowledge, MED1 (or Air MED1 or whatever else you want to call it) is something annotated on your flight plan prior to the flight.
What she should have asked for (and what the captain should have done from the start) was delare a PAN due to a medical issue with the passenger.
I get completely sick of the Yanks not using ICAO procedures - it is happening more and more here as well.

[Back Seat Driver]

Seems the Singapore AIP is the same as ours in respect of notifying urgent situations.
http://www.caas.gov.sg/caasWeb/expor...?__locale=null
(Bottom of page 15)

9.2.2 The pilot also retains the option of initiating the communication using the urgency call “PAN-PAN” 3
times to alert all listening parties of a special handling condition which will receive ATC priority for
issuance of a clearance or assistance.

Why the SQ crew didn't advise ATC in the appropriate manner of a medical situation that would give them priority, was as unfortunate as why the Aus ATCer was asking if they were declaring "AIR MED 1", which had me looking it up in the AIP. (never heard of it before, but it is in the AUS AIP, though I doubt to be used as RT phraseology). As Condition Lever says, how about we all sing from the same Hymn Book.

[Capt Claret]

Condition Lever

When flying Airmed for NTAMS it occasionally happened that the routine transfer would upgrade to Med1. This was extremely helpful in bypassing military routing requirements around Tindal and Darwin

[Condition lever]

CC

Sure - you were a med cat a/c already - different situation.
RPT should declare a PAN.
Pretty dissappointed with the Australian ATC in this instance.
Completely confused the issue with non-relevant terminology - IMHO.

[bushy]

Rigid rules??

If innappropriate, rigid rules are applied in a case like this, and this is harmful to the patient, I believe the courts would not be sympathetic. People are expected to be able to think, and to do it. Not helping,because of a technicality could be construed as obstruction.
I sympathise with the ATC'ers who have to risk their jobs to do the right thing. I have had to do that myself more than once.

[toolish]

I thought med1 and 2 where reserved for RFDS etc, if you have a medical emergency then tell them that "we have a medical emergency and require......"

[oldbull youngbull]

The minute you start making stuff up you will get hammered and possibly sued.

Nev, OK, in the above scenario, what of my actions would you sue me for?

Blindly following rules and procedure is a huge threat. Common sense is the professionals burden. Doctors , Architects , Pilots , Controllers etc fit into this group for a reason. They are accountable people, may common sense prevail.

Yep! Agree. I'm willing to account for my actions in these scenarios.

At this stage of my career I reckon I'll take my chances with ASA if they want to 'go' me over non-standard phraseology and the use of common sense

[Veruka Salt]

Med 1 / Air Med 1 ..?

Fourgolds post summed it up well.

The SQ crew would have no idea what "Med 1" or "Air Med 1" means, nor would most foreign airlines flying into Oz (my own employer included).

[neville_nobody]

No everything will be fine if everything ends happily. Which in aviation is about 99.99% of the time. It is the 0.01% time when you may end up in court.

In this example say the person died on board and it was deemed by the coroner that if they had flown at max speed and no delay the person's life could have been saved. That is when they will start going through things with a fine tooth comb and asking why wasn't procedure followed which could possibly lead to lawsuits.

For those who are arguing for a laissez-faire approach to following rules are you seriously telling me that if by your actions or lack thereof a lawyer isn't going to be putting you on the stand and asking if you are familiar with the company's manuals and if you are why you didn't follow what is written even though there is a copy on your flight deck?

Now my point is that if you did as per the procedures you can then point the finger at the writers of the manual or whatever. If however you did your own thing you are basically on your own. You will have to be explaining why you did what you did and what tested methodology you used to come up with that decision. Can be done but it will interesting to say the least.

For those talking about a Nuremburg defense not being applicable after a read of wikipedia it would seem that it would be after a particular ruling in the USA.

[dodgybrothers]

toolish, I agree. Ambos and rfds I thought were the only ones able to declare that category. But, obviously there is some room to move.

[FL400]

Has anybody here thought to read the docs?

A quick browse of AIP and the CARs reveals:

MED1/2 is not restricted to RFDS: MED1 is for transporting a sicky or proceeding to pick up a sicky, MED2 is returning medical people after transporting a sicky.

9.2.2 The pilot also retains the option of initiating the communication using the urgency call “PAN-PAN” 3
times to alert all listening parties of a special handling condition which will receive ATC priority for
issuance of a clearance or assistance.

The above paragraph is indeed in the Australian AIP under the title Weather Diversions so doesn't relate to this situation.

PAN should only be declared when there is a threat to the safety of a flight, ship or person on board or in sight of the aircraft (no mention of medical contidions... unless their condition threatened the aircraft e.g. instantaneous combustion)

Mercy flights are for flights where life is at risk and compliance with regulations is not possible. Where compliance is not a problem, aircraft should declare SAR/HOSP/FFR/MED - these aircraft will be afforded priority by ATC.

HOSP (Hospital aircraft) is a for international aircraft where carrying an ill passenger.

I think the docs are your friend

As to what response you'd get from an international by saying 'are you declaring yourself a hospital aircraft?', well I have no idea.

[Back Seat Driver]

FL400

You are slightly in error. If you re-read my earlier post you will see that the AIP ref 9.2.2 is from the Singapore AIP
This was to demonstrate the same requirements re AUS v SIN. But as you say, it or similar, appears in the Australian AIP, and indeed it does in the Weather Deviations section you refer to.
However may I also refer you to:
AUS AIP GEN 3.6_ 6.6

6.6 Phraseology. Standard phraseology exists for the declaration of abnormal and emergency operations, ie PAN and MAYDAY. Pilots are reminded that timely use of these phrases will get the level of response required. The use of non-standard terminology can lead to misinterpretation of a pilot’s requirements. This does not preclude ATS requesting confirmation of a pilot’s requirements.

The SQ flight was an RPT flight, it cannot be nor ever was a SAR/HOSP/FFR/MED flight due to the very nature of it being an RPT flight. If the Flight required priority handling then the only proper thing for the crew to do was to declare the PAN.
(Of course the proof in the pudding would be if on arrival at YSSY, did they unload the sick pax into the ambulance as a priority before unloading all the other pax?) - I don't know.
As you say "the docs are your friend" - maybe you should take them out to dinner more often.

[FL400]

Okay I'm learning quite a lot here so if people don't mind I will keep this discussion going.

Checked out GEN 3.6 para 6.6 and the bit you quoted. My only problem with this (and I would be interested in yours and others' views on this) is that it only mentions 'abnormal and emergency conditions' which I take to mean as they are alluded to in the CAR section on MAYDAY/PAN/SECURITY. The CARs say that PAN is only to be declared when the safety of the aircraft, ship or person on board is in jeopardy.

Also why can a RPT flight not be SAR/HOSP/MED/FFR?

The docs are not your friend when you take them out for dinner - they never pay their fair share and you end up with bolagnaise sauce throughout the most used pages.

[Back Seat Driver]

FL400

From AIP Definitions: as you are already aware-
Medical Flight: A flight providing transport of medical patients, personnel, and/or equipment, prioritised as follows:
MED 1: An aircraft proceeding to pick up, or carrying, a severely ill patient, or one for whom life support measures are being provided.
MED 2: An aircraft proceeding to pick up medical personnel and/or equipment urgently required for the transport of a MED 1 patient, or returning urgently required medical personnel and/or equipment at the termination of a MED 1 flight.

see AIP ENR 1.10 Flight Planning, Appendix 2 (top of AIP page 614) it says

STS/ for special aircraft handling; eg, STS/MED 1, STS/MIL SPEC REQ.

MED 1 etc. is an entry on the flight plan to notify ATC as quoted above.
It is the reason for the flight. (just as an RPT flight remains an RPT flight even if somebody gets sick and requires urgent medical attention). On an RPT flight with an ill pax/crew on board, a decision is made as to the actions required to safeguard that persons well-being as much as is possible within operational limitations. If that decision requires ATC to provide the aircraft with additional services or priorities then the appropriate method of advising of those requirements is with a PAN call. You then bypass the queue for priority handling.
It is a formality to advise ATC of your need for special handling.
regards