Unfortunately alot of it has to do with keeping your "situational awareness" ect ect, what I personally do is set a timer (an audible alarm) for 20 minutes before the 2 contacts meet. That gives me enough time to issue the requirement to ensure separation before 10 minutes to time of passing. However at 3 in the morning, the caffeine has worn off, you are on your 9th shift in a row and your neighbours garage band was practicing all arvo and you have had 2 hours sleep.... well, then anything is possible. The scary thing is that in procedural airspace the first alarm we receive is you guys responding to a TCAS RA.

Some areas of the media have reported this as a "Near miss" which is typical of them.

Does anyone know if if was actually a near miss (as reported) or a breakdown of sep and by how much ?

I feel for the individual who was plugged in, a sep breakdown is never a good feeling but well done to the aircrew's SA.

Second hand information tells me the required separation standard was not infringed. This was not due to positive control, the aircraft decided to move themselves off track.

In large pieces of airspace such as this, an unfortunate happpening is that aircraft are at the same level and are known that in the future they will be in conflict. This can be known for hours in advance. There are memory prompts that can be used to remind of who is going to hit who but often the aircraft are only in the airspace that they will break down in for a small time and these memory prompts can not be used. What happens then is that a situation you are on purpose forgetting, get forgotten. As a contrast in a small scale radar environment, a conflict is seen and pretty much immediately fixed.

For the record I do not work on the airspace this occured in and am just summarising a rumour I heard.

In Radar environments in Oz there is Short Term Conflict Alert - 90 second look ahead and not really about collision risk, focussed upon break down of radar separation.

GAFA (no surveillance) no alert yet available. Flight Plan Conflict Probe (utilising pilot reporting) is functional but not yet operationally validated and implemented. It will be as good as the data fed into it. Awaiting system upgrades prior to roll out.

Regardless of how good the alerts might or might not be, the best defence is alert controllers and pilots. Either can make a mistake and what's important is that something is done to fix the mistake when recognised - TCAS, STCA, GPWS etc. are all last ditch defences. The systems should be robust enough that you don't get to the last throw of the dice.

Random tracks work on the big sky theory but navigational tolerances on some aircraft can be huge. Proving separation when not on fixed route structures without significant system improvements will push controller workload in some airspaces so high that there will be an elevated risk of operator errors. Reciprocal tracks at standard levels help, plenty of track crossings where standard levels put you at the same level. A place for everything.

20 years is quite a long time for something to "spring up". The guys and girls that do this stuff are very good. That being said we are all human, yes even those with 4 bars on their shoulders. Operators within Australian administered airspace expect more flexibility, optimum route and levels than they would consider safe in many other parts of the world (indeed in much of the world), they can't have it both ways. Either accept the additional fuel burn or look again at the risk modelling and let us know what you want.

No doubt this incident will attract very close scrutiny. It's not the first time that it's happened, nor will it be the last. The reporting will always strive to sensationalise. I look forward to reading the final report on the investigation. What we don't need is a knee jerk trying to make someone a scapegoat, rather the simple "just culture" premise that we need to focus upon preventing repeat occurrences and treat those involved fairly.

DNC

I very much like simple timers as an aid to situational awareness. They have the advantage of being relatively foolproof, and easy to set.
One thing I used to do in such a situation (when I was an area controller) is also let the pilot know the future plan. I'm a big fan of keeping the crew in the picture.
I don't know the airspace, but is this good old fashioned procedural area control at its best? No (or limited) radar coverage, not many navaids, lots of reciprocal/converging/crossing tracks? (Primary separation tool the good old T10? Or D15 if you're lucky?)
If that's the case it might actually be time to start saying "unavailable" when at all busy, or below par due to time of day etc. I don't know. There is nothing wrong at all with a "can do" culture- I think most of us want to do the best we can for the flight crews, but it needs to be backed-up by a "can do" attitude from management in regard to tech upgrades. Time for radar (or similar), perhaps? The powers that are capable of making decisions about expensive upgrades often can only act or press for funding for same when enough operators complain about it loud enough.
I sincerely hope that's how it pans out. (The "just culture" thing, not the "scapegoat" thing.) For the sake of your workforce, and for future safety in the region.

Yeah, a big "gotcha", that one.
What do you do?
Maybe say "unavailable, one coming the other way at that level"?
Sounds like maybe it needs a bit of work from Aus's finest minds.

Tarq57,

Yep, good old fashioned procedural (now called non-radar) but in a plan-view display scenario. Bugger all navaids and dependent upon aircraft nav capability anything from the suite up to 10 minutes.

I have said it before - and now I'll say it again;

In a modern Nav environment two way routes are a dangerous and stupid anachronism.

I takes only a little imagination to establish race tracks where possible - and where there isn't room for race tracks, formalise the strategic lateral offset.

The large navigation tolerances ATC apply to aircraft are largely fantasy in this day and age - if two are going to hit in the cruise, it will happen on track, not 14NM either side of it.

I agree but this all goes out the window when weather is involved. I have had aircraft up to 300NM off track. Whilst this is extreme, it's not uncommon for a/c to be 50NM left and right at this time of year in northern Aust.

We are told ADSB will fix this and 5NM between a/c can be used. Whilst almost all of Aust has ADSB coverage, unfortunately not all a/c have the gear, so not much use at the moment, except for crossings or change of levels. The gear is to be mandatory by 2013 for all a/c above F290, however I'm sure there will be exceptions just like RVSM.

7, 14, 30, or 50 cross track might be fantasy but ATCs don't get to choose. ICAO sets the standards, all we can do is apply them.

It happened near Tindal and was in radar coverage - 2 acft nose to nose, same level - seems most likely to me the controller f..ked up - but, these days, instead of admitting it, we try to find every other excuse under the sun. :rolleyes::rolleyes::ugh::ugh::ugh:

Oh dear
 

direct.no.speed,
Now Now.Surely none of your mentioned items would ever be thought of as being part of the causal factor ? Surely not ? We are talking safety here,never would a government put cost saving and penny pinching before safety,surely ?

With this incident I note that it was a couple of days after it started being discussed on PPRUNE. :suspect: The incident you mentioned didn't rate a mention on PPRUNE (that I recall) and thus hasn't appeared in the papers.

ADSB takes the pilot out of the loop. I don't know how many times I've been flying along and then look at my TCAS and wonder "who the f%^k is that". Turns we have both been on ADSB on the same track for hours and didn't know each other existed.

We need offset tracks right now!

direct no speed
No, I'm fed up with controllers that won't take responsibility for their own actions. It's become more and more prevalent in the last 10 years - and you provided a list of 7+ other excuses for a f..kup.

Why do you think that might be the case?

Good point.........from someone whose nuts are on the line TWICE :eek:

Your seriously joking i hope.

How many pilots get stood down when ATC may have made an error that they may have caused?
I can tell you about 2 incidents that have happened to me where formal counselling and stand down happened because of Pilots mistakes (im an ATC):ugh:

Amen. I'm over pricks who won't stick there hand up. Get out if you can't handle the responsibility.

I believe the sectors involved are very short of staff. Is this true?

This probably wouldn't even be reported in europe.

Ok, so would be you be happy to be paid $72,000 a year and take the same responsibility?

well said mikk, not everyone is on the top bracket.

Having said that, if you don't like the responsibility, there are plenty of jobs out there where you can turn up, f**k up, and go home. This isn't one of them.