Just out of interest, can anybody name me an organisation that has it's headquarters in a separate city to it's two major centres?

It's great to hear cool headed, reasonable replies from the ATCs, its certainly changed my opinion of them (in a good way).
I agree this has to go much higher than us grunts, and the incompetence at the top of ASA and CASA never ceases to amaze me.
I don't believe this discussion is at all wasted and its good to see that it is coming to the attention of people like AJ and the mining companies, as you would expect since they are losing big coin each week, so it might take a while but maybe something will actually get done.
In the mean time at least this thread might alleviate some of the ill feeling between ATC and pilots.
Cheers

I don't disagree and that's what Metron is aimed at. The one that really gives me the screaming sh!ts is SY as the curfew is lifting. I can have a wall of aircraft coming at me at the end of the doggo that I could be getting in some semblance of order 500 miles out. Except that SY doesn't do Maestro overnight so there's no easy way of integrating ML and BN traffic into a sequence. Instead I'm left with a fur ball of traffic and working unnecessarily hard.

Are you going to acknowledge your faux paw with those Gatwick numbers of yours or can we just assume you are smoking crack??

As for
You obviously have very little idea how the WA airspace runs because if we just got "slowed/vectored as required" without COBTs it would be a total shambles.

I wonder if they use COBTs/CTOTs/slots in busy places like Europe...:hmm:

Well der, that's obvious. I was merely saying that from a pilot's point of view, it is far easier to just taxi at a COBT than work backwards from a Feeder Fix time: how long to get there, how long for the departure, how long for the taxi, oh hang on another aircraft is inbound, drat, that'll be an unplanned extra 5 minutes to get to my Feeder Fix while we wait for him to land, bugger. Why you would prefer that over "just taxi as close as you can to XXXX and we'll sort it out airborne" is beyond me.

I've done a lot of flights into Perth (departing with less than 2hr flight time, as you're abeam ADL) and I cannot remember when I got a 10 minute delay "shortly before top of descent".

It's working a damn-sight better that the previous system, especially now that most operators are complying with their COBTs. If there is still extensive holding with good compliance (and I've never had more than 15 minutes recently) then the Metron rate needs to be slowed-down a tad.

Right, so we have twenty aircraft holding at the Feeder Fix waiting for their allotted time to come up. Clever.

When you were only doing two miles a minute +/- a minute or two didn't really matter!! :D

And yes, I belt my FO over the head with the paper if he/she misses our Feeder Fix time by more than 12 seconds! If the FMS would indicate less than 1/10 of a minute, I'd be there. :}

So Bloggs let me guess, you're from WA and that's pretty much where most of your flying has been ?
You obviously have " no idea " how airspace runs outside your little bubble.
Busy places like Europe ? I assume you've never flown into Beijing or Shanghai ? And as far as I am aware, no, they don't use COBTs and slot times in "busy" Europe. BTW Beijing is far busier than any European airport, if you ever left WA you might have known this.
As far as my faux paw (sic), that is an " average " movements per hour for a SINGLE runway airport versus a " max " number of 24 for a 2 runway airport which I am told gets reduced to 16 when inst app in use. Gatwick handles around 4 times the traffic per month that Perth does.
PS you don't even have to travel the world to find these things out just enter " google " into your browser.....or I guess, ignorance is bliss.

I hate to say it, but Metron does seem to have improved things.

I work enroute into Perth and had little faith that it would make a difference, but it has. Summer hasn't arrived yet, tho :}

I've worked other sectors across the land and to those that shoot their mouth off arguing that other places do it differently and why don't we follow other methods, you probably don't quite understand Perth either. I'm working far harder sorting Perth traffic than I ever did working Melbourne arrivals. A lot of that has to do with the ridiculous aircraft mix and the airspace limitations, but for the most part it's simply that twice a day, a million aircraft go out and an hour later, they come back. There's no even mix over the day, it's simply everyone wanting to go and then everyone wanting to come back. So be it.

And as far as thinking that we have preferential treatment to the two big carriers, think again. You're all just dots to be processed. Do what we ask and we're happy. Bitch and moan and LIE to us about what you can do and that makes us unhappy :=.

Non compliance of COBT has improved dramatically, thank goodness. You don't want to be vectored all over the sky, and we don't want to do it to you, especially when everyone else is coming on in.:ok:

Any F100 drivers (Skywest/Alliance/Network) out there care to explain how you go about losing time enroute into Perth?

From what I can see, the F100 flies a very slow cruise (220KIAS or less) then into 250kts or more on descent, I.e. increasing speed from ToPD and a subsequently steeper descent profile.

On the 737, if possible we try and spread the delay across the cruise and descent (220/230 kts for both if down low enough and copping a really big delay). if following an F100 into Julim, we tend to catch you guys around about our planned descent point, then cop a vector off track in order to get a descent clearance through your level until you start going down. No drama really, just curious.

Also, do you ATC guys notice it too and are there plans for more standardisation across different types - aircraft performance permitting.

I don't particularly care what goes on in Beijing or Shanghai. I say again, Fault: "You obviously have very little idea how the WA airspace runs because if we just got "slowed/vectored as required" without COBTs it would be a total shambles."

Nah, doesn't sound like it...

Airport Coordination Limited - Gatwick Airport

More for you: read the first para in the box, Airdualbleedfault:

Airport Slots

Google indeed. :rolleyes:

So Perth has a movement rate of 24 an hour in good weather, does it?

Sequencer said in 2011: "40 (departures & arrivals) an hour would be moved on a regular basis".

In most part due to the agreed-to threat of severe beatings of pilots-in-command and operators if departing early. :D Must be a similar motivational principle to those big fines [that don't exist] in Europe for dicking pax around when delayed.... :cool:

Great to see some practical changes too, extending +10 to +30. Nobody likes running late and very few do it deliberately.

Aplying for ASA
 

Hi guys;

I am an experienced ATCO, former TWR and Radar APP Supervisor. Being 44 years old I am considering to leave Europe and give it a try downunder as ASA recently opened positions for experienced ATCOs in Perth and Sydney (both in TWR and APP)...

As you can easily understand if you read the above posts I am a bit worried as it looks like ASA is going through tough times.

Why is ASA opening positions for foreign, qualified ATCOS?!?
Is ASA expected to be a private company in the future?

If I manage to be sucessfull and join the company will I be an ATCO just like all my other (possible) future Aussie mates? Same pay, same overall job conditions?!?

If I do apply, will I be "playing along" some "anti- Aussie-ATCO game"?!?
Hope you understand me...
I will go if prospects are good (both for me, my family and "Aussie ATCOs").

I apologize if my post is out of the context here but so far I did not find a better place to place this message. Any feedback would be much appreciated as I do need to think this process carefully...
Thks a lot for your patience and consideration :ok:

Mismanagement mainly - recruitment and training was severely reduced, to be followed several years later by the remarkable realisation they had an aging workforce, and the mad scrabble to rebuild recruitment levels when you no longer have the resources and staff to achieve it.

Many groups can't easily release staff to fill vacancies elsewhere because it would leave them shorter of staff than they already are. Privatisation was the aim at one stage, not any more.

It's simply a matter of trying to get suitably qualified bums in seats - you aren't doing anyone out of a job or a chance at moving to Sydney or Perth. You aren't being used to undermine terms and conditions.

My understanding is you start somewhere in the middle of the pay scales, I guess depending on experience and what you can negotiate, and from there progress as per locally recruited controllers. Aside from not starting at the bottom you're treated exactly the same as a local recruit.

I work with a number of controllers who came from overseas - mainly UK and South Africans, although there have been a couple of Danes, and I don't think anyone sees foreign recruits as a problem - you'll just be another controller. You'll fit in or not depending on you as an individual, not where you're from. My immediate group has people from the UK, US, Canada, Vietnam, Philippines and Peru, as well as a few Aussies ;)

This thread would probably be more suitable: http://www.pprune.org/atc-issues/311...c-testing.html

COBT plus FFT. A thing of beauty! :}

http://i521.photobucket.com/albums/w...loggs/COBT.jpg

Last question first, about 12 times a shift, and no.

F100s seem slow down a lot more on cruise than 737's, but not below descent speed. Typically in terms of ground speed (which is what I'm most concerned with as an ATC) they seem to be constant cruise and descent, whereas 737s (particularly Qantas) will lose most of the time in the descent. At TOD a 737 will often look to be anything up to 4-5 minutes early based on groundspeed, which is why we nag about making your time. Sometimes this means you have actually overtaken the aircraft you are supposed to be following. The 737 can't have descent until it's 5 miles behind, it won't get 5 miles behind until it slows down, and it can't slow down until it descends.

It's also not just different types but different companies. A Qantas 737 behind a Virgin 737 will result in exactly the same problem. As we can see this coming 150+ miles out, I used to suggest the whichever aircraft was second to lose as much time as possible during cruise, but gave up.

In summary, two aircraft on the same STAR with FF 2 minutes apart will as often as not require vectoring or step deent even if both are exactly on time.

As an aside, when we used to vector and use speed to in-trail the inbounds, 250 KIAS was considered the minimum we could reduce an aircraft to. If you really stuffed up the vectoring you could ask for 240, 230 if you were desperate. Also, it was always taught that making an aircraft speed up again after slowing down was a cardinal sin. When we went to pilot adjusted fix times, with 250 from the fix, it never occurred to most of us that you would slow down to below 250, and than speed up again at the fix.

Edited to ask : Capn Bloggs is that near MRW, and why distance GEL? I didn't think the airline I thought you flew for went there?

Hal auto tunes any VORs within 130nm, unless the crew overrides him. We do go there on occasion; last time was a @#$% rescue.

Been in that situation twice. The 737 was so far in front (later FFT) it was never going to work, so we negotiated a sequence change. All went well after that. Maybe we got sucked in! :uhoh:

Nice reflection there Capt.....

Thanks Capn Bloggs, learn something new very day. And yes, you did :p.

airdualbleedfault - with respect I think you are still confusing movements with arrivals or departures. Wed morning TWR were firing 40+/hour departures. Remember all bar two flights out of PH are in an arc of just 135 degrees, and I don't think thats bad going (if the TWR didn't clump same direction departures together we could do better, but thats another story).

Umm, the federal government? Rio Tinto? BHP? Most/all Perth junior mining companies?

Surely this IS the story, HIRO can only be effective if everyone is playing the game.

Especially in Perth's peak departure times-

The above same direction comment just got me thinking about the fact that once all the departing aircraft are lined up nose to tail on the 1 or maybe 2 available taxiways to the THLD holding points then ATC can basically only launch them in the order they are lined up on each, regardless of their departure routing/direction or type (TP or jet) and thus departure climb out speeds.

Just an out of the box thought, what if the last approx 3-500m of the taxiway was wide enough to be like a 2 lane road so that everyone was lined up as now nose to tail in the left hand "holding lane" but could then be called out of that line/lane by ATC so that they can be launched in any order ATC deemed best??? The order of the original taxiway lineup then wouldn't matter. As gaps form in the holding lane everyone just moves forward to fill gaps and allow following aircraft in to the back of the "holding lane" area.

That way they could launch say 2-4 similar speed jets one after the other then 2-4 T/props etc and so on so there would be less issues with a jet that was lined up right behind it overtaking a T/Prop on a similar/same SID or routing or a fast jet doing the same to a slower climbing one etc until they were further away from the airport where there is then more room to manoeuvre/ radar vector both laterally as well as vertically to maintain separation.

That might lead to an overall faster TKOf rate/hr as the time waiting for faster type to be cleared behind a slower aircraft that has departed ahead of it could be reduced as the climb speeds of each would be better matched and there would be little overtaking rate speed difference, eg jet behind a much slower climbing T/prop.
IE, Separation times could be closer to the minimums allowed as the speed/performance of that "departing group type" would all be very similar.

If 2-3 T/props go one after the other with say a left turn on routes heading in a certain direction then maybe the next 2-3 jets launched behind them could be those going right initially or further straight out before turning left etc.

I hope you can understand what I am trying to say. Just an idea.

Nautilus, thanks for the ATC perspective. We get a little frustrated when we are down low, at min speed and still overtaking the aircraft sequenced in front of us. The F100s seem to cause the most grief for whatever reason, obviously they cruise slower and then plan to descend at much higher speeds.

There's only so much you can do when you're reasonably heavy and don't have unlimited fuel tanks!

It doesn't appear that any Skywest F100 tech crew have responded on this, so , from a charter SLF perspective--things have changed since the introduction of the new system. Inbound to Perth, PM, it was a case of get into the air on scheduled departure time then wait to see how long it would be before the power comes right off. Or how many holding orbits you did inland from Jurien Bay. Watching other flights orbit with you. Now, on the PM flight, departing West Angeles, you will board at sunset, and wait until last light to depart. Announcement about a slot time, get into the air, and then the power comes right back in the cruise. Normal flight time would be 95 minutes, more commonly now is 120 minutes. Can go out to 135 minutes. Slow all the way, but not often having to orbit. Some on here who haven't had to work into the Pilbara may not have noticed that the busiest minesite strips are visual daylight only. So we have to be airborne by last light. Hence you get all these F100's into the air at the same time, and they have to manage it. Less of an issue as the days get longer, probably, delay departure time to lessen time in the air. But I know we've been sitting on the piano keys, midwinter, watching the landing lights grow very bright on the ground ahead. Until the mining companies we work for decide to stagger knock-off times for those coming off-roster , or a third runway is built, it won't change. My money would be on ther third runway option happening first , as easy as the other option sounds.:*

Or something like Rome with 2 holding points each side of the departure runway AA1 and AA2 from memory. 50 seconds between departures for 737 sized aircraft. Granted they seemed to have a dedicated departures runway that doesn't cross the arrival runway. The limiting factor in perth appears to be airspace and separation on the climb though from previous postings here.

CDM
http://http://www.airservicesaustral...fact_sheet.pdf

http://

To hopefully provide a little more info for Nautilus and Transition Layer from an F100 pilots point of view-

We have a very wide speed range in the cruise and can slow down considerably more than the Boeings. We can do anywhere from M0.60 to M0.76 in the cruise so if ATC give us a Julim time the first thing we do is slow down the cruise and leave the descent as profile (normally 0.72/270). Only if at min cruise speed we still cannot meet the Julim time will we then slow the descent profile.
I think Nautilus hit the nail on the head, we loose the time in cruise and you (Transition Layer) are loosing it on descent so we end up with problems!

Ranmar850- Its good to see you have grasp of what is going on with the West Angelas departures, we often think that you guys must think we are just trying to upset you but its far from the case! Often our COBT at West Angelas is after last light and we cannot depart out of there after dark (as you pointed out) so we hold off as long as we can before taking off but as we are early on our COBT we still cop slow downs as soon as we get airborne.

Checkerboard-I can assure they they don't all "get it" :rolleyes:, but there is a generalised, vague understanding that Perth Airport is the problem, and it really is beyond your control. And they all reckon you do a great job into that strip, with all its limitations.
I'm only a PPL (with a lapsed medical :O) but maintain a very strong interest in all things with wings. And you can certainly do some quick turnarounds when your departure from Perth is delayed to the point where you are landing at WA a few minutes before sunset!

One for the Skywest boys and girls flying into West Ang.

http://ranmar.smugmug.com/Motorcycle...les-1-2-XL.jpg

Great pic! :ok:

Checkerboard - thanks for that.
Very nearly learnt that the hard way. Two F100's outbound from PH, same airline, same track, same level, leaving radar, M.07 closing!
I've always thought one thing the F100 is best at is slowing down ;).

Transition Layer - perspective makes all the difference. We would be sitting there cursing the 737 for not slowing down until the last minute. It didn't occur to me that you might be doing a constant IAS. As a radar controller I only tend to think in terms of groundspeed.

It has been suggested that if the fixes were further out it would be less of a problem, because most of the descent would be after the fix, and so therefore everybody would be doing 250kts. The downside would be less time/miles to lose speed to make the fix.

My money would be on the development of matter teleportation before either!

What needs to happen here is talk between ATC and operators. Slow as possible in cruise and high-speed descent is only one way of doing things, IMO not the most efficient, fuel-wise, and it appears not the easiest for ATC. A reasonable-speed cruise and reasonable-speed descent would probably be better.

If ATC tells us officially what annoys them, I'm sure the pilots/operators could adjust their modus operandi to fit in a bit better.

As mentioned, in some types, the descent is where a lot of the time is lost. If there is less descent, less capability to go slow (as well as less time in cruise). We see this on the Julim for 03: the higher crossing altitude leaves us less time to get slow before the FF.

Ironically JULIM for 03 is easier for us because of later descent. If you are still not 5 miles behind at REVOP on 21 its a problem, less so on 03 because you don't need as much descent.

Easiest for us is everybody doing the same, whichever that is. Thats what approach get (in theory) at 40nm, aircraft 2 minutes apart and doing the same speed.

Re talks between ATC and operators, who you get from ATC is the issue. If ASA was an airline, and I was say a 737NG pilot, my immediate superior would not have flown for 15 years, and then it would have been an F100. PH controllers would be A320 pilots, and the FLOW would fly helicopters. The overall manager would have spent the first 18 months of his airline career flying Electra's, and then spent 20+ years in an office.

Hi Bloggs and TL,

Good discussion..quick question. Both 737 I assume, what is a normal descent speed schedule for you guys assuming you have no holding/slow down restrictions and what would be a minimum fuel descent speed schedule at say your average weights arriving to Perth?


Im another F100 driver...I think its quick to assume we should be doing the same thing, but they are different aircraft and they are operated in different ways. It would seem you guys are suffering the consequence of the way we operate the aircraft. I'm happy to help out as much as I can, and having a wider understanding of how things work can't hurt. Bloggs I agree, discussion between operators is good, hence reason for my post!

Nautilus & ATC :ok:

A320 - throw in my three dollars twenty , we tend to drop the descent speed first M.70/220 then go for the reduction in the cruise to fine tune it ... everyone has a way to skin the cat but that's what I have seen the most.

Side thought - weekends we taxi past all the work areas - no one around. Are the penalty rates that high that the boys only work mon-fri ... when all this fuss is happening..... :ugh:

A320: Our company descent profile is cost index cruise in to 280kt. Usually about .78/280.

In order to try to maintain a reasonable profile (not super shallow with ATC steps) I prefer to reduce cruise speed first to a comfortably low speed, then if necessary use that as mach for descent into 280, then start reducing the 280 KIAS. Often you are 10 kt above min clean all the way and still cant make it and thats when a vector helps. Curious though why an orbit (about 2-4 min delay) is rarely available? Is it due to conflicting airways laterally?

ATC has a record of standard speeds for most companies, as yet no requests have been made to vary these 'profile' descent speeds as far as I know (as a pilot pleb). Terminal arrival speeds should be standardised fairly soon though, all going well.

If you need extra mlles, we need to get them done prior to 90nm on the outer sectors (except turbos below F190), partly due workload and partly due congestion. At the sort of levels you are out there, even a four minute orbit is optimistic. The other issue with orbits vs vectors is that we 'lose control' once you start an orbit i.e if you are 1/3 of the way around and we can see you will be late, its too late to fix it, whereas a vector allows more fine tuning. Remember late is much much worse than early.

About 6 minutes is the cutoff for vectoring vs holding. Less than that and you won't be able to get round a pattern, more than that and vectoring takes too much time and attention. There are exceptions obviously. Sometimes if the pattern if full I've vectored for 10+ minute delays well north of REVOP, particularly for non RVSM traffic if we can't get them below F290.

Well, some companies. It also only applies if we haven't given you a delay, which is why this thread has been so enlightening

737-20 ;). Normal .77->295, Min Fuel is Cost Index Zero, .74ish->220.

Bring back the 727 - descent .85/350KIAS to 20nm from touchdown,
or the DC 9 - .82/320KIAS to 15nm from touchdown.
Pilots of the day seemed to like it.

How would the airlines like it if we instructed "cross Julim at XX, descend at 250 knots"? We'd probably have to throw in a few short vectors every now and then, but you'd all be coming in at the same speed without the problem of running parallel tracks and also the issue where number one is descending at 220 and increasing at Julim with number two coming in at 280 and reducing. As Nautilus has advised, a short vector on 125.2 is far easier than trying to tweak times without encroaching Pearce airspace on 133.9.

Bloggs,

Normal descent for us would usually be about .73/280kt.

I tend to reduce the cost index to meet the julim time and if that works I don't worry about changing the descent. However if its a big delay, then we'll start reducing the descent speed. It hasn't occurred to me to try changing the descent speed first...might have to give it a go and see what happens :ok:

73-200?...ah, you must be on the top of Kevin McNamaara's noise complaint hit list? :E

I don't think the issue the speed the F100 flys at, but rather the shorter sectors they fly. It's hard to loose 20 mins on an hour sector, but the F100 is probably the aircraft best to give it a crack.

For me personally, I find it easier and more accurate to cruise at the slower speeds and have the extra power in reserve for increasing to meet the times. There is only so slow you can go (even in the 100 :}) if you've come in fast and need to slow down. And as already mentioned, that is probably the crux of the problem. Too many people skinning the same cat in differant ways.

It was only a matter of time....

Had to get the tissues for that one!

The question is: who is AH? HD? :}