In weather like this, schools close for a number of reasons - there are laws which mean the temperature has to be above a certain point indoors. The toilets have to be working (frozen pipes are a real issue particularly in older buildings) and there needs to be separate toilets for boys and girls; any of those factors are enough to close a school. And most significantly it is as much about getting kids back home after school as it is getting them there in the morning. In the school where I work the pupils have special needs and are bussed in by the local authority. A couple of weeks ago the decision was taken to keep the place open despite the forecast for heavy snow from mid-morning onwards. By hometime not a single school bus was to be seen and the last pupils were collected at 8pm that night. They didn't get home until nearly 2am because the roads and traffic was so bad. It really makes me angry when individuals who do not know what they are talking about blindly criticise schools without making any effort to familiarise themselves with facts first. If a school takes the difficult decision to close for the day there *will* be very good reasons for doing so.

Couldn't agree more with you Adam - when it comes to anything to do with infrastructure this country is a sad joke.

Piecing through the various public statements from BAA and the airlines, Heathrow seems to have suffered a series of issues

1. Friday PM, the process (or possibly the infrastructure) didn't seem to allow them to de-ice aircraft and get them away reliably. Arriving aircraft were on the tarmac for multiple hours waiting for stands to become available. (There was a small fall of ice pellets and snow on Friday PM)
2. It appears that each ground handling company has their own de-ice kit and they de-ice their customers at the stands, running a high risk at an airport like Heathrow that the push-back and taxi time will exceed the hold over time.
3. Saturday morning, therefore, Heathrow seemed to have an excessive number of aircraft on the ground when the snow hit
4. BAA have indicated their core problem was an inability to clear the stands rather than the runways
5. The stand clearance issues seemed to be a lack of plan as to where to move the snow (BAA quote 'we needed to pick up and move 30 tonnes of snow for each stand, you can't just plow it we don't have space for that'). It might have been agrevated by the larger than normal number of aircraft on the ground
6. The focus of resources on stands vs. clearing the broader surfaces resulted in a significant delay so the snow went through several thaw freeze cycles and by the time BAA got to clearing the snow from the second runway it was a significantly more challenging job.

It is difficult as an outsider, to tell if Heathrow simply has inadequate levels of equipment to de-ice the departure schedule and to clear a measurable accumulation of snow, they lack sensible processes and plans to achieve the objective, or they are hobbled by H&S/Yellow Jackets

Most people except that disruption during and shortly after a snow fall is normal. However, the communication and recovery seem to be uniquely bad at Heathrow this time.

In any event, BAA do seem this morning to have acknowledged that only being able to run 1/3 of your scheduled operation three days after a 5 inch snowfall is not a good performance!

One of the real issues is that runways are shut in the UK because they have a dusting of snow on them. Now, on a short runway and/or with significant crosswinds, contamination becomes a problem.

At LHR we weren't suffering from either of those two things... Most of the jets going in there are certified to land on runways with lying snow, ice, slush, you name it. Extensive manufacturer trials have been carried out, guidelines established and performance figures published. 09L/27R (3900m) and 09R/27L (3600m) are both amply big enough to allow landings even in icy/slippery conditions - virtually no braking action actually required. Takeoffs are a bit more closely controlled but figures are available up to 13mm of slush on what I fly.

Everywhere else I operate to in the world that suffers from wintry episodes allows taxiing, taking off and landing on contaminated surfaces. Grit rolled into snow can actually be quite grippy, even just compacted snow is OK for moving around on, if you're careful. You don't need bare black tarmac (although it's nice) as long as you're aware of what you're attempting and have made the appropriate preparations/calculations.

One flake of snow falls onto a landing runway and they're out with the checking vehicles... Unless the *whole* runway turned to sheet ice there isn't an issue (and even then, you *could* land on 3-4,000m anyway).

I've spent a lot of time practising in contaminated conditions in the sim, just have rarely used those skills in the UK... :ugh:

I feel sorry for the poor chaps at BAA. Those (rather sad) rolling news people keep on bombarding us with daily horror stories of the inevitable consequences of global warming so it's hardly surprising that snow ploughs weren't at the top of the BAA shopping list. They probably went for the fleet of zebra land
rovers so that they could chase the Wildebeast back into the parched, open savannahs of Royal Berkshire next year.

I would just like to say that BAA own a further 5 airports... How about we consider how the other airports within the group are coping??

I work at another one of the BAA airports and we are doing just fine!

Moral of the story is; Don't tar us all with the same brush!

BAA is owned by a Spanish company, Ferrovial, which employs 107,000 people with assets of euros 48Bn.

The Chief Exec of BAA was paid £1.16 million last year and the company spent around £500,000 on snow moving equipment. Shows the priorities methinks.

"and the company spent around £500,000 on snow moving equipment. Shows the priorities methinks."

I would be interested to find out where these figures came from? As a group, BAA have spent alot more on snow equipment than £500,000. This figure does not take into account the de-icing and anti-icing media.

I refer to my last post.... BAA is alot more than just LHR!!!!

Heathrow
Southampton
Stansted
Aberdeen
Glasgow
Edinburgh

Today's Daily Telegraph, page one.

BAA spend on Heathrow snow equipment is set out in a BAA PR puff from November available on their Heathrow website here:
BAA Heathrow: Heathrow's army of snow ploughs stretch their wings as snow bites

Yes, BAA (aka Ferrovial) own more shopping centres than airports, and even the airports they do own are looking more and more like shopping centres ;)

Ah but there is a difference being hit by an all out blizzard, and a relatively light dusting of snow. Perhaps the airlines should get a rebate from BAA, seeing as part of their ticket cost is 'fees' which no doubt go to BAA....I bet a weeks worth of fees for BAA at LHR would pay for a fleet of snow ploughs.

So the Gatwick total closure has already been airbrushed from the BAA corporate memory? Aberdeen has been closed - never going to make the mational news but having been held on two occasions when the airport management promised the runway would be open in 30 minutes - for that time to extend beyond 2 hours and hence a diversion - I would n't boast about the most northern of the shopping centres which happen to have a long piece of tarmac.

Edinburgh has ben pretty similar. So are BAA boasting about Southampton?

And the clown that 'runs' the company thought he would still be eligible for a bonus????????

Stansted on the other hand seems to have had the same weather but virtually no problems.

What are they doing right that everybody else should be copying?

G

BAA is ready for winter?
 

If you want to read something really really funny click on to the BAA PR puff issued in November and mentioned in Connoisseur's post at 17:19 this evening.

Heads should roll. How many snowblowers can we buy with the manager's bonus?

How on earth can you get rid of 8 inches of snow on the runways by spraying it with a deicing solution?

Simple, really - they've got MOL breathing (fire) down their neck. Works a treat....

The main problem is not the runway contamination with snow but the taxiways and aircraft Docking points.

Remember that this time of year many arrivals are in official night into complex taxi airports and not only does the surface have to be taxiable on but all the correct markings, lights and marker boards have to be visible.
The Airport runway is just one tiny aspect!!!

Unless of course you have a follow me vehicle to guide every arrival departure?
Add low visibility taxi and :ugh:

Pace

Yes and they now all use the term climate change. Then they are always correct.

Read Solar by Ian McEwan for a satirical look at the whole global warming/climate change bandwagon.

Must not take the micky out of climate change.

An awful lot of academic careers and postgrad degrees have been built on that concept ;)

You can't really expect these highly educated people to suddenly do something useful like picking up shovels and start shovelling snow out of the gates at LGW, can you?

I caught glimse of the snow clearence efforts at LHR on Sky News last night. (it was snowing in the video, som presumeably from last weekend) Quite entertaining. The runway sweepers where tiny!!! And not that many of them eighter by the looks of things.

Over here we have had -SN at ENGM/Gardermoen all day. It´s cold, so the friction was very good after sweeping.

Oh, and btw...... I counted 17 vehicles in the snow clearence convoy on my A-SMGCS display. :ok:

Yes that is true. So educated that they signed a petition at the Climate summit in Cancun (nice at this time of the year I hear...) to ban dihydrogen monoxide which is one of the key ingredients in acid rain, kills thousands of people each year. It is known as the best solvent on earth, and it has been proven to eat through rock and corrode metal.

Except it is also water.....

You'd have thought a climate change scientist would look at the facts first...;)

UN climate kooks want to cripple US economy and ban H2O | CFACT.TV