Can anyone explain the relationship between the ATZ and the airport closing to commercial traffic?
I'm wondering how long the ATZ stays in place and will the airspace eventually revert to class G? Does it depend on runway length and remain in place for GA?

Hadley Rille

Provided that the aerodrome remains licensed and the length of the longest runway stays the same the current 2.5 NM radius ATZ remains in place.

If the aerodrome was to de-license, it could keep its ATZ if either ATC or AFIS is provided. However if the main runway length is reduced to 1850 metres or less, the ATZ would reduce to 2.0 NM radius. If only Air/Ground Communications Service is provided, they would lose the ATZ.

Interesting times ahead, if the aerodrome cannot operate as a viable business with passenger carrying flights, it certainly will not without them. The infrastructure necessary to support passenger flights (ie ATC/ ILS/Instrument approach procedures) will not be sustainable.

Sorry to say it looks like the end of the road for the airport as we have known it for the past years. I shall be sorry to see it go as I had my first ever flight from there, age 4 years, in a DH Dragon.

Mine too - in a Dragon Rapide - taxied in the Dragon (another story).

Flown there off and on for the past thirty years.

TCAS Fan wrote:

" If only Air/Ground Communications Service is provided, they would lose the ATZ."

Incorrect.

If a licensed airfield then you can have an ATZ with A/G (see EGPG - Cumbernauld)

If unlicensed, then to have an ATZ you need to have FISOs operating radios. So Glenrothes - now unlicensed due to the changes that allow ab initio traning from unlicensed airfields - has lost its ATZ.

The only logic seems to be that "serious" airfields should have ATZs!

(Two of Scotland's four largest recreational airfields - based on aircraft based there - would therefore not be allowed ATZs.)

ps Strathaven is also, it seems, ineligble for a four-letter ICAO code because most of the aircraft based there are microlights and homebuilts.

Xrayalpha

To clarify, if they stay licensed ATC/AFIS/AGCS will facilitate retention of the ATZ.

If they de-license only ATC or AFIS will facilitate its retention.

And what's the relevance of having an ATZ?

As far as I understand it's just there to protect traffic on/around the aerodrome.

I think you always need to be in two-way radio contact with the ATSU if inside the ATZ, and if the ATSU is an ATC unit you need to obey all instructions given by the ATCO.

Hi Odai,

"I think you always need to be in two-way radio contact with the ATSU if inside the ATZ, and if the ATSU is an ATC unit you need to obey all instructions given by the ATCO."

Incorrect.

Glasgow (ATC) and Cumbernauld (ATZ with A/G) allow non-radio traffic (see AIP).

Of course, it is many moons since anyone even dared ask to go into Glasgow non-radio!

So, two-way contact - but could be by light signal or (as has happened with one of our chaps) relay from another aircraft in formation.

ps. Cumbernauld, as far as I know, now doesn't have an Aldis lamp. H&S said they couldn't keep the battery in the tower. So they would have had to carry it up and down the stairs. Folks said: if we go down the stairs, we can just use the radio in the fire truck!

Thanks for the interesting replies.

@xrayalpha: allow me to repeat the question:

what then is the relevance of (having) an ATZ ?

As Odai said:

"As far as I understand it's just there to protect traffic on/around the aerodrome."

Basically, the airfield operator gets some say on who flies in the vicinity of their airfield. They might allow people in non-radio but PPR, they might say people have to have radio and PPR, they might just let people call up on the radio.

They might even, like Oban, say PPR by telephone only, and then try to turn away a pal of mine who called up on radio. He then phoned a minute later on his mobile interfaced with the intercom!!! Ha! Ha!

It also gives a little bit of conspicuity on the charts! Otherwise, Farmer Giles with a 40 hour a year Piper Cub gets a small circle on the chart. A busy microlight training airfield might also have the same annotation - see East Fortune or Strathaven. Or a busy GA field, see Fife.

From the BBC: Blackpool Airport to close after 'no buyer found'.

Official announcement here.

xrayalpha, thanks for that - clears things up for me. :p

Looks like I confused 'two-way contact' with 'two-way radio contact' - I should know better given I did my PPL training at an airfield with an ATZ that often featured non-radio aircraft (and a signals square).

I work at the airport, hopefully GA will continue and will remain strong at Blackpool.

Blackpool Airport
 

Does anyone know what's going to happen to GA at Blackpool Airport? Companies such as ANT and Flight Training Blackpool, will they have to close or will they operate out of it as an unmanned airfield?

Blackpool Airport is Licensed (P724) by the CAA and therefore is open to commercial air transport operations requiring the use of said licensed airport.

A few years ago the CAA changed the rules for those airfields licensed purely for flying training and a few took advantage.

It would be possible for some operations to continue at Blackpool if the status changed but cancelling the licence triggers other consequences such as the loss of airspace and some r/t frequencies as the ANSP approval would go too.

If the licence is issued to a part of Balfour Beatty as opposed to Blackpool's local authority it's loss would be hard to regain due to the new licensee having to comply with EASA rules.

If BB fail to sell their share of the airport what they do with it as an asset remains to be seen but will be key to continued GA ops.

The Council have been very quiet on this subject but must have a Plan B for the 15th Oct. What if BB lock all the gates so no-one can get in or out?

As many livelihoods depend on continuing flying activity clear statements of intentions are need now to bring some certainty to the situation.

SGC

Quotes from Blackpool gazette

"Air traffic control and fire cover will end on October 15th. The smaller general aviation companies at the Squires Gate hub will be free to continue to operate."

"more than 100 staff at the airport, including fire fighters, security, air traffic controllers and administrative staff, are set to lose their jobs when the airport shuts on Wednesday 15th Oct"

If Atc are being booted out, surely a/g or info can't replace them immediately? Looks like the whole of Blackpool airport will be shutting after all then at least until there's some sort of radio cover sorted?

You don't NEED radio cover - and there is always the Safetycom frequency 135.475 MHz as a fallback.

Standing back from all this for a second - it seems bizarre that Blackpool Airport is closing so suddenly.

It's been in operation for so many years yet at the stroke of Balfour Beatty's lawyer's pen it's all over.

I'm just sorry for all those who earned a livelihood through the Airport and imagine it must all be something of a shock.

I certainly had heard nothing about it until this Thread on PPRuNe.

Even without the airport terminal traffic Blackpool can be a busy place, especially on a sunny weekend. Not even having a/g radio wouldn't work.

Jet 2 were going to operate out of Blackpool as normal until the end of today then everything will be diverted to and from Manchester, instead of waiting until the 15th.

However whilst mid-air it appears the 9PM arrival into Blackpool by Jet 2 from Alicante has been diverted to Manchester, with an announcement on the Jet 2 website. Other sites still show it due in to BLK at 2100hrs.

Maybe the owners have gone in and booted out all the staff ahead of schedule, or they've all walked out.

I have two major gripes with Balfour Beatty. Firstly it was through Blackpool airport that my interest and subsequent aviation career kicked off some 42 years ago.
Secondly having a rather large holding of Balfour Beatty shares I am somewhat distressed that only a few weeks back the Board of Directors of BB turned down a rather lucrative takeover deal from Clarrilion only a few days later to issue a profits warning! I reckon every single member of the BB board should hang from Blackpool tower by their testicles........sadly though they have proved from recent actions they don't have any!!!

Blackpool Airport closure: BAE Systems offers to help aviation operators
 

Please sign this petition to save Blackpool Airport:

https://submissions.epetitions.direc...etitions/70619

Sadly I think Blackpool airport failed because it employed 110 people, there's no way to provide funded work for that many people in a GA regional airport. The need to have ATC on site to run CAT in the UK is a big problem that needs fixing through the red tape challenge work. Nonetheless I reckon a deal with Warton for ATC and say 4 FISOs on the field would be more than enough. Then 7 firemen or so, some support staff who can also do security and you could run the whole operation with less than 30 people.

You need more than fiso but radar from warton would work.

There is no way you would get the numbers down to 30 the security empire would require that just to move 1pax.

From my limited dealings with operating in there they need to have a clear out of the dinosaurs anyway so I suspect CAT will be gone for a year at least. Once all the TUPE issues are gone they may then be able to be born again.

BAe have an interest in keeping the tarmac available so close but if the cost is to much i don't know.

Hmm, but at only 1800m or so LDA and with no arrestor cables it's probably not good enough for a lot of the potential divert scenarios e.g. high weight flapless Typhoon. They probs use Valley. And anyway, would BAe pay for it? Seems doubtful. Unlike the RAF, which is happy to pay for keeping full facilities open at both Kinloss and Leuchars for Typhoon diverts after their "closure".

I don't know but for cat ops it would be no problem.

We shall see what happens a bit like norwich there has been years of history and dinosaur procedures stopping anything happening.

Now if they choose its a clean slate. Any airport which starts raping pax in the departure lounge for a development fee is on borrowed time anyway in my opinion. Its just giving chemo to someone who already has secondary cancers.

The whole of the airport not just the terminal is closing tomorrow evening. No date as to when its reopening :=

Very sad from an aviation history point of view alone. Blackpool was very 'go ahead' in the days of early aviation, sponsoring flying pageants in 1909 and 1910, the latter being on the Squire's Gate site.

It's a great pity if 'dinosauritis' has killed it. I used to enjoy flying in there in happy days when you paid your (very reasonable) landing fee to the bloke in the fire station office, then out through the side gate and away.

There is 4 people in the terminal I am more than happy I will never have to be subjected to having to deal with again.

If even 5% of the antics i have heard of that have gone on there are true there will be more than a few breathing a sigh of relief its shutting.

Hopefully it will open again after a period with all the dead wood gone and some of the rotten pruned. You need to get rid of the idiots that bring the whole place down.

Love this; 'Blackpool Council’s cabinet member for highways and transport, Cllr John Jones is blaming Jet2 for the closure of Blackpool airport'

Has everybody forgotten until recently Ryanair used to operate from Blackpool. And why did they completly abandon Blackpool, because of an airport development fee introduced by Balfour Beatty, an extra £10 pp.

It's the idiot/s that introduced the airport development fee that has led to this.

Balfour Beatty want land to build on. Only if they sell the airport land to a buyer who knows and wants to make money by running an airport, only then will egnh be secure.

Plenty happening at Norwich.Plenty of dinosaurs( and very popular ) down the road at the Dinosaur Park. Not seen any on the airport for a few million years now!!!
Anyway, this is a Blackpool forum. The 2 don't begin to compare!:mad:

True for a start blackpools runways and taxiways arn't breaking up.

And you should talk to the bird running the front house pax services and the idiots in security in Norwich to talk to the local dinosaurs.


The idea though that norwich will be anything but a constant battle to make ends meet is fantasy. Eventually they won't be able to put off the major infrastructure renewal thats required there and that will be it.

I flew into Blackpool about two weeks ago. ATC etc were helpful but we had to wait about 45 mins for fuel (there were no other aircraft on the move) and a friendly airfield tels girl told us that it was pointless trying to get through security to grab a sandwich, we would be better-off starving.

In many ways, no different from most regional airports.

I think they used the same security consultant that Norwich did.

Utter idiots of the, I am taking your sandwich because butter can melt producing a liquid mentality. And no you can't put it in a liquid bag and put it through because its not in a bottle with a size on it.

Sure you're not confusing Norwich with Southend? It might be ridiculously expensive, but handling at Saxonair is a pleasure, while Southend is a run-down hovel with under-paid over-zealous security, a GA apron that looks more like a gravel driveway and taxiways that look like they've survived a minor air attack, but only just. They are redeemed only by certain staff who are professional, friendly and helpful.
Blackpool was tatty last time I was there. I've visited all three within the last month, and a few others besides. At Blackpool, directions to the C were a joke, although the refuelling guy was great. Despite a couple of helpful staff most weren't bothered and I wouldn't choose to go back there if it were open.

A fond memory of Blackpool in the early '80s. We'd (me and Peter P) flown in in our Chippy in days when the radio rarely worked on xmit (not a major problem back then). On departure, we found the RH brake had failed. Peter had flown in so it was my leg back to Barton, and due the duff right brake Peter was out on the RH wingtip as 'steerer' as we slowly made our way from the apron to the runway. And it was raining. Eventually, at walking pace, we got to the holding point and I pressed the PTT.

Me: "squeel crackle burp click"

BPL ATC: "If that's SL, you are cleared to line up"

I signalled to Peter to proceed, and he steered me onto the runway, got in, (dripping wet), and we closed the canopy (so actually we were both wet having spent the last 20 minutes or so with it open).

Me: "Click, burp, Lima, crackle, pop"

BPL ATC: "If that's that bluddy Chipmunk, just GO!"

Well, he might not have actually said "bluddy", but it was certainly implied!

Blackpool has always been an unlucky destination for me.

Went on a weekend fishing trip in the 80's and all we caught was crabs.
Fly in for a lads weekend in the 90's and all that was available was mingers.
Had an engine failure with a Seneca on t/o in 2000.
Flew in with the C421 in 2011 and lost the door/locker key somewhere on a beach.

I just ain't going back! :p