No Alternate flight planning
 

This interesting concept of flight planning has now arrived in our operations manuals. It's not being used at the moment. The idea is that provided certain criteria are met we can dispatch with no destination alternate in return for an additional 15 minutes of final holding fuel. The criteria are as follows:

1. Flight time of less than six hours.
2. Two independent runways at the destination available and usable.
3. Cloudbase of 2,000' or Circling plus 500', whichever the greater.
4. Visibility of 5 km or more.
5. Congestion Classification of "Predictable".

I'm not too fussed about this as we can order whatever fuel we want without repercussions, but not everybody can. Also, the reality is that at many European airports you will probably still have an alternate up your sleeve but that will not always be the case. So with the above in mind, what do other people think of this concept? Do you already operate like this? I'd love to read your opinions.

I'm surprised that this has only just appeared in your manuals.

Personally, I've never used it. However, there are plenty of places we operate to where I'd be more than happy to apply this (AMS, BRU, BCN etc.). To be honest though, by the time you've added the 15 minutes holding fuel, in many cases you cover alternate number 1 anyway.

So am I .......had this in the books over a decade ago. Not followed by many of us tho

What does it actually cost to carry extra fuel all other being equal?
A quick look at our manuals, paper graphs, thick lines etc I get a figure of about 25kg extra burn per 1000kg heavier, less than a minute of average burn per hour.

So you get an extra 15 mins fuel with no alternate planned, cost to carry if you average 2 ton /hour = 500kg or on above figures 12.5 kg extra cost
In Europe you could need an extra 25 mins for a suitable divert so 10 mins more than the given 15 mins, call it an extra 15 mins to save the maths, another 12.5 kg cost.

I am sure we could all come up with instances where the company waste more than the 12.5kg cost of the fuel that would not cause my sphincter muscle to become irritable if they made the cost savings there!

The other way to look at it is you're using the parallel as an alternate. It is a planning excercise. Can be used wisely when needed, as long as all consequences are well understood. No problem arriving to MAN with 2,2 t on a A320, but the above is exactly what's needed to have legal paperwork at dispatch.

I'm flying in Australia and we rarely carry fuel for an alternate. When we do need an alternate it is often over an hour away so the restrictions on payload are significant.

The airport charts here are printed with the weather requirements that would force you to carry an alternate.

In general I think it is just fine. If I really think I need fuel for an alternate I'll take it, but on most flights, sometime after top of descent we are committed to the destination.

We regularly dispatch without alternate, with an estimated fuel on arrival with as little as 1,6 T (for a 737-600 or 700). As long as you understand the consequences I find it acceptable. E.g. what if you have an engine failure, stuck flap or anti-skid fault. If you always leave yourself a way out, it's just a numbers game. Declare a mayday, skip the long complicated checklist, do what it takes to get yourself on the ground with the fuel you've got onboard. Rather 1.6 T on arrival to an airport with 3 long dry runways than X.X on arrival to a slippery short runway with alternate another slippery short runway. In either case if you've got an anti-skid fault you've sold yourself short.

172 driver,
That's a pilots posting, always leave a way out.
Without the alternate fuel a lot of problems encountered will mean land at first suitable airfield not just take the problem to destination.

Think you will find many carriers have used what we called a 're-dispatch' flight plan for eons. QF certainly used to operate without a destination alternate and that would be 13 hour sectors, SIN-LHR for example. In another company I have operated the B744 long haul on re-dispatch plans, flight plan to, say, FRA with the intended destination being LHR, when within an hour or so of FRA do a complete re calculation fuel remaining and in most cases, weather permitting, you have enough to continue to your originally intended destination. Can only think of one time en route SFO to HKG, strong head winds and a heavy load, had to drop into Narita, otherwise made it safely pretty much every other time in ten years of B744. This procedure is also known as using an en route alternate in some carriers.