@Airbubba
Quote from the Hungarian AIP (I quess the last sentence is the main thing here):

"The controller-pilot data link communication (CPDLC) application provides a means of communication between the controller and the pilot, using data link for ATC
communication. CPDLC services are available for ACFT in the entire Hungarian airspace above FL285.The following CPDLC services are provided in this airspace:
•DLIC (data link initiation capability)
•ACL (ATC clearances and instructions)
•ACM (ATC communications management)
•AMC (ATC microphone check)
The use of CPDLC is not mandatory in this airspace and is conducted at the discretion of ATC and at the initiative of the pilots concerned."

I think the problem is that there are so many aircraft airborne these days, and ATC sectors have been combined; that VHF ATC comms are becoming so busy (in Europe) that in some regions there can be near constant chatter on Box 1. Add to this the conversations on 121.5 between old mates and it becomes unmanageable at times.

In just the last week, I missed calls three times from Box 1 because they were 'stepped on' in my headset by stations on 121.5. I think I will have to start putting in ASR's about this.

Sometimes one has to actually turn off 121.5, but then of course how do you remember to switch it back on?

As an ex communications engineer, I like "personfromporlock's" idea of a temporary mute button: A non-locking button that you pressed which would mute box 2 for, say, one minute.

Another perhaps easier solution would be if the ECAM memo (or equivalent) would display the message '121.5 NOT MONITORED' in Amber.

This assumes that the software of the ACPs (audio control panels) would be capable of modification to detect if : the box 2 audio buttons were selected, and/or that 121.5 was dialled up in the active channel.

Airbus and Boeing et al can have this idea for free in the interests of better safety.

Good idea! :D

EICAS already does it for frequencies given over CPDLC on the 777. Once the correct freq has been dialled in on Box 1 the EICAS message frequency changes from white text to green text.

Wouldn't take too much to add an alert similar to 'Pilot Response' linked to box 2.

The EICAS message/alert might be the way to go but a couple of observations:

1. Are you going to have the alert displayed every time you deliberately go off 121.5 to get ATIS or talk to company et.al (Yes, I know on some types there's the luxury of having 3 VHF Boxes,but it seems some types don't).

2. Will an alert be triggered, if, say, VHR X has 121.5 as the active freq, , the crew have correct audio selected on the ACP but volume(s) is/are turned down.

CPDLC is in use on the North Atlantic (has been for at least 8 years to my knowledge) and is used and welcomed by controllers and pilots alike. It is many times easier and more efficient than passing position reports on HF!

I no longer fly commercially and cannot comment on its use elsewhere.

There was a good suggestion on this thread that ATC and/or the military could have rung up BA Ops and asked them to ACARS the aircraft in question with a frequency to contact. BA 777s have satcom as well, so ground agencies could have made a call, too.

Seems like something that should be set up in the command centres of the various civil/military ATC units. Could save a bit of bother and expense for all.

I don’t know the exact frequency of this kind of incident but I think it’s quite high - possibly several times a day over the whole of European airspace...

I'm guessing a Final Warning letter means that you're on Double Secret Probation. :eek:

Good point, I'm wondering if that 15 minute prior rule is legacy verbiage from the Cold War ball notes for voice communications on that route.

So maybe they weren't using CPDLC, it sure would have been nice for the controllers to be able to send up a ding with a frequency.

Perhaps several incidents of temporary lost comm a day but I don't think that many intercepts would go unnoticed in these times of selfies with the hijacker and social media.

I've seen that done in a slightly different way - ATC asked a "same company" aircraft on freq (i.e. us) to contact base to initiate the above string of comms.

I guess doing it that way saved ATC ringing directory enquiries and also the cost of an international call....:ooh:

Edit to add: Genuine query - as anyone here actually used CPDLC with Budapest?

It wouldn't be up to just me obviously. We would have to agree on the best protocol.

1. Could do, or perhaps not until after say 1 minute of non monitoring 121.5, so the caution will not appear straight away when PM is talking to company or getting weather, but will pop up after a time period - to be determined?

2. There is no technical reason why not.


Perhaps an even easier way of doing this would be to monitor the audio output of box 1 downstream of the ACP selector and volume control and trigger an Amber ECAM caution or Memo "Check Comms" after a period of radio silence longer than say a few minutes. This would detect sleeping receivers, un-selected radios and radios turned right down.

At times when I hear my fellow Company "missing" on frequency, I have sent a message to our NOC, Network Operations Center on CPDLC and ask them to tell XYZ to go on 123....45 for ATC (requested ATC freq) and 2 minutes later they on frequency!

Most loss of coms in my experience are America based Airlines coming off the Nat tracks early morning. & orange ones in the BDX fir.
So I wonder if some form of fatigue is involved. Please don't think I am having a go at anyone/airline as it may be just that there are more of those operators in those FIRs.
(numbers game)

Hi Guys,


I just can confirm that the Hungarian ATM system has been fully CPDLC capable for a couple of months now... but only if the aircraft is logged on!

How very nice, a thinly-veiled insult aimed at military pilots. Just being armed won't get anyone killed.
Its going through that whole control/decision bit that has the potential for that, which includes a lot of mugs on the ground these days sine micromanagement of everything being all the rage. In this case, that most odious modern trait, micromanagement, lends a few more layers of "oops" prevention than not.
Do you, or any other air transport pilot, need to be reminded of how innocent a large plane isn't unless you know who's in there and what they're doing? I doubt it. Verification got a hard push towards Ops Normal since a fateful day in 2001. No sir, we don't get to un-write history.

In this case, it's nice to see that comms were eventually established and all ended well -- as it should.

I think you're seeing insults where there are none.

Accidents happen, as I'm sure you know, and you're more likely to be shoot by something that is armed than by something that is not.

We are all aware of KAL 007, among others, on both sides of the equation. What we can't do is pretend that the increased tension in the air is something that can be wished away, and with a finger pointed at those whose profession is handling the armed birds, just as PPRuNe is at it core for those whose profession is handling the unarmed birds, I found it (and Ian W's overwrought follow up) to be indicative of an unfortunate divide between camps.

I assume these are usually resolved without an intercept? The recent intercepts that come to mind are AB2266 from MUC to AGP, intercepted near Toulouse by the French about 2 months ago, BA108 discussed in this thread and today's AF1558 from CDG to NCL, intercepted by RAF Typhoons.

Quick look elsewhere also shows an Egypt Air flight intercepted by Israeli F15s last month and a Monarch flight intercepted by Croatian MiG21s last year.

balaton

Thanks for the info, the reason I asked is that the Budapest CPDLC facility has not yet made into some company's manuals.

Wiggy, a company aircraft did ask LHR to ACARS them, not sure if that's what got them back in comms

LHCC CPDLC
 

It's worth noting that there is a likelihood that the BA 777 involved was not capable of logging on to Budapest CPDLC, unless a retrofit to the CPDLC interface had been carried out.

Budapest is a non FANS based CPDLC system and in my outfit, only 777s that are around two and a half years or younger can log on to such CPDLC connections. BAs -200 airframes are a little older than that if I can recall correctly. The newer aircraft enable you to select if the CPDLC connection is FANS equipped or not and for Budapest, the FANS selection box should remain unticked when logging on. For connecting to Maastricht (for example), the FANS box would be ticked whilst logging on as that is a FANS based CPDLC system. Older 777 airframes do not allow you to differentiate between a FANS or non FANS based CPDLC connection and default to all connections being FANS equipped. Therefore connecting to the likes of Budapest will not be possible. The same applies to the likes of Rhein and Copenhagen who have a non FANS based CPDLC system.

My basic understanding is that FANS CPDLC connections use ACARS technology to send and receive messages and the alternative uses the ATN network to send and receive messages.

I myself have used CPDLC with Budapest with no problems!

Couldn't CPDLC logging-on be made automatically? In my mind such a system becomes much more useful, specifically as a side-channel for lost comms, if the pilots didn't need to do anything except maybe once at the start of the flight (entering a callsign/ID/authentication, whatever), and it then handles log-ons by itself. I realize this might be difficult for technical and legal reason, such as it not being easy from GPS position to determine where to log in....

Hi All,


The Budapest ATM system was upgraded in line with "VDL Mode 2" CPDLC specs by EU requirements. (The older FANS was out of question).To my knowledge, the deadline for the full implementation in EU states is 2018.

Budapest CPDLC is currently not an approved logon for use on BA aircraft. So other procedure (currently) required to re establish lost comms

Once the ATN-B2 system is operating on VDL2 initial CPDLC logon will be automatic. The current controller is known as the 'Current Data Authority' and on handover the controller's system initiates a 'Next Data Authority' message identifying the next controller's CPDLC identity to the aircraft systems which then will transfer the CPDLC connection to the next controller.

Problem is that CPDLC is rather like sending an SMS text message from your cell phone. You do not know that it has been read by the crew until/unless you get a response.

As a 'frequent flyer' on this route, my sympathy goes out to the BA crew and a strong dose of being thankful for my good luck (thus far) not to be on the receiving end of a 'close inspection'. One of the most insidious issues we have to face is the sectorisation that is invoked in many European FIRs. In the Bucharest FIR there is a frequency change about 40 miles from the Budapest FIR, least when you expect it (too soon for an ATC FIR handover, too soon to expect an inter FIR handover). Germany is another classic case in point, it seems that if you are heading E-W in Germany, you get a freq change every thirty miles (slight exaggeration I know, but the point is made). We can use various techniques to alert us to the passage from one FIR to anther, but we are blissfully unaware of how each FIR is divvied up into sectors.

Question for CPDLC air traffic controllers - does your system give you an option to send a message to an aircraft to inform them they are "lost comms" or similar? The UK has both ATN and FANS CPDLC capabilities but no message available to solve a lost comms issue, there is however a "stuck mic" message!!

We have "CHECK MIKE" msg and "FREQUENCY CHANGE" msg available, the latter would be more useful in COMLOSS cases.

CPDLC is not above fallacy. EK-LH loss of separation incident is a clear example.

There will always be mistakes when humans are involved and failures when technology is involved.

Jack Schidt - I never thought about building range rings over fir entry/ exit points. Thanks for the good idea.

Yeah, or put in abeam lines.

All the above is good for FIR entry/exit but as another frequent flyer on the specific route in question I'd agree with the point Thridle Op Des made about the size of some of the sectors.

Poor us pilots....how about opening your damn enroute chart,select/highlight the FIR entry waypoints in your FMC,and if not called by the relevant ATC then remind them.

Did Europe ever contemplated single FIR? Is it even possible.

Militaries would never allow it. They're the biggest opponents of SES already

That is interesting. 121.5 appears to be a nuisance over Europe and fighter jets on your tail if you miss a call for few minutes. Someone should rethink the entire process.

It is getting close to that. You may not have noticed but the airspace in Europe is being split into 'Functional Airspace Blocks'. These are blocks of airspace that are very similar. So the whole of central Europe is one FAB known as FABEC. UK and Ireland airspace are one FAB. This is part of the move toward user preferred trajectories. The routes are being simplified already and you can plan from entry point of the FABEC to exit point of the FABEC for example. Step 2 of the 'SESAR Master Plan' will see all fixed routes removed from European airspace (more correctly EUROCONTROL States airspace) from exit of the departure TMA to entry of the destination TMA.

This is a huge change.

Concurrent with that the North Atlantic Oceanic Track Structure will cease to be published in 2025. All transatlantic flights will be user preferred trajectories, or in SESAR parlance, Business Trajectories. It might be a good idea to start chatting with your dispatch to see how they intend to work with airspace without air routes. It will not be a simple change for dispatch.

...that will not work in a large portion of UK airspace, and I imagine several other European sectors also. Not forgetting that this principle doesn't allow natural avoidance of Danger or Restricted areas which will add workload to the controller concerned which just means even more restrictive flow measures when these areas are active.

FABEC is a wonderful idea on a politicians piece of paper, which is where it should stay.

FAB's have already demonstrated clearly that they simply don't work. SES is indeed a great idea and a noble cause strongly supported by airspace users but just have a look at the recent attempt to implement a common transition altitude across the EU and you will quickly see how difficult the process of establishing a workable single FABEC is.

Ian W It is not.