Scheduling - Eastern Med
CH3CH2OH
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Scheduling - Eastern Med
I appreciate there are a number of factors that relate to scheduling with I expect maximising utilisation being prime.
Apart from utilisation are there temperature limitations in say Dalaman, Larnaca, Paphos (A319/320, 73X) etc that seem to favour inbounds around 21:00 local and the next couple of hours with commensurate return flights making it back to the UK early hours?
I can see how that works for maximising utilisation with your aircraft ready to go again for an 06:xx departure, curious about the temperature effects if any.
A return trip seems like a long day for the crew too.
Apart from utilisation are there temperature limitations in say Dalaman, Larnaca, Paphos (A319/320, 73X) etc that seem to favour inbounds around 21:00 local and the next couple of hours with commensurate return flights making it back to the UK early hours?
I can see how that works for maximising utilisation with your aircraft ready to go again for an 06:xx departure, curious about the temperature effects if any.
A return trip seems like a long day for the crew too.
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Weight and temperature are certainly factors, as is utilisation. Correct on all counts.
Longish days certainly but easy enough as only 2 sectors - all the hard work is on the ground. Days just as long occur with 4 sectors and are far more debilitating. Try a double Nice for instance.
Sharm or the Canaries are quite a bit longer. (Sharm is illegally long unless you gat a piece of paper from the CAA to say it isn't)
Longish days certainly but easy enough as only 2 sectors - all the hard work is on the ground. Days just as long occur with 4 sectors and are far more debilitating. Try a double Nice for instance.
Sharm or the Canaries are quite a bit longer. (Sharm is illegally long unless you gat a piece of paper from the CAA to say it isn't)
CH3CH2OH
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Thanks, idle curiosity prompted by sitting in Pissouri and seeing a steady stream of inbounds to Paphos turn to finals overhead.
Either that or sit on the beach outside Limassol and watch the odd bit of U2, Tornado or Bell 412 activity
Either that or sit on the beach outside Limassol and watch the odd bit of U2, Tornado or Bell 412 activity
CH3CH2OH
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Thanks will check it out, there was a Rossiya 744 in to Paphos earlier and there seems to be another one just left Larnaca, Cyprus seems to be very popular with Russians and if they can bring in Jumbo loads suggest the economy there is in reasonable order despite sanctions, depressed energy prices, etc..
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Poor old Cyprus. I know they need the money but having to put up with hordes of boorish drunken Russian oiks is not much fun at all, as anyone who'se seen them "at play" knows to their cost.
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Noflynomore- I am not sure What canaries flights that you have done which is longer than a LCA or PFO even with good weather it's around 4:10min going East and 4:25 coming West. Where most of my recent ACE,FUE and TFS have been less than 4hours.
I am not sure about all other crew but I always find LCA & PFO flights more challenging and tiring than Canary Islands flights. I think this is due to the amount of different countries and airspace your travel through with not so good English spoken by ATC and at night have lots of the heavy traffic heading East to Arabia and Asia
I am not sure about all other crew but I always find LCA & PFO flights more challenging and tiring than Canary Islands flights. I think this is due to the amount of different countries and airspace your travel through with not so good English spoken by ATC and at night have lots of the heavy traffic heading East to Arabia and Asia
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It not mentioned from which UK airport(s).
Those times may be good from, let's say, LGW, LTN or STN but the likes of BRS, CWL & MAN are longer, Scotland even moreso and, back in the day, BFS/LCA/BFS would be a particularly long day with the occasional B737-300 fuel stop in to LPL on the return leg.
As for scheduling the biggest problem is crew duty hours, unless from the south-east airports mentioned I recall scheduling was circa 4.66 hours going out and 5.25 hours coming back, 9.9 hours plus a 1 hour crew report plus a 1 hour turnround equals a flight duty period of 11.9 hours, at the best time of day (morning) crew could do 13.25 hours, come an afternoon report 12.25 hours which doesn't leave much leeway in the event of a delay, a bad slot or whatever, and come an early evening report then the crew could only do something like 11 hours ... Unless the operator have slip crews in Cyprus (as my then operator sometimes did) or wherever.
Those times may be good from, let's say, LGW, LTN or STN but the likes of BRS, CWL & MAN are longer, Scotland even moreso and, back in the day, BFS/LCA/BFS would be a particularly long day with the occasional B737-300 fuel stop in to LPL on the return leg.
As for scheduling the biggest problem is crew duty hours, unless from the south-east airports mentioned I recall scheduling was circa 4.66 hours going out and 5.25 hours coming back, 9.9 hours plus a 1 hour crew report plus a 1 hour turnround equals a flight duty period of 11.9 hours, at the best time of day (morning) crew could do 13.25 hours, come an afternoon report 12.25 hours which doesn't leave much leeway in the event of a delay, a bad slot or whatever, and come an early evening report then the crew could only do something like 11 hours ... Unless the operator have slip crews in Cyprus (as my then operator sometimes did) or wherever.
Last edited by Harry Wayfarers; 14th Jun 2017 at 01:19.
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Harry Wayfarers- Duty hours on PFO & LCA is a problem that I have noticed Thomson have been coming up a couple of times this season with a couple of flights picking up an hour and half delay due to various reasons them the crew are out of hours for the return meaning an overnight for crew and pax.
It doesn't help at both Cypriot airports they are so stretched on Wednesday and Sunday evenings that if you miss your slot to arrive and your stand often won't let you leave UK until a lot later after their rush
It doesn't help at both Cypriot airports they are so stretched on Wednesday and Sunday evenings that if you miss your slot to arrive and your stand often won't let you leave UK until a lot later after their rush
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As I recall all flights to CY routed out via Dover & Koksy and G1 etc. and regularly we would receive bad slots.
But our departures were from the likes of BRS, CWL, MAN & BFS and from those we could reroute down to BHD, across France to a point somewhere around Nice and route along the Med past Corfu and Crete etc. and this only increased the flying time by a mere 8 minutes and with no flow control restrictions.
Once the flow regulators got wise to us whilst congratulating us for our initiative they introduced flow control on the route of something like one aircraft every 15 minutes but that still suited us, better than a significant delay exiting via Dover.
But our departures were from the likes of BRS, CWL, MAN & BFS and from those we could reroute down to BHD, across France to a point somewhere around Nice and route along the Med past Corfu and Crete etc. and this only increased the flying time by a mere 8 minutes and with no flow control restrictions.
Once the flow regulators got wise to us whilst congratulating us for our initiative they introduced flow control on the route of something like one aircraft every 15 minutes but that still suited us, better than a significant delay exiting via Dover.
