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Airline fine may send flight cancellations soaring
WASHINGTON — The government's $900,000 fine Monday against an American Airlines affiliate for holding hundreds of passengers on board a small jet for hours on an airport tarmac may serve as a deterrent to future such incidents. But industry analysts warned that may come with the price of more canceled flights. Even before the fine against American Eagle Airlines, airlines had cancelled more flights to avoid pushing up against the new three-hour limit on tarmac delays the Department of… (www.thenewstribune.com) Altro...
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When will they fine the FAA and the airport operators? They are the source of the delays. Do people really think the airline create these delays on purpose? The FAA and airport operator DO purposely(maybe needfully) create these delays.
Would you care to explain how you think the airport operator creates delays. As an airport operator (albeit a smaller commercial airport), I am curious.
First let me say that I have the utmost respect for the small airport operator. Few, if any, businesses must work so hard with so many entities, for so little.
Your large airport, however, markets tirelessly for the carriers to come to their place. The more the merrier.
But when things go bad and they cannot handle this traffic, or they don't have the equipement(i.e. deicers etc) delays are inevitable. Often the operator will contact the FAA to limit traffic. All very logical steps. The FAA will impose delays, often major delays. As a retired Air Traffic Controller I have seen expected delays delays(EDCTs) of 10 hrs and more. Little or no information is given to the crews or the airline about these delays. Or how to avoid future delays. They only know that if they deplane, and miss their "slot", the delays multiply.
So when the delays occur, it is suddenly the carrier fault. No one seems to look at the system that creates these delays. It is simpler to blame to carrier, because that is who the passenger believes who is at fault and it could never be the politicians fault... I understand the carriers over schedule and this contributes. But if the carriers had advance information, they could reschedule flights and crews to minimize these. Delay information is rarely available more that 1/2 hour befiore flight time.The plane is already loading.
Your large airport, however, markets tirelessly for the carriers to come to their place. The more the merrier.
But when things go bad and they cannot handle this traffic, or they don't have the equipement(i.e. deicers etc) delays are inevitable. Often the operator will contact the FAA to limit traffic. All very logical steps. The FAA will impose delays, often major delays. As a retired Air Traffic Controller I have seen expected delays delays(EDCTs) of 10 hrs and more. Little or no information is given to the crews or the airline about these delays. Or how to avoid future delays. They only know that if they deplane, and miss their "slot", the delays multiply.
So when the delays occur, it is suddenly the carrier fault. No one seems to look at the system that creates these delays. It is simpler to blame to carrier, because that is who the passenger believes who is at fault and it could never be the politicians fault... I understand the carriers over schedule and this contributes. But if the carriers had advance information, they could reschedule flights and crews to minimize these. Delay information is rarely available more that 1/2 hour befiore flight time.The plane is already loading.
Tom, I will agree with what you say, but a big part of it is the Airlines fault for their scheduling and it just overwhelms the facility because they get more than they wanted.Hence it is left up to ATC to untangle the mess. Flying a corporate 757 most of my career it makes no difference whether you are a single corporate or multiple arrival/departure from the Airlines, EVERYBODY gets delayed and ATC is generally so busy, nobody gets a notification as to WHY. Sad part of it is, whether private or public, everybody has a reason to go to that point. If notification as to why was available, especially on the super long ones, plans might could be changed
Thank you for the feedback. The reason I asked, is there has been some "non aviation" types asking on various forums why the Bradley Airport did not step in and tow those Jet Blue aircraft to a gate and handle the passengers, and I was wondering if you were looking for the same answer (which by the way is because most airports usually don't own the equipment or have the trained staff, and if they did the airlines would probably not allow them to use it).
Now from the airport standpoint, a lot of times delays are hard to plan in advance of, or to know when they will end. Sometimes we have had a flight take off from MSP and had a ready airfield for them, but in the 40 minutes it takes for the flight to arrive, unexpectedly heavy preciption happens, or a plow breaks down, or any number of other factors that are unpredictable. We try very hard to be proactive in most cases, but sometimes we are forced to be reactive, and that causes delays and diversions.
As for the big news on delays recently, the Bradley Int'l incident, there were several factors that came into play to create the log jam. 1. Boston had a runway closed, reducing capacity. 2. JFK and Newark both lost their ILS systems due to the ice and snow. 3. Many airlines selected Boston as their alternate, unaware #1. 4. When these flights had to divert to BOS, they found themselves over CT and MA with no where else to go, so they all headed to BDL. 5. BDL itself was feeling the impacts of the storm system, with multiple power outages and trouble clearing snow. There were other internal factors that created further chaos at BDL, but the basics are all of these factors resulted in an airport being forced to take an overload of diversions while at the same time dealing with power outages and a blizzard itself.
Now from the airport standpoint, a lot of times delays are hard to plan in advance of, or to know when they will end. Sometimes we have had a flight take off from MSP and had a ready airfield for them, but in the 40 minutes it takes for the flight to arrive, unexpectedly heavy preciption happens, or a plow breaks down, or any number of other factors that are unpredictable. We try very hard to be proactive in most cases, but sometimes we are forced to be reactive, and that causes delays and diversions.
As for the big news on delays recently, the Bradley Int'l incident, there were several factors that came into play to create the log jam. 1. Boston had a runway closed, reducing capacity. 2. JFK and Newark both lost their ILS systems due to the ice and snow. 3. Many airlines selected Boston as their alternate, unaware #1. 4. When these flights had to divert to BOS, they found themselves over CT and MA with no where else to go, so they all headed to BDL. 5. BDL itself was feeling the impacts of the storm system, with multiple power outages and trouble clearing snow. There were other internal factors that created further chaos at BDL, but the basics are all of these factors resulted in an airport being forced to take an overload of diversions while at the same time dealing with power outages and a blizzard itself.
I agree 100% with you. But in the end, the carriers are fined, yet I see nothng in what you say thatw as their fault.
Best of luck to you. I get to BDL alot. Beautiful facility.
Best of luck to you. I get to BDL alot. Beautiful facility.
Just an FYI, I am not at BDL, but MCW. Look me up if you are ever in the area.
MCW is very nice as well. Used to fly through there regularly when I lived at SPW. Now I'm just up the road at OWA.
Thank you for all that you do, David. Community airports truly are the backbone of aviation but they rarely get the recognition that they deserve.
Thank you for all that you do, David. Community airports truly are the backbone of aviation but they rarely get the recognition that they deserve.
