Also in this issue:4 CANSO 4 TCAS RAs Downlink update

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THE CONTROLLER

Journal of Air Traffi c ControlMarch 2010

44 ATC IN ATC IN RUSSIA RUSSIA

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Contents

THE CONTROLLER

DISCLAIMER: The views expressed in this magazine are those of the International Federation of Air Traffic Controllers’ Associations (IFATCA) only when so indicated. Other views will be those of individual members or contributors concerned and will not necessarily be those of IFATCA, except where indicated. Whilst every effort is made to ensure that the information contained in this publication is correct, IFATCA makes no warranty, express or implied, as to the nature or accuracy of the information. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or used in any form or by any means, without the specific prior written permission of IFATCA.

VISIT THE IFATCA WEB SITES: www.ifatca.org and www.the-controller.net

In this issue:

Photos:

Russian Air Traffi c Controller at Work Photo credit: Andrei Dubovik (Khabarovsk, Russia)

An Antonov 148 Photo credit: Nikolay Ustinov(St. Petersburg, Russia)

March 20101st quarter 2010 Volume 49 ISSN 0010-8073

PUBLISHERIFATCA, International Federation of Air Traffi c Controllers’ Associations.

EXECUTIVE BOARD OF IFATCA

Marc BaumgartnerPresident and Chief Executive Offi cer

Alexis BrathwaiteDeputy President

Alex FiguereoExecutive Vice-President Americas

(Henry Nkondokaya) †Executive Vice-President Africa/Middle East

Raymond TseExecutive Vice-President Asia/Pacifi c

Patrik PetersExecutive Vice-President Europe

Dale WrightExecutive Vice-President Finance

Scott Shallies Executive Vice-President Professional

Andrew Beadle Executive Vice-President Technical

Jack van DelftSecretary/Conference Executive

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Philippe DomogalaEditorial address: Westerwaldstrasse 9D 56337 ARZBACH, GermanyTel: +492603 8682email: ed@ifatca.org

Residence: 24 Rue Hector BerliozF 17100 LES GONDS, France

DEPUTY EDITOR AND WEB SITEPhilip Marien (EGATS)

CORPORATE AFFAIRSKevin Salter (Germany/UK)

REGIONAL EDITORSAfrica-Middle East: Mick Atiemo (Ghana) Americas: Doug Church (USA) Phil Parker (Hong Kong)Patrik Peters (Europe)

COPY EDITORSPaul Robinson, Helena Sjöström, Stephen Broadbent, Brent Cashand Alexis Brathwaite

PRINTING-LAYOUTLITHO ART GmbH & Co. Druckvorlagen KGFriesenheimer Straße 6aD 68169 MANNHEIM, GermanyTel: +49 (0)621 3 22 59 10email: info@lithoart-ma.de

Editorial by Philippe Domogala ……………………….…………...................... 4Foreword by Marc Baumgartner ..……..….….…………......…......…................. 5

Greece VFR Flying in Greece by Philippe Domogala ........................................... 6 Russia English Training and Testing in Russia by Roman Bondarenko .................. 8

Russian Traffic-Table vs Strips: No Winner by Eduard Kolodnyi ................. 9Interview with Sergey Kovalev, President of Controller’s Union in Russia (FUATC) by Eduard Kolodnyi …...................……............... 10

European Union Safety and Politics do not Mix by Marc Baumgartner ........................ 7TCAS RA Downlink – An Update by Philippe Domogala ................................................ 12

EUROCONTROL and SPIN work on RA Downlink by Stanislaw Drozdowski ........................................................................................ 13

CANSO CANSO and IFATCA Cooperation on Safety by Philippe Domogala ................... 14 Delivering Safety Improvement in Air Traffic Management by Gretchen Burrett ............................................................................................... 151st CANSO Caribbean & Latin American ANSP Conference by Jean Robert Dumfries ....................................................................................... 16Interview Alexander Ter Kuile, Outgoing Secretary General CANSO by Philippe Domogala ........................................................................................... 17

ERM Kos European Regional Meeting by Philippe Domogala …......................................... 18Performance The 2009 IFATCA Perfomance Seminars by Philippe Domogala

and Alexis Brathwaite ...............…................................................................... 19AFM African Middle East Regional Meeting by Philippe Domogala ................................... 20

Discussing Morocco Problems with IFATCA President .............................................. 21Book Review Going Up Sir by Martin Leeuwis ............…................................................... 22ASECNA Interview Meissa N’Diaye, Operational Director ASECNA

by Philippe Domogala ...........…......................................................................... 23Spain ATC and Management by Pedro Contreras Blanco .............…............................ 24Brief & News .……….……....……………..........….........…........…................................ 26USA News ATSAP: A Voluntary, Non-Punitive Safety Reporting System

for Controllers by Gini Briggs ...........…................................................... 27European News Working on the Executive Board by Patrik Peters ...........…...... 28

African News Ghana Aviation Training Academy (GATA) by Mick Atiemo .....…................................................................... 28 An Emergency Landing at Lome Airport (Togo) by Togue Nyntche Ouro-Sama ....…............................................ 29 Asian News A New Year Full of Meetings by John Wagstaff ............. 30 Spotlight Spotlight on Corporate Members by Kevin Salter.......... 31

Philip Marien Feature Crew Egress Systems by Philip Marien.. 32Charlie‘s Column .……….……....……....…........…............... 34

Advert Germany DFS Improves Controllers Scheduling with an Integrated Quintiq Solution by David Hillis .............................................. 35

Also in this issue:4 CANSO 4 TCAS RAs Downlink update

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CONTROLLERJournal of Air Traffi c ControlMarch 2010

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Editorial

4 THE CONTROLLER

Editorial

It is time to make sure that we are not reduced to mere “cost factors” figures by aggressive “new”

management techniques.

Safety and Cost Reduction Financial Targets

^ by Philippe Domogala,Editor

The authorities responsible for that safety case “assumed“ the aircraft was “safe any-way“ because the airframe it was based upon (a DH Comet 3) had already flown for 30 years, so the task of drafting the safety case became essentially a “tick-box“ pa-perwork exercise.“ The report says: “It was a lamentable job from start to finish, it was riddled with errors and missed the key dan-gers“. The report also concludes that there was: “… a shift in culture and priorities in the UK Ministry of Defense, towards “busi-ness“ and financial targets at the expense of functional values such as safety.“

But this would never happen in ATC with an ANSP of course. All our risk analysis and safety cases are far more stringent than just ticking boxes. Our regulators are all watch-ing real operations and are not solely check-

ing to see if the “processes“ are in place, and there is no such thing as business or financial pressure in ATM today, right?

The world is changing, and not only in ATC. Cost benefits and analysis are a stand-ard today. But “we“ the people are what make the (ATC) world go round. It is time to make sure that we are not reduced to mere “cost factors“ figures by aggressive “new“ management techniques. Aviation, and ATC in particular, is a people-centred business in which common sense should al-ways prevail.

It has been a real pleasure to work as Edi-tor for the past 5 years. Enjoy reading this issue. ^ ed@ifatca.org

Philippe

4 Philippe in Julius Caesar Throne. Photo credit: Thierry Carquet / FATCOA

This will be my last editorial as Editor of the magazine. I will pass the work to Philip Mar-ien, who has been Deputy Editor for some time already. But you will not be completely rid of me, as we are simply swapping jobs and I will be Deputy Editor for the next few years. This will enable continuity in producing The Controller, and also allow me some more free time which is a rare thing these days.

Emperor´s ThroneDuring the African regional meeting in Ouarzazate, Morocco (see pages 20-21) a fantastic dinner was served in the local film museum, and we dined on one of the sets used for many “Roman“ films (like “The Gladiator“ or “The Life of Jesus“). During the dinner, I was allowed to sit on Julius Caesar’s throne and feel the power of an Emperor overlooking hundreds of people gathered at his feet (okay they were mostly eating and not paying much attention to me, but that is not the point!). This posi-tion of power reminded me of a good old wise lesson I was told a long time ago – that when one sits on top, one should remem-ber the work is really done by the people you command. You can give directions, but the humans under you are what make the world go round. Treat them well, and you’ll be allowed to remain on the throne – treat them like numbers costing money, and you’ll be gone. Maybe a good reminder for some of our managers who put costs and productivity ahead of “real life“.

A Wake-up Call?In Sept 2006, a UK RAF Nimrod was lost in Afghanistan after suffering a catastroph-ic mid-air fire, leading to the total loss of the aircraft and the death of all 14 crew on board. The accident report, just out and available on the internet, points to a series of “significant failures and negligence“ in the way the aircraft safety case was made.

Foreword fromthe Executive BoardIs a New Moral Approach Required for Air Traffi c Control?

^ by Marc Baumgartner, President and CEO IFATCA

While some aspects of air navigation are being hit severely by the impact of the financial crisis, voices have noticeably become louder that the business model of ANSPs requires change. Some of the more commercialised and business-like Air Navigation Services believe that they are unable to react to improve the quality of service if they remain in a government controlled environment. Has the industry reached the point of not being able to progress further without rethinking com-pletely the approach to the management of ANSPs. As an observation, well func-tioning and peaceful societies in the past, and currently, have shown signs of exhaus-tion before imploding. Has the industry reached this point, and is it time to invent a new business model?

Over the last 2 decades, IFATCA has ob-served all the various evolutions of ATC service provision from government owned or government regulated being released to some form of independence. Some-thing which has not changed though is the financial side. Airlines or in certain cases government have continued to finance the infrastructure we use. A question that is never asked however is if they were con-tributing enough to make this public serv-ice a modern one with reserves built into the financial model to provide for the lean years.

Many of the systems (equipment/people) at national, regional and continental level have normally reached a degree which had always been 3 years behind the actual de-mand and very seldom matching it. Cur-rently traffic figures in most areas of the world are back to 2005 levels which mean that the delay figures have never been as low as currently being experienced. This means that the systems are now 2 years

ahead of current demand. With airlines going bankrupt in the name of the free and liberalised market, air navigation serv-ice providers are being urged by these customers to cut the cost to levels never before imagined. What we see is the usual knee jerk reaction by curtailing recruit-ment, reducing training, putting on hold capital expenditure, and/or postponing their investment to a hopefully more prof-itable time.

A long term failing of the system has been the lack of staff, the shortfall of which has been resolved by the use of overtime. Overtime has always been seen as cost saving as it does not require additional recruitment and training. It does however rely on the staff to be amenable to having less time off which was recognised in some cases by generous payments. However in these difficult times some air navigation service providers have now commenced reducing their cost bases by attacking the major cost factor of ATM – staffing. This has lead recently to a very strange phe-nomena, where CEOs and Ministers have started to blame the controllers who work the overtime as the cause for a potential shortfall in budget. Personally I find it strange that the same people who looked at overtime as a saviour now see it as curse. That overtime which is now only seen as a benefit to the controller is withdrawn and that other benefits to the same managers who offered these overtime rates have continued to be paid a lot of fringe ben-efits, bonuses (usually collectively) costing more than the overtime budget and who after an average of 5-6 years have moved on to another company leaving the con-troller as the common element to pick up the pieces. Maybe one day we will see the governments starting to draw up regula-tion to limit the bonuses of the top execu-

tive of ANSPs in an analogy to the financial market.

In which world are we living, I ask myself sometimes. Europe under the fast track approach of the European Commission is trying to introduce a performance driven ATM system. The European Commission has managed to convince Ministers and the European Parliament that a system which delivers every day 33,000 or more move-ments with a punctuality rate of not lower than 92% (show me any commuter traffic on the road with such a punctuality score) at worst is broke and fragmented and has created the need to move to a perform-ance based air traffic management system. ... continued on next page

Foreword

5 THE CONTROLLER

Overtime has always been seen as cost saving as it

does not require additional recruitment and training.

4 Marc speaking

Photo credit: Oman Amahmoul

an Air Navigation Service Provider to achieve as any other quality and safety standards which are currently being transposed.

The Executive Board will pick up this chal-lenge and try to give guidance in the form of a code of conduct or a human factors label to be achieved at the highest level, ideally endorsed or supported by ICAO. Until then, all the air traffic controllers should keep their ethics high by trying to present the IFATCA and ICAO policies and recommen-dation to the management and the govern-ment and foster the need to invest into the Human Factor or the Human Capital which will be the only pillar which will guarantee a long standing survival and a continuation of the efficient air traffic control system. ^ pcx@ifatca.org

plan has to be approved by ATC of course… The rest is easy. Main reason for all of this is the proximity (less than 5 NM) of the Turkish bor-der, where the Turkish Air Force F16s are likely to come to say hello if by error you enter their airspace, even as relations between Turkey and Greece have greatly improved. The Turkish Air-port of Dalaman is temptingly close, only 15 minutes away in our PA28, but the landing fee (140 Euros for a VFR) is off-putting. The Rhodes Island coast is very populated but there are no real noise abatement procedures, so you can fly everywhere at any altitude basically. We do so at 600ft and admire the landscape and the coast. Despite the price of fuel and the bu-reaucracy, flying VFR in Greece is indeed a very nice experience. ^

4 Foreword/Greece

THE CONTROLLER6

Foreword Executive Board

VFR Flying in Greece

This should show the way to the rest of the world how the ICAO ATM Concept with the aim to move from CNS/ATM to per-formance based ATM should be organised. Four out of the eleven key performance areas ICAO has identified have been chosen to drive the perform-ance. Safety, cost-efficiency, environment and capacity are the 4 areas. The Commission wants to set targets at the na-tional level to achieve an overall improvement of the perform-ance. The approach chosen will open Pandora's box. The ANSP will lose complete control over their possibility to plan and in-vest in the future capacity trig-

One of the controllers in the Greek island of Rhodes, Yannis Stavlas, is also a pilot-instructor in the local aero club. I arranged

gering measures. This could lead to a system where all the actors are simply getting lost and at a certain stage the air traffic control-lers might have to play again (like in the 80s and 90s) the boogie man. This is certainly not a favoured scenario, and at the performance seminars during the IFATCA Conference the need to set up an ethical standard and or a new moral for providing a so-called (socially or professionally) sustainable development of ATC has been identified.

How could such a new moral for providing, modern, efficient and forward looking ATC which would put the human factor (numbers and quality) in the centre, look like? As pro-fessionals we are being challenged by such an undertaking. It does have to be constructed in a way that it becomes a commonly accepted ethical code, which becomes as important for

to get a flight around the island in the club’s old Piper PA28 Warrior. Flying VFR in Greece is different: firstly, the fuel is imported from Italy and is sold there at 4,10 Euros a liter (yes that’s more than 22 US$ a gallon!). Then there is the old bureaucracy at its best: before you start anything you have to fill a “General Declaration of Intentions“ with the airport authority. Just telling them you are going to fly an hour with 2 on board. The form has to be brought to an of-fice where a nice lady behind a desk full of tel-ephones will put a big stamp on the form. This then allows you to go to the airport police, who will examine your passport, send you to a metal detector and points you towards ATC, where you have to file a flight plan – mandatory in Greece for all flights, including VFR. The flight

^ by Philippe Domogala, Editor

4 Yannis and Philippe

4 The PA 28 Photo credits: Gunther

(Continued from previous page)

4 European Union

THE CONTROLLER 7

This proposed text will negate all the efforts made by aviation in the past to improve safety by having a blame,

punitive free (just culture) reporting system in place.

Photo credit: Council of the European Union

Safety and Politics don´t Mix

^ by Marc Baumgartner, President & CEO IFATCA

Accident and Incident Prevention Regulation Ignoring Annex 13

- public interest is higher than protection of information

- anonymity only granted to actors if no other interests prevail

- self incrimination is favoured by imposing a penalty

- EASA becomes an accident investigator – however where it could be against EASA – as an authority of design, certifica-tion and/or endorsement, then it will not be investigated

- victims rights are being put at a higher level than the involved actors rights (basic human right – not to self incriminate themselves)

This proposal is short sighted, unfair, lacks understanding of what is at stake and will lead to a proliferation (if accepted) of states filing a difference and will stop reporting of the ac-tors involved. It undermines by this the very nature of accident prevention. Clearly a proof that politics do not mix with safety. Unfortunately for the actors in ATM the political process does not allow prevention of this – but only to improve where agreed (politically). In the end the safety of the travelling public will suffer, because of a so called political initiative. ^

pcx@ifatca.org

the real issues and proposes an option which is against the common good and more importantly safety. Now this proposed Implementation Regu-lation will go into the normal review process of the European Union with the European Parlia-ment and the European Council of Ministers hav-ing to decide if the proposed text will become a binding Implementation Regulation.

The European Commission has not only ignored the views and opinions of the major stakehold-ers and experts, but has introduced notions of competence to organisations such as EASA which are already covered by Annex 13. By in-troducing this and other proposed articles the Commission enhances the fragmentation of transposing ICAO recommended practices and annexes into Europe. This text does not men-tion in any article the prevention of accidents (as does Chapter 8 of Annex 13) and does in-troduce anti-constitutional and an anti- basic hu-man rights article.

IFATCA has commenced coordination of ac-tivities with other stakeholders to convince the politicians of the European Parliament, The Commission and the Council of Ministers, that this proposed text will negate all the efforts made by aviation in the past to improve safety by having a blame, punitive free (just culture) reporting system in place. As our policy states we believe that reporting shall only be possible if it is voluntary and anonymous. The European Commission proposal is counterproductive and potentially hazardous to the essential reporting requirements in the following categories: - against or differing from ICAO Annexe 13 in sev-

eral principles

In the past IFATCA has been one of the global actors to get Just Culture introduced as a ba-sis for the future growth in a sustainable and safe way for ATC. We have introduced the es-sential notion of Just Culture with a myriad of articles being published by our organisation detailing why it is essential to have a bottom up approach, the only way to improve safety. Safety in aviation is at such a level that an acci-dent occurs (luckily) very seldom, but that gives the problem of learning from accidents unlike for example in road transport, where accidents regrettably are numerous and the development of cars and trucks can be made to be safer as a result of the knowledge gained. ICAO has pub-lished in Annex 13 a chapter 8 and the Attach-ment E which introduces the necessity to make accident prevention part of the daily job of all the actors involved in aviation.

The European Commission has a directive on Accident and Incident Prevention which was published in 1994 and was supposed to be re-vised during the Single European Sky 1 process around 2000. During the discussion in the revi-sion process IFATCA was able to contribute with a significant number of results from research and recommendation from ICAO’s Air Navigation Commission and Assembly in order to explain to the politicians at the Commission that it was important to take Annex 13 as a baseline and to build on this to have a safe and sustainable growth being made possible in the framework of the Single European Sky. Several initiatives have been created to bridge the gap between avia-tion and the judicial world.

Safety and politics do not mix – even if this is a “bon mot“ we were however deeply concerned by the latest move of the Commission which proposes in December 2009 a new Implementa-tion Regulation (stronger than a directive) which completely ignores Chapter 8 of Annex 13, fails to mention Attachment E and talks about the overarching interest of public interest against protection of information. This approach ignores

of the “regional features“ which were ex-plained above.

At the present time we have a contract with M.L.S. College (England, Bournemouth) to train Russian controllers that have level 3 up to level 4 of the ICAO scale. When a con-troller achieves the third level on the ICAO scale, his salary is increased not by 15% but by 25%. For level 4 and above, this bonus in-creases to 50%! We also give great attention to examiner training. They all have higher language education and have passed exten-sive training in aviation English. All of them, about 100 in total, have trained in foreign colleges. Periodically they hold meetings and workshops at which they align the test proce-dures and the order of level assessment.

Unfortunately (although maybe not for sub-ject matter experts), our examiners have re-fused the expert assistance from air traffic controllers during the test procedure. Basi-cally, this is wise, because we very meticu-lously selected examiners’ candidates and all of them have a long-term operational experi-ence as teachers of aviation English language and even general English.

Controllers from upper airspace centers and from busy international airports (Shereme-tyevo, Domodedovo, Pulkovo, etc.) get pri-ority in the language training system. If an ATC unit has two controllers working simul-taneously (radar and procedure control) we aim to have at least one of them to be level four at the moment. Overall, I believe Russia will meet the 2011 target of controller’s lan-guage training, at least in those parts of our huge airspace where there is constant flow of internationally operated flights. ^ romio2000@mail.ru

4 Russia

THE CONTROLLER8

English Proficiencyin Russia^ by Roman Bondarenko, Head of Training

Center Rostov-on-Don, Russia

Over the past years, the Rus-sian Federation has significant-ly expanded its international airway network and airports. Consequently, Russian air traf-fic controllers deal with inter-national flights using English more often than before. At the same time, more stringent ICAO requirements have been placed on the reliability and quality of such services.

In order to satisfy demand and requirements, a linguistic train-ing system for air traffic con-trollers was adopted in May 2002. Basically, it implements ICAO Doc. 9835. There are two paths to obtaining a license to handle international flights us-ing the English language: after finishing basic training in col-lege or after passing English language courses in the Insti-tute of Air-navigation which handles refresher training for already qualified controllers. After on-the-job training or simulation training, a final ex-amination (both practical and theoretical test) determines whether you get a license. As

an incentive, this license entitles controllers to 15% more salary…

In 2002, the air-navigation service of the Rus-sian Federation adopted a plan to improve the language training system for air traffic controllers. The plan outlined the principal steps to ensure a strong growth of the lan-guage competence level of Russian control-lers and a time frame for the implementation of those steps. Firstly, the plan defined the unified tests and exams. It was important to initiate a national testing system for control-lers, even more so because of our “regional features“: our national ATS rules differ from standard and recommended practices of ICAO. Furthermore, there was no require-ment at that moment for students entering the ATC college to know any English. Also, because of the way they were trained, flight crews in Russia strictly applied the radio phraseology. This impacted the English lan-guage refresher courses, which all controllers licensed to control international flights were obliged to pass regularly.

Since 2008, after each refresher course, we have been testing language proficiency in accordance with the ICAO scale. Authorities of the Russian Federation have chosen two tests – the Australian RELTA and a national testing system ELPET. In my humble opinion, the latter one is more suited for us because

4 Roman Bondarenko Photo credit: Eduard Kolodnyy

4 Antonov and Yaks in Russia Photo credit: Sergei Vasiliev

Traffic-Table vs Strips: No Winner^ by Eduard Kolodnyi, ATC Instructor of Training Center

Rostov-on-Don, Russia

ally requires extensive training. That is probably why we are not going to change anything.

And after all, you know, also electronic strips exist. But I would not like to be the one who starts the discussion with the words “I did not work with electronic strips, but a traffic-table is better…“

kolodnyi@mail.ru

Some years ago, after having worked with traffic-tables for a long while, our centre in Rostov-on-Don installed a new system with strips. Before it was put into operation how-ever, we replaced the strip system by the traffic-table again. Today we are using a sys-tem from the Spanish company “Indra“. This uses neither strips nor traffic-tables, but just shows lists of pending and ‘under-control’ aircraft. While it has a definite advantage over strips and traffic-tables, like highlighting conflicting traffic in red, it would not allow to cope very well with a system or radar failure.

Now, looking back, I would like to say that all systems have their own place, both with their own advantages and disadvantages. There are no major problems with either of them. Some difficulties can arise when transit-ing to a new system, and overcoming this usu-

4 Russia

THE CONTROLLER 9

This article deals with an eternal discussion or rather, a never-ending battle. For rea-sons explained later, it only takes place in Russia or republics of the former USSR. This discussion, as a rule, begins with the words: “I haven’t worked with strips, but I think a traffic-table is better“. Occasionally, the ar-gument is reversed. There are a few people who’ve worked with both methods, but they are fed up with the discussion and try to avoid it.

For outsiders to understand the discussion, it is necessary to explain a few things. There are 97 ATC centers in Russia and traffic-tables are used in each one except in the Moscow cen-tre, which works with strips since 1981, when a Swedish ATC system was installed there.

But what exactly is a traffic-table? It is in fact quite simple: it’s a transparent roll of paper that’s overlaid on a table or board. Flight de-tails on each flight are written on it and then a line is drawn from the flight’s entry point to its exit point. A traffic-table displays the progress of moving aircraft in a Cartesian co-ordinate system: the axis Y – is the time axis and the axis X – is the distance axis. Verti-cally, lines mark periods of 5 or 10 minutes. In the horizontal plane, the different reporting points are marked at the relative distances to each other. At the end of each hour, you can scroll up transparent paper forward. This ex-plains why we generally need the information about time and entrance point firstly. When working with strips, the callsign is the first things that are needed, in order to retrieve it from the computer or to find it on the strip display. One advantage that strips have is that it probably takes less time to mark informa-tion compared to doing so on a traffic-table. There are many additional special symbols to show a climbing, descending, conflicting traf-fic, speed, icing, turbulence and so on.

The ultimate aim of all of this is of course to help the air traffic controllers maintain sepa-ration in case of radar failure. Personally, I think this is more self-evident using a traffic-table. One major drawback however is trying to handle a lot of traffic handed over from your colleague with illegible handwriting.

4 Russian traffi c table Photo credit: EK

Photo credit: EK

Corporation“ was agreed. This defined a re-muneration system, social guarantees and indexation of wages twice a year for employ-ees. That same year, the transfer of military air traffic controllers to the civil side began. This entailed some serious political deci-sions: a former Air Force general became the Director of the “State ATM Corporation“ of Russia. He appointed former colleagues-generals as his deputies.

The 2007 agreement stipulated a pay increase of 5% in April 2009, but this wasn’t respected. FUATC of Russia tried to force the employer to comply with the collective agreement: we appealed to office of Public Prosecutor, the government, the Russian President and the International Labor Organization. Based on this, the management of the “State ATM Corporation“ began to see FUATC as a hin-drance. With support from a military lobby, they continue to violate the collective agree-ment and thereby Russian law.

4 Russia

THE CONTROLLER10

Interview Sergey Kovalev, President of Controller’s Union in Russia (FUATC)

^ by Eduard Kolodnyi, ATC Instructor of Training Center Rostov-on-Don, Russia

Q: Was 2009 difficult for FUATC compared to previous years?A: Yes, it was actually the most complex for our trade union, but not due to the global economic crisis or financial problems for the air navigation system. We encountered much more difficult economic problems before, in 1997-1998 and 2001-2002 for example. Back then we had financial problems connected with low income and a pressing need for technical modernization. The direct result was strikes each of which resulted in a sub-stantial pay rise. But I can say that all those complex periods with strikes now look less complicated in comparison with present situ-ation in 2009.

Q: Could you describe and comment on the problems between FUATC and administration?A: The “State ATM Corporation“ of Russia was created in 2004. In 2007, a collective agreement between FUATC and “State ATM

4 Sergey Kovalev President FUATC RussiaPhoto credit: FUATC

4 Russian winter Photo credit: Sergei Vasiliev

- Work- and rest time regulations.

- Managed to get air traffic controllers on a list of people eligible for early retirement.

Moreover, in conjunction with the employer, we’ve set up a non-governmental pension fund which complements the basic pension scheme.

Q: In what areas was FUATC less successful?A: We still haven’t been able to secure an increase of the basic pension for air traffic controllers, and unfortunately, we were unable to defend the right to strike for air traffic con-trollers. But his right is not re-ally necessary for us, it is more important for the employer. After all it is better to agree and discuss with us and not force FUATC to use the right to strike.

Q: Do you have any wish or message for your colleagues abroad?A: I hope our colleagues are not facing similar problems and that they have a normal part-nership with their employer. And that, if necessary, you can expect support from FUATC of Russia. ^

kolodnyi@mail.ru

tive authorities urging them to call our em-ployer to order. Unfortunately, our engineer-ing colleagues – members of IFATSEA – have not yet expressed their support, despite be-ing closely involved in the dispute. We have not yet asked for support abroad, but we’re sure we can count on support from our col-leagues at IFATCA when required.

Q: Could it be that financial problems of “State ATM Corporation“ of Russia are a reason why they don’t respect the agreement?A: There are no financial problems in ATS in Russia. Yes, we had a 16-18% fall in flights for the first three months in 2009 as compared with the similar period of 2008. But then the number of flights increased, and charges for air navigation services have increased. As a result “State ATM Corporation“ of Russia has made a higher profit level in 2009, some 10% more than in 2008!

Q: Do you think ex-military commanders are good managers or is their appointment simply part of a policy?A: The civil-military integration was a difficult and long exercise: I think having ex-military as managers of “State ATC Corporation“ was one of the trade-offs of this integration and therefore a policy. They have never been top managers and, probably, never will be.

Q: The situation between FUATC and “State ATM Corporation“ of Russia has es-calated over the past months. How will it evolve?A: I think the employer will try to delay ne-gotiations with FUATC to avoid having to im-plement the collective agreement and sign a new one. We are not going to wait until the current agreement expires: we’re ready to organize various forms of protest actions. But we hope with the assistance of the in-ternational organizations and particular from the International Labor Organization that we will be able to avoid a strike.

Q: Are you satisfied with the work of your command?A: On the whole, yes. But I’d like to see more activity and initiative in time of critical events.

Q: Can you list some of the FUATC achievements of the last years.A: There is course the collective agreement that was signed for the period 2007-2010 and which will expire on 01st April 2010. On top of that, FUATC of Russia has contributed to a number of improved working conditions:- Health working standards

for air traffic controllers.

4 Russia

THE CONTROLLER 11

Moreover, they attempted to obstruct the activities of FUATC by submitting claims to the court, directing different complaints in office of Public Prosecutor and so on. They even went as far as blocking our access to the FUATC offices.

Q: To what purpose are they taking these actions?A: There are several possible scenarios:1. The general political situation in Russia de-

velops in such a way that active public in-cluding trade union organizations are not welcome. It’s possible that the employer has a kind of permission from the executive branch to provoke a strike. This can then be repressed similarly to what happened in the USA in 1981, although I’m not sure that we have so many qualified military air traffic controllers who can take over.

2. By taking them to court, the employer wants to demonstrate that FUATC is una-ble to defend the interests of its members at all costs. This costs them about 3 million euro per year in legal fees!

3. The employer doesn’t want to sign a new collective agreement for the period 2010-2013.

In all three versions, the employer benefits from making our organization as weak as possible.

Q: How are going to force the employer to respect the conditions of the collective agreement?A: While our employer has broken the law reg-ularly, we are trying to resolve the problem by taking legal actions. But FUATC of Russia can, if necessary, begin a strike at any time.

Q: Do you meet with support from other trade unions in the country and abroad?A: FUATC of Russia gets strong support from other trade unions inside the country. They have written a lot of requests to the execu-

4 Caption: Moscow ATC Centre Photo credit: atcm.ru

4 2 Tower controllers Photo credit: atcm.ru

Pilots Responses to TCAS RAsa) The average delay by pilots in reporting

RAs to ATC is 30 seconds (Eurocontrol FARADS).

b) The NLR (Netherlands) studied 50 aircraft operators over 7 year for TCAS. Of the pi-lots reporting RAs to ATC: only 45% were reported correctly and in time, and 20% were reported but well after the event, thus of no use to ATC.

c) According the same NLR survey, Some major airlines are instructing their crews to only report the RA to ATC after they are “clear of conflict“ The current ICAO-based training focus on the first priority for the Pilot Non Flying (PNF) is to look for traffic, not on contacting ATC.

Procedural Problem The danger of issuing opposite-direction clearances: 70% of RAs correspond to 1000ft high speed level-offs (PASS study in France over 6 months and 1.3 million flights). It is under those conditions that the danger is for controllers to issue instructions to confirm a level-off to maintain separation, an instruc-tion that could be in contradiction of the RA issued to the pilots. With TCAS downlink, there is an increased possibility of such inter-vention, even more so if the direction of the RA is shown to the controller.

ICAO RecommendationsUnder the current ICAO regulations (Doc 4444 PANS-ATM, section 1.6, para 15.7.3.3), controllers are still responsible to provide separation, even with a RA downlink informa-tion displayed. This is reaffirmed in the ICAO ACAS Manual (Doc 9863) para 6.3.2.6, where it is noted that what controllers see on their CWP may not be the correct information and they should not assume downlinked RAs to be the behavior of the aircraft.

The Eurocontrol SPIN (Safety nets: Planning Implementation & eNhancements) Working Group is in charge of RA D/L and requests ur-gently that rules and guidance material are is-sued. There is a need for harmonisation. They say that “RA D/L is not a safety net on its own and controllers responsibilities are to be clear

4 ACAS

THE CONTROLLER12

TCAS – RA Downlink ^ by Philippe Domogala,

Editor

The Eurocontrol Agency and the DFS (German ANSP) organised a workshop on RA downlink in Berlin last October, which was attended by 80 representatives from nearly every ANSP in Eu-rope together with Japan and the USA. We learned that three States (Japan, Hungary and the Czech Republic) have already introduced RA D/L to their Con-troller Working Positions (CWPs) without co-ordination between themselves and utilising differ-ent procedures. These proce-dures are not in accordance with, and sometimes opposite to, the current ICAO recommendations on ACAS. We learned that there are still huge technical problems in the accuracy of RA downlink-ing, and that a survey shows that the correct response to RAs by pilots is still a major issue.

What is RA Downlink? – When you fit TCAS you include a Mode S Transponder. During a TCAS encounter, if the intruder is TCAS equipped, TCAS resolution messages are sent every second to the (one or more) intruder aircraft to en-sure coordination between RAs on the aircraft. These messages can be received on the ground by fixed ADS-B antennas. In ad-dition, there is an RA broadcast message on 1030 MHz using

the bottom antenna (i.e. it is designed to be monitored on the ground, but does not use the normal ADS-B frequency of 1090MHz). This message is sent once whenever the RA occurs or changes and is repeated every 8 seconds until the RA ends. In the future, air-craft will become progressively equipped with transponders that broadcast details of RAs every second with an ADS-B message. This will enable fixed ADS-B antennas to bet-ter detect RAs that occur against non-TCAS equipped aircraft. During RAs, Mode S tranponders also in-dicate to ground radars that an RA is in progress. The details of this event can be read using the Mode S radar from a RA downlink message (BDS 3,0). In Europe, USA and Japan, radar Mode S antennas are cur-rently more available than networks of ADS-B receivers, hence the delay in receiving the information on the ground (due to the rate of turn of radar antennas). A Eurocontrol survey (FARADS) estimated that when using Mode S radar, 95% of RAs can be captured and seen by controllers within 10 seconds.

Technical ProblemsThe main problem when listening to RA downlinks is that 96% of the messages are false (most of them are empty messages and thus easy to filter, but there are lots of other errors as well which are less easy to eliminate). Of the remaining 4%, only 17% of these are valid TCAS-TCAS encounters, 33% are on one aircraft only, 29% are mode C threats, 7% are ghost threats, and in the remainder either the TCAS was inoperative or they were “intentional RAs“ involving mili-tary, test, or photo flights, etc.

4 Workshop poster Photo credit: Eurocontrol

Photo credit: DP

EUROCONTROL and SPIN work on RA Downlink ^ by Stanislaw Drozdowski,

SPIN Chairman

ConclusionA formal report of the workshop will be made by Eurocontrol that should contain recommen-dations on the way forward. In the meantime, IFATCA will go into an information campaign to its Member Associations warning them of the dangers of current local RA Downlink un-coordinated procedures, and urging them to stick to ICAO procedures. ^

ed@ifatca.org

has to be demonstrated. Germany (DFS) is currently testing six low-cost fixed ADS-B re-ceivers in which the display time to CWP time is expected to be within 1-2 seconds. But cur-rent plans are for monitoring only, not for dis-play of the RAs to controllers. In the USA the FAA has also no plans to display RAs to con-trollers. In Europe, ACAS D/L research will be covered by SESAR (Project 4.8.3) with France DSNA as leader. They are expecting their first results around 2015 at the earliest. Many States said they would wait until that is avail-able to make their decision whether or not to implement RA D/L.

4 ACAS

THE CONTROLLER 13

and unambiguous as practicable“. Many States (France, USA and the UK very strongly) indi-cated they have so far seen no evidence on the usefulness to display RA D/L to controllers.

France even insisted that before continuing spending efforts on this, the usefulness of it

The danger of issuing opposite-direction clear-ances: 70% of RAs cor-respond to 1000ft high

speed level-offs.

4 Stan Drozdowski Photo credit: eurocontrol

SPIN is a EUROCONTROL Group that stands for Safety nets Performance Improvements Network. Automatic notification of ACAS RAs to controllers as they occur has been contemplated for many years. In Europe the Überlingen mid-air collision gave additional impetus for a number of organisations to implement what usually is referred to as RA Downlink.

EUROCONTROL involvement started in 2003 with a launch of a feasibility study (commonly known as a FARADS project). It consisted of technical and safety studies and a series of simulations. Some 50 controllers from several European States participated in the simulations. and provided valuable feedback about the usefulness of RA Downlink.

The results were presented during a first RA Downlink workshop in May 2006 which con-cluded that although RA Downlink seemed technically feasible and operationally useful, insufficient data regarding ACAS behaviour in European airspace was available to draw firm conclusions. Sufficient progress was made to justify the organisation of a second RA Downlink workshop in October 2009 in Berlin, but this time not limited to Europe. RA Downlink is already available in commer-cial systems and diverging operational prac-tices are already emerging. The workshop brought together over 60 participants.

Before the Berlin workshop, the issue of RA Downlink was reviewed by the EUROCON-TROL SPIN Sub-Group. SPIN is an expert group dealing with safety nets that was cre-ated in 2005. Currently, SPIN consists of active or former air traffic controllers, engi-neers, safety experts coming from 19 service providers and several industry suppliers.

The mission of SPIN is to develop standards, and support the implementation and use of “classic“ ground-based safety nets (STCA, MSAW, APW, APM). RA Downlink, although not a safety net in its own right, falls in the remit of the SPIN Sub-Group as a bridge be-tween the airborne safety net (TCAS) and the ground systems.

SPIN recognizes that the feasibility and use-fulness of RA Downlink will depend on local factors. Valuable experience has been gained in the Mode S environment, including some experience on RA downlink operations. In the light of the emerging implementations of RA downlink, SPIN believes there is an ur-gent need to establish a harmonised concept of operation and develop a detailed safety case and operational procedures. Most im-portantly, controller responsibilities must be made as clear and unambiguous as practica-ble. Changes to ICAO provisions should be proposed, if deemed necessary. Any interac-tions with the ground-based safety nets, es-

pecially the STCA, need to be taken into account.

SPIN Sub-Group has the re-quired competencies and will undertake the work. Any con-tribution from IFATCA to SPIN work will be appreciated.

For more information visit EU-ROCONTROL websites:RA Downlink Workshops and studies: www.eurocontrol.int/ra-downlinkSPIN Sub-Group: www.euro-control.int/safety-nets ^

4 CANSO

THE CONTROLLER14

CANSO and IFATCA Cooperation on Safety

^ by Philippe Domogala, Editor

4 Gretchen Burrett, CANSO Director of Safety, Philippe representing IFATCA, and Alexander Ter Kuile, CANSO Secre-tary General CANSO in Krakow (Poland) last November. / Photo credit: DP

issue involved during the dispute, but coop-eration on professional issues should remain unaffected. We have many common goals in the professional field, especially on safety matters where it is obvious that there is much to gain in cooperation. The first stone of that cooperation was laid in Krakow, where IFAT-CA and CANSO representatives discussed together future strategies with the Safety Directors of 20 ANSPs present at the meet-ing. The ambiance was excellent, and we are confident that progress will be made.

Further details on this cooperation will be reported and discussed during the annual meeting of both organisations in the coming months. ^

ed@ifatca.org

organization also supports Regional Offices in Brussels, Jeddah, and Singapore, in addition to a representative office in Montreal, Canada to support their work with ICAO. Other CAN-SO regions are Africa, the Americas, and Eur-asia, which comprises many of the countries within what was formerly the USSR.

For more info visit their (very well done) web site: www.canso.org ^

To put this into practice, CANSO invited four major stakeholders (IATA, ACI, ICAO, and IFATCA) to their Safety Standing Committee (SSC) in Krakow. The main points debated there were Human Factors, Resilience, and the introduction of Just Culture on a world-wide basis. IFATCA has the same objective regarding Just Culture, and this item was chosen by both organisations to be the first area of cooperation between them. One im-portant point for both CANSO and IFATCA is to recognize and agree at all levels that there is a clear distinction between industrial issues and professional ones.

There might come a time in the future where both organisations will disagree on industrial disputes, and each organisation might de-fend and support its own membership on the

members share information and develop new policies, with the ultimate aim of improving air navigation services on the ground and in the air. CANSO also represents its mem-bers’ views in major regulatory and industry forums, including at ICAO, where they have official Observer status.

Whilst CANSO HQ is based in the Netherlands, just outside Amsterdam Schiphol Airport, the

Relations between CANSO and IFATCA took a sharp turn to-wards cooperation last Novem-ber when CANSO invited IFAT-CA to participate at their Safety Committee meeting in Poland to present a plan for active combined efforts on safety.

CANSO, which has existed for 10 years, initially concentrated in regulatory issues but is now get-ting more involved in direct op-erational matters. They decided, among other things, to work in partnership with global aviation stakeholders in order to drive significant improvements in safety performance and culture.

What is CANSO?The Civil Air Navigation Servic-es Organization (CANSO) is the global voice of the companies that provide air traffic control, and represents the interests of Air Navigation Services Provid-ers worldwide. CANSO mem-bers are responsible for sup-porting 85% of world air traffic, and through their Workgroups,

INTER-

NATIO

NAL F

EDERATIO

N OF AIR TRAFFIC CONTROLLERS’ ASSNS.

Managing DeliveryThe identified benefits were then tracked through to de-livery in our operations. This included periodically reviewing the estimated benefits to build confidence that they would in fact be delivered. Safety per-formance was also monitored and compared against our ini-tial predictions to ensure that the expected benefits were be-ing delivered. Figure 1 shows the forecast benefits from the programme of work identified in our 2007 strategic plan for safety. The achieved safety performance (measured using a risk index calculated from a weighted sum of safety signifi-cant events1) is also shown. The reliability of the forecasts was, to some extent, a surprise. The methods used were rela-tively crude and there were ex-amples of both over and under estimation. But it has proved possible to identify and deliver a programme of work that de-livered measurable safety bene-fits. Our safety strategy has now been reviewed and updated us-ing the same techniques and an extended programme of work out to 2016 has been devel-oped.The method is relatively simple but has proved very ef-fective, so we are working to develop it to support the future harmonized ATM system being developed by the SESAR Joint Undertaking. This should help to ensure that the focus on deliver-ing improved safety is sustained through to the delivery of to-morrows ATM systems. ^ Gretchen.burret@nats.co.uk

1 =The NATS Safety Significant Event scheme classifies incident severity ac-cording to the degree of separation loss and the effectiveness of the reso-lution in the incident.

Delivering Safety Improvement in Air Traffic Management

^ by Gretchen Burrett, Director of Safety CANSO

Safety is at the heart of Air Traffic Manage-ment and there is a constant demand to re-duce ATM risks whilst improving service qual-ity and reducing costs. However, advancing safety in what is already a very safe industry can be difficult, particularly in today’s uncer-tain economic climate.

To help focus improvement activities on the things that can really make a difference, NATS has introduced a new safety benefits man-agement process. This is similar to the ben-efits management process already used within NATS for capacity. It aims to ensure that new systems and operational concepts deliver the improvements in safety performance that we need.

Understanding Existing RisksThe first step is to understand the current risks in the operation. To do this we have used data from incident investigations and from our vol-untary open reporting scheme. However, data on the things that have gone wrong in the past may not give the complete picture. To address this issue we have introduced an operational safety survey programme called day to day safety observations. This involves recording positive safety indicators from the operation during direct observations. For example, an observer will collect information on the use of defensive controlling techniques that help to ensure that a situation remains safe even if an error does occur. This technique has given us much better information that helps us to un-derstand the underlying safety performance of our operations.

All of the safety related information has been assessed by operational experts, including both controllers and pilots, to identify key risk areas for improvement activities. These priority areas are a combination of event types (e.g. airspace infringements) and caus-al factors (e.g. air-ground communication errors).

Identify Improvement ActionsTo identify potential improvement actions, we looked at all of our existing activities to see where these might help reduce risks. For

instance, airspace design changes may have the potential to reduce risk from level busts by simplifying flight profiles. Also, groups of pilots and controllers were set up to identify any additional actions that could address the key risk areas. Examples included reviewing aircraft and ground procedures and chang-ing them where necessary, introducing new training requirements and developing new safety nets.

This activity resulted in a programme of im-provement actions that addressed each of the key risk areas.

Quantifying BenefitsTo assess the improvement programme we estimated the potential benefits from each activity. The benefit assessments were made at workshops that included operational ex-perts and safety analysts.Taking into account forecast traffic, we then made a prediction of the overall effect of the work on future risk. In some cases, we found there was a need for additional actions.

4 CANSO

THE CONTROLLER 15

4 Figure 1: Day to Day Observations help provide a complete picture of safety

4 Figure 2: Comparison Between Forecast and Actual Risk

For many ANSPs, this Conference provided a first opportunity to compare regional mod-els like COSECNA or the Eastern Caribbean Cooperation with other regional cooperation models, such as the European Single Europe-an Sky regulations. Separation between Reg-ulation and Service Provision is a fundamen-tal principle for optimised service provision and a recommended ICAO Standard. There are many studies that give evidence to the fact that separation leads to more efficiency, which in turn leads to value-creation for soci-ety. As monopolies ANSPs share the respon-sibility with States to serve national societies – but also to contribute to the well-being of their region as best they can. The consen-sus was that the State-ANSP relationship is a crucial factor for success, and that there is urgent need to work on improvement.

In the third focus area of the Conference, ANSP Excellence, where everyone gave in-sight into best-practice examples and shared experience, with concrete methodologies which ANSPs can use to continuously im-prove their performance. ANSP Customers very clearly articulated their expectations: the economies in the Caribbean & Latin American region are growing, and airlines need to accommodate this economic growth with their own expansion strategies. It is well known that Aviation is an economic driver and ANSPs have to play a more active role in the future. The conference also learned of the many great initiatives of ICAO in support of the region, to improve Safety and optimize the use of Airspace with RNP or RNAV.

As CANSO, just like ICAO, does not accept the status quo, CANSO initiatives and Work Group activities are complementary to ICAO activities. Through cooperation and exchange they built a foundation for mutual trust. It is now up to each participant to continue and develop this trust into a solid bridge strong enough to carry cooperation into the future. Otherwise, to draw on another image that was used in one of the workshops – use the strong Voice of CANSO, find the right song and create a powerful choir consisting of all stakeholders in the Aviation Industry. ^

jrdumfries@hotmail.com

4 CANSO

THE CONTROLLER16

1st CANSO Caribbean & Latin American ANSP Conference^ by Jean Robert Dumfries,

Regional Correspondant

The event, held in Curacao on November 10-12 2009 and hosted by Netherlands Antilles Air Traffic Control (NAATC) attracted more than 100 delegates from across the Caribbean, Central and South America, as well as representa-tives from the world-wide avia-tion industry, including ICAO, IATA, ALTA and IFATCA. The response to the debates and workshops was strong and there was overwhelming sup-port to return for a second conference in 2010.

The conference program and exhibition was designed to give ANSPs in the region ac-cess to as much best practice and CANSO’s leading thinking as possible. The theme of this conference was: ‘building ANS capability in the Caribbean & Latin America’. The keynote speakers expressed their hope that the Conference could mark a crucial milestone in promoting regional cooperation, by engag-ing all stakeholders; States, Air Navigation Service Providers, Airlines, Airports, Suppliers, and their respective Associations, in

constructive solution-oriented dialogue and activity. Today – the situation in various re-gions is characterized by a high degree of fragmentation with a lack of communication between ANSPs and their Customers.

In the Future – ANSPs will form an integral part of the Aviation Value Chain working to-gether with all the other partners in our in-dustry. Concepts like Collaborative Decision Making (CDM) will support decision making processes leading to “better decisions“ and System Wide Information Networks (SWIM) will become a crucial enabler of seamless ATM. ANSPs are in the PEOPLE Business and their highly professional staff will always be a key success factor. The Conference dis-cussed the significance of continuous train-ing to prepare staff for future challenges. Delegates also listened to operational exam-ples from ANSPs, and touched on regional issues and potential solutions.

CANSO Members strive to transform into performance-based and customer-oriented organisations. The speakers on the Bench-marking Panel discussed the value created by identifying appropriate KPIs for ANSPs and using them to measure performance on a regular basis, comparing themselves with industry leaders, while taking informed deci-sions to improve service delivery.

Benchmarking helps to not only learn how to ‘do it better’, but also to learn the rea-sons why things do – or do not – work well, and then find right means for improvement. However, exchanging data calls for a solid trust base. Despite this, there is only so much that ANSPs can do to improve themselves. ANSPs are entrusted by the States, the own-ers of airspace, with the provision of Air Navigation Services. Therefore ANSPs are very dependent on appropriate institutional frameworks and governance structures to support optimal performance.

The Conference dis-cussed the significance

of continuous training to prepare staff for future

challenges.

4 The conferencePhoto credit: JRD

Interview Alexander Ter Kuile, Outgoing Secretary General CANSO

4 CANSO

THE CONTROLLER 17

The transformation of ANSPs towards performance-based entities cannot be stopped, and we need

to work with external partners such as IFATCA that are going to be affected by these changes.

4 Alexander ter KuilePhoto credit: DP

Photo credit: CANSO

^ by Philippe Domogala, Editor

Philippe: You have been so successful as Sec-retary General over the last years that you are known all over the world as “Mr CANSO“ why have you decided to leave the organization?Alexander: “Mr CANSO”? That is exactly the reason why I like to change . I have spent 9 years as Secretary General and this always was the objective I had set myself. If I stay any longer I might as well continue forever. I need to move on with my career and do something else. It is also healthy for CANSO, it is good management practice to refresh the leadership at regular intervals.

Philippe: What are you going to do now?Alexander: First I haven’t had a holiday in 9 years and I badly need one, and it is going to be a long one. Then I will see. I have no defi-nite plan yet, I might even leave this industry altogether.

Philippe: What would you say was your biggest achievement in those 9 years?Alexander: We successfully raised the posi-tion of the ANSPs in the Aviation community, 10 years ago the new corporatized ANSPs were seen a pariahs, CANSO gave them a collective voice and today we have proved the world that ANSPs can be pro-active, reli-able, and work together with others. In my years as Secretary General we have made huge steps forward in that recognition.

Philippe: What about the relations CANSO-IFATCA?Alexander: The relations started in Europe with the social dialogue and the personal rela-tions I enjoyed with your President Marc Baum-gartner right from the start. At the beginning CANSO concentrated its work on regulatory & policy issues, such as separation of regula-tion and provision. It is only very recently that CANSO started to address true operational is-sues. Co-operating with external partners such as IFATCA on these issues is s necessity. We have started to involve you with our HR, our Seamless Airspace and our Safety Standing Committee for instance, and we look forward to more fruitful cooperation in the future.

Philippe: what would be your outgoing message to us?Alexander: The world is dynamic and avia-tion moves very rapidly. So accept the chang-es we all face and work with us to boost the positive while containing the negative aspects of change – it is as simple as that. I think the ATM sector is in a long transition towards a whole new model that will be defined by SES-AR and NextGen. There will also be a new in-stitutional model, we need to step away from “One State – One Airspace“ – regionalisation and globalisation are a must. The transforma-tion of ANSPs towards performance-based entities cannot be stopped, and we need to work with external partners such as IFATCA that are going to be affected by these chang-es. Acceptance of change by everybody is a necessity in my opinion. ^

Since mid December 2009, Graham Lake is the new CANSO Director Gen-eral to replace Alexander Ter Kuile. Graham has 30 Years experience in ATC, a former ATC Controller he held management roles at SERCO, SITA and ARINC. I have known Graham since many years when we worked to-gether in the ICAO FANS II commit-tee. We will meet again in ATC Global in Amsterdam next march, and there will be an interview of Graham in the next issue of The Controller. ^

“duty of care“ (Linate, Thessaloniki, Caligiari, etc..). Normally in order to prosecute some-one a court has to prove the facts and the “intent“ or intention to cause these facts. If the facts are easily established, with a con-troller or a pilot, proving the “intent“ is far more difficult.

Prosecutors have circumvented this using the so-called “conformity to the standard of care“ where the notions of “endangering offences“ and “negligence“ are used. The aim of the prosecutors is to send a signal to other ATC staff. But she showed that regard-ing safety, theses verdicts were in fact det-rimental to the objective. Sofia Michaelides demonstrated that not only did sending controllers to prison did not improve safety, but her study shows that criminalization of controllers had also negative effects on cur-rent incident reporting schemes and lead to extra stress. This even can result in poorer decision-making. In fact criminalization did do bring any positive effect at all.

Hippocrates Oath Ceremony To close the meeting we were all trans-ported by bus to the nearby ruins of Ask-lepion, where Hippocrates oath ceremony took place. Hippocrates was born in Kos on 460BC, he is considered the father of west-ern medicine and his oath is traditionally tak-en by doctors swearing to ethically practice medicine (photo). Maybe we should consider a controller oath? ^ ed@ifatca.org

4 ERM Kos

THE CONTROLLER18

Economic Downturn and Criminalization

European Regional Meeting

^ by Philippe Domogala, Editor

Last years’ IFATCA European regional meeting took place last October on the Greek is-land of Kos. 250 controllers at-tended, from 35 of the 44 Eu-ropean member associations, showing the continued dedi-cation and interest to share information among Air Traffic Controllers in Europe.

The meeting was extremely well organized by the Greek Controllers association, Espe-cially Dimitris Daniilidis, Leon Tournavitis and Effie Papa-dopoulou but also many oth-ers controllers of the associa-tion went through great effort to make sure everyone felt at home. The Hotel management of the Kipriotis complex in Kos was exceptional and special thanks to Tatyana Ratkevich, the hotel conference manager. Everything was perfect.

ControllersShortage...The Eurocontrol agency and the European Safety Agency EASA made several statements during the meeting, indicating that even though air travel has declined in the last 12 months, their expectation is that traffic will soon rebound. If sufficient numbers of controllers are not catered for, serious capacity problems will occur. With the economic downturn, the Air

Navigation Service Providers of many states are suffering from reduced revenues since fewer aircraft are using their airspace and airports. This prevents them from recruiting more staff, which in turn increases overtime for current staff. “Controller shortages re-main an issue in the region and could affect safety“, says Patrik Peters, IFATCA Executive Vice President Europe.

Criminilisation of ATCOSThe meeting reviewed recent accidents, in-cluding the New York Hudson River collision, where mainly Italian tourists were killed. Legal protection for controllers remains a top pri-ority for IFATCA. A lawyer, Sofia Michaelides delivered an interesting presentation: she explained the recent prosecutions and heavy prison sentences of Air traffic Controllers after incidents and accidents based on the

Controller shortages remain an issue in

the region and could affect safety.

4 Greek delegation

4 Patrik fi nal words

4 Hotel / Photo credits: DP

4 Hippocrates oath

The 2009 IFATCA Perfomance Seminars^ by Ph. Domogala, Editor

and Alexis Brathwaite, Deputy President IFATCA

4 Performance

THE CONTROLLER 19

Performance is not only for high density

areas, but is applicable everywhere.

4 Performance Seminar in KosPhoto credit: DP

4 Poster SeminarPhoto credit: Patrik Peters

important and well known and understandable to even those who don’t talk to planes“.

Regarding the introduction of Automatic Safety Monitoring Tools (ASMT), IFATCA policy is that's such tool should not be used to monitor the perform-ance of individual controllers, neither should it be used to measure capacity and should not be used as a punitive tool.

The introduction of PBN will bring more changes in our pro-fession and it is essential that everyone is prepared. There-fore these global seminars are extremely useful to increase controller awareness. More in-formation on these seminars, as well as copies of the pres-entations can be obtained by contacting the IFATCA office (office@ifatca.org). ^

dp@ifatca.org

as a region. It has always been important for us to be good professionals and we pride ourselves on that. But as the world of civil aviation has evolved, what it means to be a professional has also evolved. The knowl-edge we need to have, the information we need to be familiar with, has increased tre-mendously. It is incumbent upon each of us to be proactive in seeking this knowledge.

As fulfilling and satisfying as it is, talking to planes and ensuring that they land safely, is no longer enough. Those of us who have made the effort to come here are already aware of this. We need now to make our colleagues aware of this so we can push our associations and our employers to make our job just a little bit easier. By developing our associations and making them more effec-tive, we will make our regions more effec-tive and more influential. From this we will be able to influence how Air Traffic Manage-ment evolves rather than just reacting to the dictates of other stakeholders who may not always have the full picture.

Our seminar is but a start from IFATCA to make us more knowledgeable and more ef-fective as air traffic controllers and as leaders in our organizations. This seminar will only get better and will become an integral part of the education of air traffic controllers. That is the promise from IFATCA. The promise we wish from you is the commitment to continue participating and providing the interest and feedback that is necessary for this to be a real-ity. The promise we ask of you is the commit-ment to continually improve your individual performance, the performance of your asso-ciation and to contribute to improving the performance of IFATCA in all regions so that the profession of air traffic control becomes

For the 2nd time the IFATCA Executive Board presented a Seminar at its 4 Regional meet-ings in Kos (Greece), followed by Miami (USA) and Ouarzazate (Morocco) and Bali (Indone-sia). This year’s topic was Performance.

The goal was to raise awareness and educate controllers and other aviation personnel on the specifics of performance and on the new ICAO Performance-Based Navigation (PBN). IFATCA aims with these seminars to confirm its commitment to assist a global approach on a rapid introduction of PBN for the im-provement of flight efficiency everywhere in the world.

Marc Baumgartner, President and CEO IFATCA, delivered a well structured and ex-tremely informative series of presentations that explained what was behind the term “performance“ and what was expected from controllers. He explained that a set of met-rics will be used to measure performance and controllers should ensure that their expertise is used to apply those metrics. Controllers need to be involved and make sure opera-tional common sense is applied. Often data is misleading because it is either incomplete or incorrectly interpreted. He also warned that performance should not be linked to the salaries of individual controllers. He clearly stated that: “ IFATCA is opposed to bonuses paid on the basis of performance, as this has the potential de decrease safety“.

Performance is about all ICAO’s Key Per-formance Indicators – one of which is safety. “Performance is not only for high density ar-eas, but is applicable everywhere “ said Alex-is Brathwaite, Deputy President of IFATCA. Performance is necessary most especially for safety and for ensuring appropriate facilities and procedures are implemented (that is a Performance Based Approach to improve-ments to ATM). All the recent ICAO work is being done using a performance based ap-proach and using special ICAO performance forms.

Alexis continued: “We need to think about our own performance as air traffic control professionals, as associations or unions and

The late Henry Nkondokaya, IFATCA EVP AFM, who died unexpectedly last Septem-ber, is to be awarded a certificate of distinc-tion in recognition for outstanding support for ATC profession in the Region. A system of donations will also be put in place for his family, as it is customary in Africa to do so in order to offset the costs involved in the funeral. Commenting on the results of the seminar held the first day, Alexis Brathwaite closed the meeting by stating that perform-ance is a broad term, not to be mistaken as only meaning capacity. On the contrary, one of key performance indicators is safety and safety remains one of the most important things for Africa today. ^ ed@ifatca.org

4 AFM

THE CONTROLLER20

African Middle East Regional Meeting

^ by Philippe Domogala, Editor

The 20th Regional meeting for Africa and the Middle East was held in Ouarzazate, Morocco. It’s an extraordinary small city at the foot of the Atlas moun-tains in the Sahara desert. The meeting was held in the “elec-tricians village“ in fact a luxury hotel that belongs to the Mo-roccan electricians trade Un-ion. It has excellent facilities and was just opposite one of the city’s most visited monu-ment: the Kasbah Taourirt.

120 controllers, from 17 Asso-ciations, attended the meeting. Two International organizations (IFALPA and ASECNA) were also present as were two large ATM manufacturers, Indra and SELEX. Many sub-Saharan asso-ciations could not travel mainly due to economic reasons. It is really a pity. The Governor of the province and the Directors General of both Air Navigation and Civil Aviation Authority opened the meeting.

The meeting lasted 3 very long days and many subjects were discussed and, as it is customary for this re-gion, a series of rec-

ommendations issued. The first of those was to call on ANSPS in the Region to improve communications, a real issue especially when using RVSM procedures. The meeting also pleaded for investment in training in order to increase the number of controllers to al-leviate the current staff shortage in the re-gion. Preparations for the world football cup in 2012 in South Africa already show that the acute controller shortage in that coun-try might seriously disrupt the predicted in-crease of traffic foreseen during that period.

IFALPA was represented by its Vice Presi-dent Africa Middle East, Capt Hassoun from Lebanon. From his interventions it was clear that there is a need in the region to improve co-operation with airlines and pilot associa-tions. IFALPA and IFATCA gave a series of presentations on the current problems with TCAS system. They demonstrated that pilots and controllers responsibilities where still not clear, especially when pilots do not follow RAs. Adhering strictly to SOPs was a must and both organizations should do awareness campaigns to their members on this issue.

The IFATCA Executive Board also promised to provide guidance for managing crises and provide the framework needed to report ATM deficiencies. Human factors issues need also to be reported and was placed high in the list of priorities by the meeting. ASECNA, who was represented by its Director of Operations, and IFATCA have agreed to have standing coop-erative meetings on a more regular basis.

The Meeting pleaded for invest-ment in training in order to

increase the number of control-lers to alleviate the current staff

shortage in Africa.

Ouarzazate, Morocco

4 Head table Photo credit: Omar Amahmoul

4 Vicinity Ouarzazate Photo credit: DP

4 Ouarzazate city Photo credit: DP

4 Alexis Photo credit: DP

Discussing Morocco Problems with IFATCA President

Philippe: What difficulties did you encounter in organizing this regional meeting?Abdellatif: It was very difficult to find sponsors. An event of such size needs sponsorship to be financially viable. The other problem was that our airports and ATC were involved in an ISO certification and most of us were involved in this as well. So we had to work double, some-times up to 18h a day recently.

Philippe: What are the Moroccan Controllers Association expectations from organizing such a meeting?Samir: One issue was to show our mem-bership that we, as a new association, are present on the international field. We do a lot of work, but it is not always visible to the average controller. With this regional meet-ing we also wanted to educate the Moroccan controllers on this international experience.

The Moroccan association approached IFATCA to assist in the introduction of CISM. Marc Baumgartner, used the opportunity to discuss the needs and the possibilities for the best and sustainable introduction of this needed CISM in Morocco. ^

Philippe: Are you pleased with the results?Abdellatif: Yes, entirely. This meeting proved that the whole Middle East and Africa is a big family. It leads to a real South-South coopera-tion. It was also an opportunity to show what Morocco has to offer.

Philippe: What advise would you give anyone wanting to organize such an event?

And this was a success: some of our control-lers even drove 800km by car to be here.

Philippe: Is the status of Moroccan control-lers today still as good as a year ago?Samir: Still very good. Our Director Gen-eral has still a very positive attitude towards controllers and he announced here that the first promotion of Controllers-Engineers will start in the coming months in our Academy.

Abdellatif: You need to clearly define your objectives beforehand and stick to them. No improvisa-tion. It has been a very rewarding experience. I have gained a lot of organizing skills, but also learned about re-enforcing human con-tacts. I’m ready to help again and use what I have learned. ^

This will further elevate the status of the controllers in our country. This was one of our demands since the beginning. But this took a lot of time and efforts. Compared to our col-leagues further south we are definitively showing the way in Morocco. ^

4 AFM

THE CONTROLLER 21

4 Abdellatif Photo credit: Thierry Carquet/FATCOA

4 Samir Photo credit: Thierry Carquet/FATCOA

4 Marc with Moroccan delegation Photo credit: Omar Amahmoul

Interview Abdellatif MATOUAL, Chairman Organizing Committee AFM Regional Meeting

Interview Samir BERRAKHLA President Moroccan ATC Association

Gary Clark’s famous Australia “SWAMP“ ducks series are also included, as well as the American “CHICKEN WINGS“ of the Strasser brothers.This is a very funny book, which would make an excellent present to anyone who likes aviation in general and it can be high-ly recommended. The book is available in most aviation book stores or you can order it directly on the internet at www.goin-gupsir.nl at 12,50 EUR plus postage.

GOING UP SIR 160 pages, 350 illustrationsISBN: 97894 9000 8024

THE CONTROLLER22

Going Up, Sir

^ Compiled and published by Martin Leeuwis.Review by Philippe Domogala, Editor

Cartoons by Artists from all around the World

Photo credits: M.Leeuwis

Book Review

Say Again series was followed by 6 more books including the famous “SAY COFFEE OR TEA“ and the “SAY HEADING“.

Martin has been approached by many aviation artists to publish their work and “GOING UP, SIR“ is the second collec-tion of cartoons from various artists. In this book, 21 aviation artists have drawn over 350 cartoons, all about aviation, mostly ATC, including some of the famous ATC drawings of Martin Germans, a control-ler in Maastricht UAC (Eurocontrol) which we published a long time ago in The Controller Magazine.

Martin Leeuwis is an active airline captain with more than 15.000h under the belt. His hobby is to publish aviation humor car-toons. His first book “SAY AGAIN“ with Dutch cartoons from Ton van Andel, was so successful that it has now be reprinted 10 times and still remain very popular. The

Interview Meissa N’Diaye, Operational Director ASECNA

^ by Philippe Domogala, Editor

4 ASECNA

THE CONTROLLER 23

Philippe: You mentioned during the meeting that you were invest-ing 0,5 Billion USD to improve ATC conditions in Africa. Could you be more specific as to what is planned with this money?Meissa N’Diaye: These 500 Millions are our investment for the period 2009-2013. We already spent 228 millions. The top priority is to improve communications, mostly VHF but also HF over desert, for-est or oceans. ADS-CPDLC is planned to be introduced in all continental airspace. We will also invest in training, Energy/power supplies and last but not least in fire fighting equip-ment. Because you can still operate an airport with many technical facilities down but without proper firefighting you have to close down. ^

ed@ifatca.org

Philippe: Will this license allow controllers to move from one country to another within ASECNA?Meissa N’Diaye: Yes, this is already the case even without a license. ASECNA is one big community. Today for instance, 1/3 of the controllers in Senegal are not from Senegal, but expatriates. Expatriation means better salaries (extra allowances) and tax advantag-es. All these transfers are done on a volun-tary basis. We do not force people to work in another country and have no intention in doing so in the future.

Philippe: You mentioned during the meeting that you intended to introduce Just Culture in ASECNA. How are you going to achieve this?Meissa N’Diaye: This is indeed one of our priorities. I have pushed for a voluntary in-cident reporting system to be applied in ASECNA. The aim is to improve by learning from mistakes and ensure that controllers who have made and reported such mistakes will not be punished

Philippe: Will this include full protection in case a controller is taken to court following an incident or accident?Meissa N’Diaye: Yes for the civil responsibili-ties. That is ASECNA as an employer will take responsibility and pay for damages done if any. But the penal, it will be the responsibil-ity of each state. Generally everyone has to answer for their own actions.

Mr N’Diaye attended the 3 days of the IFATCA AFM regional meeting in Ouarza-zate and I had the opportunity to interview him there.

Philippe: Can you confirm that all the sanc-tions that were taken against the ASECNA controllers who organized the “Radio Si-lence“ action last … have been lifted as promised?Meissa N’Diaye: Yes absolutely. All sanctions have been lifted now except for one person, the former President of the Cameroon Asso-ciation, who was transferred to a very small airfield as a disciplinary measure (Ed note: his story was covered in the June 2009 issue of The Controller). He has now been re-instated as a full controller and we are currently ne-gotiating the possibility for him to work as an expatriate in Brazzaville ACC in Congo, with a substantial salary raise. Once this is re-solved, there will be no more sanctions left.

Philippe: What is the situation regarding the ATC licenses?Meissa N’Diaye: We have now reached an agreement with our member States and we are currently in the process to grant every ASECNA controller who is medically fit an ATC license by the end of 2009. After that date they will need to have an ICAO level 4 English proficiency. To attain this we will prepare English courses, send some people to the UK etc in order to meet the objective.

4 Meissa N’Diaye and Philippe Photo credit: Thierry Carquet/FATCOA

I have pushed for a voluntary incident

reporting system to be applied in ASECNA.

We must be prepared to think of new times, with new challenges and tasks, with a co-herent involvement in operational manage-ment. This should be based on the quality and quantity of air traffic controllers that are required for our important professional work and with what is demanded of Air Navigation Services in the medium and long term devel-opment in mind.

What is Management?In different dictionaries and variations of the Spanish language, management is defined as the set of actions and measures, aimed at achieving objectives in the various activities of industry, commerce, finance or any other professional function.

A coherent management must:• develop a company policy from an appropri-

ate planning of services.• implement and commission procedures and

structures.• set up training and education processes to en-

sure their staffs’ professional competence.• establish a way to manage safety at different

levels and responsibilities.• conduct periodic performance verifications

through audits to detect both strengths and deficiencies, so they can be respectively maintained or corrected.

• take adequate measures based on the above.

Time for ReflectionAlthough times and labor relations have changed, our union relation to our ‘compa-ny’ seems to be more negative than in other sectors. Any reference to the ‘company’ is al-most always derogatory, without any loyalty the organization from which we receive our salary. We often talk about it as if it were the source of our ills and problems, a stepmoth-er who does not understand us and whom we do not understand.

What are we missing? Well, it may seem sim-plistic, but we often lack faith in the company. A true and full integration within the organi-zation is missing. Input of air traffic control-

4 Spain

THE CONTROLLER24

^ by Pedro Contreras Blanco, USCA (Spanish Air Traffi c Controllers Union)

sun to rise on the horizon. Things do change: negotiations between airlines and their pilots for example are suddenly resolved with posi-tive agreements for both parties. The same is seen in other sectors as well…

Looking closer, one discovers that in addition to purely economic gains, there are a series of benefits ranging from social objectives and workplace improvements, to professional as-sociation quotas, technical proficiency func-tions and participation in activities that have a specific implication in the management of their organization or operation.

In the belief that everything lasts forever, what benefit can be obtained from this kind of management these days? But what if we make an effort and reflect on the consequences in the short, medium or long term if we followed one or another indicator, or any gray cloud that suddenly appeared in the sky?

When things change following the crisis, it’s likely we’ll hear things like “it’s no longer what it was“ or “it was better before“. It may well be that other have plans that don’t match union views and have other interests than those of air traffic controllers in mind. Shouldn't we be prepared for the situation after this crisis?

A joint study should be launched to evalu-ate the quantity and

profiles of the various management positions

that can be filled by controllers.

ATC and ManagementWhy should we be Different from the Rest of the World?

Global air traffic has seen a de-crease of up to 20% in some areas. Perhaps because of this, politicians appear no longer able to use steady increases in air traffic as an excuse to shun their responsibilities. For us however, life goes on. We shouldn't stop thinking about what is needed: plan today so we can ensure a better tomor-row and face new and renewed challenges.

In times of crisis such as these, one should not simply hope for the storm to pass and for the

4 Spanish controllers Photo credit: Levante Angel Gutierrez

plied by Member States, and directly affect us in the short to medium term).

Achieving all this may seem dif-ficult in the current economic work environment. Perhaps in the very near future, experi-enced air traffic controllers with a wide and recognized reputa-tion would like to perform such duties in the ACC or Central Air Navigation Services (ANSPs), if they were given the informa-tion and requirements to access these management positions.

A joint study should be launched to evaluate the quan-tity and profiles of the various management positions that can be filled by controllers. They should additionally de-fine and establish a formal and standardized process for initial access to management posi-tions and the filling of subse-quent vacancies produced by attrition over time.

Except for (elected) political office positions, purely tech-nical management positions should be filled through a se-lection process ruled by tech-nical and economic conditions. This would be subjected to an agreement a service provider and union representation. After all, why should we be different from the rest of the world? ^

atcmagazine@usca.es

Improvable AspectsAlready submerged in this crisis, we must take another step forward, think of a new fu-ture, and plan the resources to provide the appropriate and sufficient representation of controllers. It should cover those areas that are essential to our role and thereby be of direct benefit:• Airspace organization: should ensure broad

collaborative skills within PANS OPS, and technical approval before being published in AIP.

• ATC Operations: ATM procedures, to im-prove and update. Competence and par-ticipation in both operational processes and in letters of agreements, modifications of technical manuals, internal policies, etc..

• ATM Safety: participation in incident and accident investigation, audits and safety in-spections and ATS safety management. In-credibly, quite often safety administration does not even involve controllers let alone is it managed by one. This often results in neg-ative connotations it has for our profession.

• Air Navigation Systems and their opera-tional structures: vital competition in the process of new systems or structures, and implementation and deployment of new technologies, risk analysis and the accept-ance and implementation of new units, structures and systems.

• ATS Internal audits: essential to our active presence since the controllers are those who have the knowledge and experience of the ATC operational role.

• Participation with international organiza-tions: insure the participation and presence in European organizations and trans-na-tionals (i.e., Eurocontrol, EASA, ICAO, EU, etc), where debates and decisions are tak-en for technical issues in air navigation and ATS on new technologies and regulatory or operational procedures (which are later ap-

4 Spain

THE CONTROLLER 25

lers (in quality and quantity) is needed, so that the objectives of the Air Traffic Control Services (ATS) are as efficient as required.In recent years there have been important contributions by professionals, mainly con-sultants coming from various European air navigation service providers. But the number of controllers involved in this for the moment is only around 10, and within a few months could possibly be reduced to 5.

While it is widely recognized that our engi-neering counterparts are indispensible con-tributors, there are certain functions where the know-how, of both the controller and pi-lot, cannot be ignored or replaced. Doing so, e.g. for cost saving reasons, leads to undesir-able situations due to the lack of sufficient knowledge and operational ATC experience. This is easily solved by daily collaboration, just as is and was done for years on many joint projects and jobs.

It seems incredible how quickly one forgets that the existing systems are often the result to a successful symbiosis between profes-sional competence and technical expertise of aeronautical engineering teams and air traffic controllers. Furthermore, like it or not, in the navigational environment there are two major players: the controller and the pilot. Undoubtedly, they are competent to fill those positions where technical or opera-tional decisions (that directly affect them) are made, and as stated earlier, are those with the capacity, experience and professionalism to plan, implement, verify and work as ATC operational managers.These positions also represent the future of the air traffic control-lers union. We cannot be reduced to being the people behind the microphone, as it will result in no controllers being present in the company’s management.

We cannot be reduced to being the people

behind the microphone, as it will result in no

controllers being present in the company’s

management.

Photo credit: Philip Marien

A sad moment as LTU had been one of the last truly ATC-friendly airlines, and many crew and controllers especially in Dusseldorf social-ised as a result. Remarkably LTU never suf-fered any fatal accident in the 54 years of its existence. ^

of 2012. This will be followed by additional military development flying, and the type will be certificated by both the civil and military authorities. A total of 184 aircraft have so far been ordered by Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Spain, Turkey and the United Kingdom.

Subsequently big discussions about the fi-nancing of the delays and the extra costs of the aircraft (+25% on the original price) are shaking the partners of EADS, the par-ent company of Airbus. A decision on the program future was expected at the end of January 2010. ^

4 Brief & News

THE CONTROLLER26

2009: One last Flight and 2 First Flights

Last Flight – LTULTU, the old German airline founded in 1955 which flew long range all around the world, was absorbed by Air Berlin in 2007. LTU-painted air-craft continued to fly under Air

First Flight for the Airbus A400M After many years delay, the Airbus A400M military airlifter finally took off on December 11 2009 for the first time from Se-ville (Spain). It was a successful maiden flight lasting 3h 47min without any problems. For its first flight, the aircraft took off at a weight of 127 tonnes car-rying 15 tonnes of test equip-ment including two tonnes of water ballast, compared with its maximum take-off weight

Berlin, but last year it was decided to have only one airline name and LTU had to go.

The last LTU-painted aircraft (an Airbus A330-200, D-ALPF) took off in August from Dussel-dorf, its home base since 1961, to Abu Dhabi to be repainted in Air Berlin colors. The flight number for that last flight was BER699P, but all German controllers from DUS Ground, TWR, APP and Langen Radar changed the R/T call sign and called it LTU699P to show respect. The crew was touched and emo-tions were felt through the frequencies. Dur-ing the taxi to the runway, the A330 was also sprayed over by the Dusseldorf airport fire-fighters as a last salute.

of 141 tonnes. As planned, the six-man crew extensively explored the aircraft's flight en-velope in direct law, including a wide speed-range, and tested lowering and raising of the landing gear and high-lift devices at altitude. After checking the aircraft's performance in the landing configuration the crew landed back at Seville. In the first half of 2010, this prototype will be joined by two other aircraft, with a fourth by the end of the year.

A fifth aircraft will join the program during 2011. This fleet will be used for some 3,700 hours of test-flying between now and first delivery to the French Air Force at the end

Take-off for the Boeing 787 Dreamliner Also after many years of delays, the Boeing 787 finally took to the sky for the first time a few days after the A400M, on December

4 Last LTU flight / Photo credit: GDF

4 A400M taking off Photo credit: Airbus

4 First landing Photo credit: BoeingCo.

15 as it departed before an estimated crowd of more than 12,000 employees and guests from Paine Field in Everett near Seattle.

The newest member of the Boeing family of commercial jetliners, shown here landing at Seattle's Boeing Field, flew for approxi-mately three hours, landing at 1:33 p.m. lo-cal time.The flight marks the beginning of a flight-test program that will see six 787s flying nearly around the clock and around the globe, with the airplane's first delivery scheduled for fourth-quarter 2010. Boeing has received 851 orders for the 787 so far.Despite 59 cancellations, Boeing received 24 new orders for the plane in 2009. ^

4 USA News

THE CONTROLLER 27

Honest error reporting without fear [of punish-ment] is one of the best

ways to contribute to safety.

Photo credit: NATCA

ATSAP: A Voluntary, Non-Punitive Safety Reporting System for Controllers^ by Gini Briggs, NATCA National Safety

Committee, Central Region, and member of the ATSAP National Training Team

in place for everyone, not just management. New performance monitoring equipment is being rolled out without any input from NAT-CA. We remember when 15 days as the amount of time the FAA keeps voice tapes turned into 45, but that is probably going to go away soon too. With everything going digital, voice data will be available in-definitely. Big Brother is watch-ing and he’s waiting for you to make a mistake. NATCA’s advice to its mem-bers is, ‘take any ATSAP ru-mors with a grain of salt until you’ve heard the briefing first-hand.’ Ask questions. Talk to the people who have used AT-SAP and ask how it’s working in facilities. NATCA members have an obligation to safety. Honest error reporting without fear is one of the best ways to contribute. Fearless safety reporting is what ATSAP is all about. ^

gbriggs@natca.net

ing seen as culpable.“ He further states, “Re-sponses to incidents and accidents that are seen as unjust can impede safety investiga-tions, promote fear rather than mindfulness in people who do safety-critical work, make organizations more bureaucratic rather than more careful, and cultivate professional se-crecy, evasion, and self-protection.“ Without ATSAP, the FAA’s quality assurance process to investigate errors allows only three hours to conduct an investigation and find a “guilty party“, not the cause of the incident. When the result is decertification the parties involved have no motivation to contribute to the process. The fact that the problem may not have been caused by a person but by an unsafe situation such as a bad policy or pro-cedure is rarely unveiled within a three-hour investigatory window. The agency rolled out the Safety Manage-ment System (SMS), with fanfare – the premise being that safety issues can be ex-amined in a proactive manner and mitigated prior to an incident. This concept looks good on paper but without a comprehensive re-porting system and input from controllers it is worthless. If you report an honest mistake and are punished for it, you’ll stop reporting it. The mistake may not have been your fault. There may have been a policy or procedure in ef-fect that you didn’t understand. The failure to report the unsafe situation may exacer-bate an unjust culture. ATSAP removes the fear of being punished for an error, encouraging a more honest in-formational flow from the system. Will this happen overnight? Will the implementation of ATSAP compel management to do the right thing? No. This is a new process and a shift from the reporting system currently

United States air traffic controllers now have the ability to improve the safety of the U.S. National Airspace System in the current envi-ronment without fear of retribution. The National Air Traffic Controllers Asso-ciation (NATCA) has worked with the Fed-eral Aviation Administration to create the Air Traffic Safety Action Program (ATSAP) – a voluntary, non-punitive safety reporting sys-tem where controllers can report events that could be caused by factors including human error, equipment, procedure, etc. ATSAP is concerned with the “what,“ “why“ and “how“ of an event rather than on the “who.“ When a mistake is made, there is a root cause. No one sits down at the scope to make a mistake. ATSAP compiles all extenu-ating circumstances and looks at the incident from every angle in an attempt to discover the cause. Each incident is broken down into quantifiable data points that are tracked for patterns that can be used to show systemic problems within the NAS that can then be modified to mitigate future issues. ATSAP is a solution to the biggest obstacle in any safety reporting system: a lack of re-ports triggered by fear. A safety culture is impossible to achieve un-der the outdated “name and blame“ error reporting system that exists in the FAA. A safety culture is one in which communica-tions are founded on trust by shared percep-tions of the importance of safety. It presumes that errors are events from which we can learn. The concept of a “just culture“ is more com-plex to convey. Dr. Sidney Dekker (PhD, Ohio State University) says, “A just culture protects people’s honest mistakes from be-

conference, regional meetings and attend-ances are planned and work is divided be-tween all Board members. The planning of more regional meetings is left to the respec-tive Regional Vice-President. Naturally, the main objective of the RVP is the exchange of information between the associations and the dissemination of material from the Board, whereas the work of the VP Professional and Technical include the coordination/guidance of IFATCA committees like the Professional & Legal Committee (PLC) and the Technical & Operational Committee (TOC). Deputy President, EVP Finance and the President build the administrational and constitutional backbone of the Federation.

Knowledge and experience are certainly helpful, but more important are motivation and dedication to serve the Federation. Many shoulders carry IFATCA. Teamwork is essential! Everybody has to decide him/her-self how much time can be made available – but every helping hand is welcome and every minute counts! ^ evpeur@ifatca.org

trol non-radar refresher courses. In addition two foreign courses, area radar refresher for Nigeria and an aerodrome control for Liberia were held, as well as a team resource management course for some ATS personnel of GCAA. Future plans are to introduce other aviation courses for AIS, Airport operations, radio telephony, safety regu-lation and aviation English language proficiency in short term and in the long term affiliations that will offer aviation related degree programs. The management's aim is to establish a world-class aviation institute for the West African subegion and the entire continent. Kwapong05@yahoo.com

4 European News / African News

THE CONTROLLER28

Working on the Executive Board^ by Patrik Peters

outgoing EVP EUR

Vacancies in the Executive Board of IFATCA need to be filled to guarantee the func-tioning of the Federation. It has become increasingly diffi-cult to find volunteers for those posts. Some fear that the time required to fulfill the work ex-ceeds their possibilities, some feel unsuitable for the work entailed and others are unsure about the support available.

The daily work is carried out by e-mail, where some are “in-formation only“, some ask for input others require a certain action to be carried out. This e-mail exchange is in urgent cas-es complimented with phone conferences.

The Executive Board meets four times per year to discuss progress and to align the Fed-

GATA started in the 1950’s as the ATC School of the then de-partment of civil aviation of the Republic of Ghana, which be-came Ghana civil aviationx au-thority in 1986. The school has a record of having produced most of the qualified controllers who have and continue to manage the Accra FIR since Ghana was given charge of the airspace.

In 2003, SWEDAVIA and Ghana CAA reached an agreement to reestablish and refurbish the

erations work with that of our stakeholders and external developments. Two meetings are fixed regarding their venue. The Janu-ary/February meeting serves the preparation of the annual conference and is always tak-ing place in Montreal (at minus 20 degrees), as we require the services of the office. The next time we gather a few days prior confer-ence to review late working papers and deal with last minute arrangements/changes. New Executive Board members are introduced into their work at the end of conference in the “post-conference“ EBM. The two flexible meetings in June and October will be held on invitation of member associations, i.e. the EB offers associations to invite them to meet in their country. This occasion can be used to highlight certain issues of concern and the Board will assist by meeting with officials where deemed necessary.

All Board members provide reports of recent activities to the EB meeting. These reports along with updates of ongoing projects are part of the agenda. Additionally, the next

school that became operational again as an academy in 2008. With the help of the Swedish ENTRY POINT NORTH TRAINING ACADEMY it was inaugurated in March 2009. Certification was granted in August 2009. The academy has two lecture rooms, an auditorium, a library, an English language proficiency lab, and a FIVE-IN-ONE SIMULATOR (aerodrome, approach, non-radar area, and both radar approach and area). It is manned by both Ghanaian and Swedish instructors.

GATA has since successfully conducted two area radar control, one aerodrome control, RVSM implementation training and area con-

4 Patrik Peters Photo credit: DP

Ghana aviation Training Academy (GATA)

by Mick Atiemo, Africa Regional Editor ^ 4 GATA academy

Photo credit: MA

An Emergency Landing at Lome Airport, Togo ^ by Togue Nyntche Ouro-Sama, Tower Manager

Lome Airport and IFATCA Africa and Middle East Regional Support Group Member

4 African News

THE CONTROLLER 29

Photo credit: Sean D’Silva

4 Togue Nyntche Ouro-Sama

the chairmanship of the Minister of Transport with Director Gen-eral of Togo CAA, the ASECNA Representative to Togo and the Director General of Lome Air-port Company. A report of the management of the emergency at each level was made. It was noted that the controllers on duty prevented the aircraft from crashing. The Minister acknowl-edged the fact and on behalf of the government he congratu-lated the controllers for their good deed.

A letter of congratulation was given to the controllers by the DG CAA during an official cer-emony, where ASECNA, the ANSP that employs the control-lers, celebrated the event to ex-press its gratitude to them. ^ nyntchetogue@yahoo.fr

Tower and explain what had happened. Ac-cording to the pilot, they were flying from Is-tanbul, Turkey to Lagos, Nigeria. While they were descending to Lagos Airport, suddenly the navigation equipment of the airplane ceased to function. Then Lagos ACC handed them over to Accra Radar to be vectored to land at Accra Airport. Since the altimeter was operative, he kept flying in VFR at low altitude not far from the coast line. Thus when the crew saw a city, they thought it was the city of Accra. Then they started turning around what they thought is Accra airport. As soon as they saw the runway lights on, they told Accra ATC that they had the runway in sight and Accra gave them clearance to land. Once they had landed, they realized – through the communi-cation with Accra ATC – that they were not at Accra airport. Accra ATC then told them that they had probably landed at Lome airport and advised them to contact us. After land-ing, they had about 20 minutes fuel left. There were 195 people on board.

NB: There is a published local procedure to switch off the runway lights when no traffic is expected.

The AftermathThe next day the crew had the plane repaired and took off for Lagos with its passengers. There had been a debriefing meeting under

In the June 2009 issue, the ‘’ASECNA Con-trollers Motivation’’ article included an exam-ple of procedures with ‘’serious safety impli-cations’’ referring to an emergency landing of an airliner on an international airport of the region. I was involved in managing this emergency flight as the Tower Manager of that airport. I’m therefore in the position to give some clarifications.

On August 14th 2008, a Turkish Airlines’ Air-bus A310 landed unexpectedly at Lome Air-port. It did this without prior authorization of Lome ATC.

The FactsIn the night of August 14th 2008, the control-lers on duty at Lome Control Tower heard an aircraft noise while they were not expecting any traffic at that moment. The aircraft over-flew and circled over the control tower and the city at low altitude. By observation, the controllers noticed that it was a big jet airlin-er. The controllers called adjacent ATC cent-ers in Cotonou and Accra to inquire whether they’d sent them any traffic. The answer from both centers was negative. The controllers then tried to call the aircraft on Lome Tower frequency but there was no reply from the pilot. Since the aircraft kept flying at low alti-tude around the airport, the controllers con-cluded that it was an emergency situation and that the pilot was probably expecting an opportunity to land. The controllers decided to switch on the runway lights. When the pi-lot saw the runway lights on, he then made a final turn and landed safely at 21:38. After his successful and happy landing, the pilot in command said to Lome Control Tower: ‘’Thank you very much; God bless you’’. The pilot was invited to come up to the Control

4 The ASECNA Rep (Mr. Medezi) between the two controllers (Mr. Telou and Vitokpa) at the top table during the congratula-tions ceremony . Photo credit: TNOS

MET/ATM Task Force (Bangkok 2-4 December)Weather is one of the significant factors in the everyday work of controllers, no mat-ter if they are located in a windowless radar control centre or a control tower with a 360º view. Therefore, it was surprising that this was the first ICAO meeting for over 2 years between the meteorological authorities and ATC. It was good that the meteorological representatives gave information on the new improved services they will be provid-ing in the future, particularly with respect to Terminal Area airspace and Flow Manage-ment Planning. However, there are still many anomolies in the procedures between MET and ATM. These differences should be re-solved to enable the forecaster and the con-troller to work in unison.

South East Asia Route Review Task Force (Bangkok 8-11 December) With the introduction of new automated ATM systems at many of the Control Centres and the impetus to adopt more environmentally effective practices, this route review exercise will have the opportunity to implement new routes and procedures that will resolve many of the problems and inefficiences associated with the current airspace structure and ATC practices.

East Asia Traffic Management Coordination Group (Taipei 14-16 December)The primary topic was the recent introduction of the Taiwan-Mainland China flights and the implementation of 3 new routes within the Taipei FIR that directly impact on some of the primary north/south routes.

I have to advise you that my IFATCA trav-els and workload pale in comparison with many others who devote much more time and effort in serving IFATCA and ultimately you, the individual controller. It is important that IFATCA is seen and heard at all levels of meetings – from the ANC at ICAO Head-quarters to a locally organised meeting by some Association. ^

john.wags@gmail.com

4 Asian News

THE CONTROLLER30

A New Year Full of Meetings ^ by John Wagstaff,

Asia-Pacifi c IFATCA Representative

One look at the calendar of any of the IFATCA officers, be they an Executive Board member, one of the Committee mem-bers, a Representative or one of the many other volunteers who generously give their own time, and you will see that for each month there are meet-ings scheduled. However, as a working controller what do these meetings mean to you and what does IFATCA do at these meetings?

The following extract from my 2009 calendar may answer these questions – in the 7 weeks before Christmas I at-tended 5 meetings in the Asia Pacific Region.

ASP Regional Meeting (Bali 3-5 November)With the introduction of a Sem-inar Day at the Regional Meet-ing, an informative and educa-tion element has been added to each Meeting. This is a good opportunity for the ordinary members to learn why the way they do the job is changing and how it will change even more in the future. At every meeting it is often the informal exchanges that take place over a cup of

coffee outside of the meeting room that are the most interesting. Having just listened to an IATA presentation on optimising ‘gate to gate’ efficiency and CDOs, I talked with an In-donesian controller from a small airport in Iri-an Jaya where Twin Otters and helicopters are the daily traffic and the passengers are mostly the film crews from Discovery Channel. I was reminded that PBN means different things to different people in different parts of the world – be it an RNAV approach with a CAT III land-ing or basic navigation through misty jungle valleys with cloud shrouded peaks.

IATA Safety Workshop (Singapore 24-26 November)IFATCA and IATA share many common goals, but we sometimes have differing viewpoints on how to achieve them. Because of the high incidence of runway overrun ac-cidents IATA is promoting a Runway Excur-sion Risk Reduction programme. Although the ‘stabilised approach’ is now standard operating procedure for many airlines, in-formation on a stabilised approach was only published in ICAO Doc 4444 in November 2009, therefore many controllers may not be aware of the practice. IATA analysed the dif-ferent ‘threats and errors’ associated with a stablised approach, with many ATC actions considered as ‘threats’, including radar vec-tors to approach, numerous R/T transmis-sions, additional speed control, tailwind on approach and inaccurate reporting of runway contamination. It is essential that both con-trollers and pilots are aware of each other’s problems, limitations and restrictions.

It is essential that both controllers and

pilots are aware of each other’s problems, limita-

tions and restrictions.

Photo credit: Phil Parker

SPOTLIGHT

31 THE CONTROLLER

Spotlight on Corporate Members^ by Kevin Salter

Contributing Editor, Corporate Affairs

Kevin Salter

A big Thank you to Kevin Salter.When Kevin approached us some 7 years ago with the idea of doing a regular fea-ture on Corporate members in the magazine Spotlight, we did not expect if would be such a success. In fact, before Spotlight we did not do much to give our Corpo-rate members some profile on their activities on a regular basis. Kevin's enthusiasm has proven to pay, and in some issues the demand was such that we had 4 pages Spotlight!. While we respect Kevin decision to stop, we would like, on behalf of the Controller Team and IFATCA Executive Board to thank Kevin for his work during all those years . I know also we can still count on you in the future to help.

Philippe Domogala, Editor The Controller

Welcome to the first Spotlight article in 2010. May I wish everyone every success in the coming year.

I have to start this issue with some sad news. I am sorry to announce that, due to my new managerial responsibility and role at the Academy in Deutsche Flugsicherung GmbH, I have had to make the decision to leave the position of editor and compiler of Spotlight.

Over the many years of this feature I have been supported by numerous corporate members and I have made many friends. Therefore I would like to use this issue of `Spotlight´ to take the opportunity to thank them and make a request to you.

Firstly the thanks...Many Press Offices have been involved in the copy that has been provided over the 21 previous issues of the magazine and my thanks goes to all of those that returned my calls, answered my questions and sup-ported me by providing information, copy and photographs. In particular, I wish to say a big `Thank You´ to the following peo-ple and companies:

THALES - Joelle Lebreton, Fanny Coelho, Mathilde Bouchard and Danielle Pitel

TERMA – Kasper Rasmussen and Hwee-Kwoon Li

SERCO – Kathrine Stedman

MICRONAV – Tom Howard-Jones and Silke Graham

SKYSOFT – Laurent Courtois

HELIOS – Laurette Royer

IRISH AVIATION AUTHORITY - Paddy Kennedy

AIRWAYS NEW ZEALAND – Ken Mitchell

NORTHROP GRUMMAN PARK AIR SYSTEMS – Gemma Clements

SENSIS – Beth Larson and Rob Conrad

ERA – Daniel Finke

CARNEGIE SPEECH – John Lucke It may be that some of those named have moved on within their company, or are no longer in position, but it must be said that without their support `Spotlight´ would have much harder to produce for you, our reader.

Secondly, my request...I would like to ask if there is anyone within the IFATCA membership who would be interested in taking over this feature from me. It would be a great shame to lose such a valuable means of keeping in touch with what our Corporate Partners are develop-ing and how they are supporting ATM.

If you would like to discuss the idea, can I ask you to please contact me using my de-tails below. I would also like to thank you, the members of IFATCA, for your e-mails and questions over the years showing me that there was an interest in Spotlight and what we were trying to provide. And final-ly a special thank you must go to Philippe and Tatiana in our Montreal office for all of their assistance to me in helping me to provide you with this feature. I wish all those involved with `The Controller´ every success for the future. ^

This concludes `Spotlight´ for this issue!

Kevin SalterIFATCA Contributing EditorCorporate Affairskevin-john.salter@dfs.de

baker.com) keeps track of how many people survived their aircraft: to date some 7,500 pilots owe their lives to Martin-Baker seats, out of a estimated total of 12,000 ejections worldwide. It also means that well over 6,000 multi million aircraft were reduced to scrap metal – but that’s a different story. Also on their website are some amazing videos and animations, including one of a zero-zero ejec-tion: from an essentially stationary aircraft, a pilot is ejected to an altitude of 200 ft – his parachute is fully deployed in about 3 seconds from the time he pulls his ejection handle!

Alternative designsOther designs have looked for so-called pod or capsule ejection: instead of the individu-als to be shot out of the cockpit, the cockpit itself would be separated from the aircraft. This would be especially useful for aircraft with larger crews – it was even considered for the Space Shuttle after the Challenger disaster – but to date, only a handful of air-craft have had this fitted. Interestingly, a vari-ation of this is generating a lot of attention in the past few years in private aviation: in case of a disabling emergency, the pilot can deploy a parachute that slows the descent of the aircraft to a survivable impact.

Contrary to popular belief (and even sub-ject of some quite crude cartoons) there are helicopters that are equipped with ejection seats: Russian Ka-50 Black Shark and Ka-52 Alligator helicopters have a system that first fires explosive bolts to jettison the rotor blades. It then jettisons the canopies, allow-ing the crew to eject.

ClubSurviving an ejection entitles you to mem-bership of a rather exclusive club: the Ejec-tion Tie Club. Established after the Second World War by manufacturer Martin-Baker, the club has over 5,000 members worldwide. Every club member receives a tie and pin, or a brooch for the women, which depicts a red triangle, the recognised international danger symbol for an ejection seat.

The club only has about 10 female members – perhaps not surprising, knowing that the first female pilot* to eject was Lt. Linda Heid

4 Philip Marien Feature

THE CONTROLLER32

Crew Egress SystemsWhen Everything Else Fails

^ by Philip Marien, Deputy Editor

Isn’t there an old pilot saying that a good landing is one that you come out of alive? I guess that would include the ones where pilots have used their ejection seats to escape a stricken aircraft. Although mostly available to military air-craft, it appears nearly as old as fixed wing aviation.

Early ideasAs early as 1910, people start-ed looking for ways to get the pilot safely out of a flying airplane. Although very lit-tle information appears to be available, these seemed to use elastic cords to propel the pilot from a monoplane. No easy so-lution was found for biplanes, as pilots would simply hit the top wing. Additional oddity seems to be that no one had yet attempted to parachute out of a moving plane before: only in 1911, Grant Morton made the first parachute jump from an airplane, a Wright Model B, at Venice Beach, California. His parachute was of the 'throw-out' type, holding it in his arms as he left the aircraft (which

was piloted by someone else). Quite how the ‘bungee’ seat of 1910 got the pilot to the ground remains a bit of a mystery….

GermansIt wasn’t until the aircraft became faster and the cockpits needed to be enclosed, that se-rious research began into how pilots could safely leave a disabled aircraft. Unsurpris-ingly, during the 30’s, it was the German Luftwaffe that made the biggest advances: they were far more advanced in develop-ing high-performance military aircraft than other nations at the time. The new Luftwaffe recognized the need for crew to be able to leave a stricken airplane safety. This was es-pecially important, as they had a lot of highly experimental aircraft, including some of the first jet planes: with the propulsion system at the back, which would be hazardous to a pilot leaving his airplane by simply stepping out of their cockpit.

Early designs simply tried to ‘guide’ the pilot(s) from the aircraft. One such design called for a boom, which would extend from the aircraft. Attached to this, the pilot would glide a safe distance beyond engines and airfoils. The Space Shuttle still has a similar system for its astronauts, although it’s never been used.

Other designs used seats with compressed springs. More exotic designs had telescop-ing arms, which would bring the pilot, seat and all, out of the cockpit so he could cleanly leave the aircraft. By 1942, most of the Luft-waffe’s experimental aircraft were equipped with some sort of ejection seat using either compressed air or an explosive charge. At the end of WWII, it is believed some 60 Ger-man pilots had ejected successfully from their aircraft.

Interestingly, towards the end of WWII, the British had, mostly independently of the German research, come up with very similar designs. As aircraft quickly became more powerful, the need for reliable crew egress systems also grew. Although there are sev-eral manufacturers around the world, British Martin-Baker became the market leader. A counter on their website (http://www.martin-

4 Early designs used bungee cords Photo credit: Unknown

F-15s stationed in the Netherlands. It eventu-ally ran out of fuel and crashed into a house in the west of Belgium, killing an 18-year old man who was asleep inside. depEd@the-controller.net

* At least the first female I could find docu-mented. There is little or no documentation available on former Soviet technology or ejection cases. ^

4 Philip Marien Feature

THE THE CONTROLLERCONTROLLER 33

in February 1991(!) She ejected together with the other pilot from their A-6 Intruder when the aircraft suffered a hydraulic failure and became uncontrollable.

UnluckySadly, there are also people who’ve lost their lives as a result of ejection seats. One of the more famous cases occurred in July 1989 overhead Europe: on a routine training flight. Colonel Nicolai Skuridin departed a Soviet air base near Kołobrzeg, Poland. During takeoff, the afterburner failed and the engine began losing power. At an altitude of 150 meters and descending, the pilot assumed he had a complete engine failure and ejected with-out incident. However, the engine had not failed completely, and the aircraft remained airborne, flying on autopilot in a south-west-erly direction. The now-unmanned aircraft crossed into the airspace of East Germany and, as this was still very much the Cold War era, it intercepted by a pair of U.S. Air Force

Your Own Ejection Seat!Probably the largest aircraft to be fitted with ejection seats is the B-52 Stratofortress. Some versions have 8 ejection seats, including several downward-firing ones. Recently, MotoArt, based in California USA, have started converting these into furniture. The company specialises in recycling aircraft parts into furniture. One of the most impressive pieces is a B-52 Ejection seat that has been converted into an office chair. Their website (www.motoart.com) doesn’t give prices, but I assume they don’t come cheap….

4 Thunderbird Pilot ejects his F-16 during an airshow in Idaho, USA in 2003. No one, including the pilot, was injured. USAF Staff Sgt. B.J. Davis III

Charlie‘s Column

34 THE CONTROLLER

Weddings in the air The low-cost British airline EASYJET was trying to organize weddings on board their aircraft. They sought permission from the local authorities to allow their captains to perform legal weddings, in a similar man-ner as sea captains can do on ships.

The British Air Line Pilots’ Association (BALPA) had an article on this in their last magazine (The Log), even giving a sugges-tion as to the possible in-flight announce-ment: BING-BONG! “Ladies and gentle-men, this is your Captain speaking, can I have your attention please. We are gath-ered here in the London TMA and in sight of a power infinitely greater than ourselves (Swanwick ATC) to witness the union of Kyle Tracy Jordan to Kevin Barry Wayne. I now pronounce you man and wife, but before inviting you to make use of the hon-

OVERHEARD IN THE AIRPORT BAR: Discussing the definition of a hard landing:TWR Controller: “A good landing is one that the passengers do not feel.“Pilot: “It does not matter, they always clap and cheer afterwards.“--------------------------------------------------------------

OVERHEARD ON THE FREQUENCY:Ground frequency major airport in Germany:Pilot: “Tower, ABC123 ready to start“.TWR: “Sorry we do not have your flight plan.“Pilot: “To Berlin, like every Friday morning“.TWR: “But today is Saturday“. Pilot: “What! That should be our day off then!“--------------------------------------------------------------

En-route Frequency in Italy with CB’s A pilot transmits on the frequency after report-ing having been struck by lightning.Pilot: “We have lost half of our instruments, now

Charlie‘s Column

eymoon suite, or rear passenger toilet as we call it, I’d like to say a few words to the happy couple.

I always feel that marriage is like a long haul flight – you start at full thrust, and at first the earth seems to move, but soon performance deteriorates and you settle into the long boring cruise, and then even-tually, there comes a point where you start a long slow descent, and finally you end up with very little money in a place where you don’t understand the language, exhausted

the compass is unreliable too.“Controller: “Do you need special assistance?“Pilot: “No, it’s okay, but we have also lost our VORs now.“After a few minutes, the Pilot comes back: “Ah, we have lost our altimeter as well I think.“Before the controller can answer, a voice (from another aircraft) comes out of nowhere:“Come on, man, shut up and die like a man!“ --------------------------------------------------------------

One morning in Copenhagen ACC:AAL 123 is transferred from one sector to another within the Centre. The female controller working the radar can't see him on her screen, and thinking he is on the frequency by mistake she tells him to go back to the previous one. Her mistake is sorted out, and he is transferred back again, at which time the following conversation takes place:Controller: “AAL123, identified, sorry about that. You are of course very welcome!“Pilot: “That's okay ma‘am, I'm used to being rejected....I've been married twice!“

and disorientated, arguing over who’s go-ing to carry the baggage.

Well on that note, on behalf of manage-ment and staff of EASYJET, I’d like to offer our congratulations and bring to your at-tention the very affordable range of wed-ding buffet options available on the menu card in your seat pocket. The Reception will take place in rows 12 to 17. Thank you and have a good flight with EASYJET.“ ^

charlie@the-controller.net

--------------------------------------------------------------

Time when the TWR controller was also a Met observer.Coming to an airfield during the monsoon period:Pilot: Could we have the latest weather please?Tower: Visibility 1 Km in heavy rain, 9 octas at 1000 feet, etc….Pilot: confirm 9 octas, surely you mean 8 octas?Tower: No, the whole week it was 8 Octas but today it is much worse! --------------------------------------------------------------

AIRCRAFT TOILETS STORIES (continuing story) A toilet with a vengeance: A Boeing 757 from American Airlines from New York to Paris had a leak in one of the forward toilets last December. The “liquid“ transformed to blue ice, accumu-lated, finally got lose and hit the right engine during the cruise. The crew diverted to Bangor (Maine). A practical demonstration of the famous motto: “when the […] hits the fan. ^

4 Wedding with Easyjet Photo credit: Easyjet.

of the requirements,“ explains Mr. Schlingmann. “Working to-gether with Quintiq has been a positive experience. Quintiq of-fers the possibility to come to-gether to discuss solutions and recommendations in an open atmosphere. I am extremely happy to have had the oppor-tunity to collaborate with them to create a solution that exactly matches our needs.“

The DFS roll-out is continuing and will eventually include all of DFS' ATCOs and operational technical people in the Control Centers, Tower sites and Aero-nautical Information Service Centers – a total of 2,700 peo-ple. Also, additional functionali-ty including productivity checks, event handling in real time and controller training alerts will be included in the system at a fu-ture date. Together DFS and Quintiq will bring ATCO sched-uling to new heights. ^

For more information visit: www.quintiq.com/atcOr contact: david.hillis@quintiq.com

personnel shortage,“ says Mr. Schlingmann. “During shift planning, planners can view on one display where there will be a shortage of controllers, a day, month or year ahead. The fact that the capacity is shown clearly in one display makes the planning much easier.“

DFS’s future vision is to benefit from the Quintiq solution even further. Using some of the most advanced planning algorithms available today, the Quintiq Workforce Opti-mization solution is able to exactly adjust the number of ATCOs to the flow of traffic and to position controllers in the right sectors to constantly ensure that safety regulations are strictly adhered to. Also, the solution is flex-ible enough to include different labor agree-ments for each control center and to take into consideration employee preferences. With every project milestone set, DFS and Quintiq strive in that direction.

Another reason DFS chose Quintiq was be-cause of the unique Quintiq capabilities which allows the system to be configured to meet DFS' strict planning requirements. Quintiq and DFS have been working closely together to develop the DFS-specific aspects of the system. “By the end of the iterative develop-ment process, the software design was exactly configured to our requirements. DFS has very rigid requirements, so this is a big benefit. Often, we find that contractors can't meet all

4 Advertisement

THE CONTROLLER 35

Around the world, Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSPs) work in dynamic, complex environments. They need scheduling systems that can change and grow with the company, and they need round the clock support for their system’s administration.

When DFS decided to replace its legacy scheduling system they had high demands for the new shift scheduling software as it wanted a solution that could exactly meet its specific planning needs. As Ralf Schling-mann, Project Manager at DFS, explains: “The old system did not meet our software requirements any more. As a result, in cer-tain cases, we had to use Excel sheets to complete some tasks. These processes were time-consuming.“ An additional requirement for the new system was that it would be able to integrate with DFS' IT environment.

Answering these criteria, the Quintiq Work-force Optimization solution was chosen to replace the former system. It was first imple-mented in the Bremen Control Centre and, over time, it will be implemented in all of DFS' Control Centers and Towers.

The Bremen Control Centre is one of DFS' five national control centers and 16 Towers. Of the 1,800 ATCOs working at DFS, 270 work in the Bremen center together with 50 Flight Data Assistants, helping to direct more than three million flights that cross the Ger-man skies annually. For many reasons, plan-ning and scheduling this large number of employees is an extremely complicated task. First, government regulations regarding the number of controllers and the licensing nec-essary to man each sector are very strict. Second, DFS has to deal with a complicated set of collective labor agreements which can even vary from site to site. Finally, for the past couple of years, Europe has suffered from a shortage of ATCOs, but the recent economic decline had a significant impact on demand. Short term scheduling and long term recruitment and training must take fluc-tuating demand into consideration“Quintiq shows us in a capacity chart where there is a

35

4 So many positions to man (LBSF ACC) Photo credit: Philippe Domogala

Germany DFS Improves Controllers Scheduling with an Integrated Quintiq Solution

^ by David Hillis, Quintiq