VA Cancellations, Delays growing?

[PERLHR]

The Air Traffic Flow Management Daily Plan is published by Air Services the night before. If adverse weather is predicted, then the rate of arriving and departing aircraft is reduced. This then causes cancellations as there are more flights scheduled than available runway capacity.

This is why you'll see cancellations start to trickle in hours in advance, as the airlines pre-emptively cancel a number flights to manage the overall operation based around the reduced arrival/departures rates or ground delay programs that are going to be in place.

The other option is they wait until the last minute to cancel flights, knowing full well that runway capacity is reduced and cancellations are inevitable. I know I'd prefer the advance notice...

Agreed generally....but I wonder what the stats are regarding other airline cancellations? It's not as if MEL is Heathrow or Gatwick (the latter who as we know, operates an amazing one runway operation for the movements and pax numbers ) and busy London TMAs to content with and I don't see such a degree of cancelled flights there. It's usually all or very little. Out of interest has MEL got Cat 3 for low vis ops?

 

[AviatorInsight]

Agreed generally....but I wonder what the stats are regarding other airline cancellations? It's not as if MEL is Heathrow or Gatwick (the latter who as we know, operates an amazing one runway operation for the movements and pax numbers ) and busy London TMAs to content with and I don't see such a degree of cancelled flights there. It's usually all or very little. Out of interest has MEL got Cat 3 for low vis ops?

Yes it does, but just because an airport has CATIII ops doesn't mean it's straight up better. It actually restricts operations in a number of ways.
1. You need to the protect the ILS signal for CAT II/III. This means ATC need to hold aircraft further back from the runway on the ground and further spacing between aircraft in the air. So this obviously drops the arrival rate and departures then get squeezed.
2. Then you've got the aircraft/crew not capable of CATII/III. So ATC need to sequence around who can/can't.
3. Activating low vis procedures early would straight up impose delays on a day when Cat I ops would have been fine with normal spacing.

TLDR; Stay in normal ops for as long as possible to sustain the higher rate. CAT III is there to avoid a total shutdown.

 

[PERLHR]

Yes it does, but just because an airport has CATIII ops doesn't mean it's straight up better. It actually restricts operations in a number of ways.
1. You need to the protect the ILS signal for CAT II/III. This means ATC need to hold aircraft further back from the runway on the ground and further spacing between aircraft in the air. So this obviously drops the arrival rate and departures then get squeezed.
2. Then you've got the aircraft/crew not capable of CATII/III. So ATC need to sequence around who can/can't.
3. Activating low vis procedures early would straight up impose delays on a day when Cat I ops would have been fine with normal spacing.

TLDR; Stay in normal ops for as long as possible to sustain the higher rate. CAT III is there to avoid a total shutdown.

Yeah I get that. Just that it should help to avoid if fog or low vis , actual flight cancellations or at least keep them to a minimum. Begs the question are all pilots (eventually) Cat 3 certified in Australia or is it kept low?

 

[AviatorInsight]

Yeah I get that. Just that it should help to avoid if fog or low vis , actual flight cancellations or at least keep them to a minimum. Begs the question are all pilots (eventually) Cat 3 certified in Australia or is it kept low?

Pilots will be low visibility qualified, but this depends on the airline’s certification and the aircraft itself. Some VA aircraft are only good for CAT II operations, yet I’m CAT III qualified. Turboprop pilots generally aren’t low visibility qualified because the aircraft isn’t capable of an autoland.