Super Busy Sydney

[benmay]

Hi All,

I've been through SYD a few times this year, around 5-10 flights (In+Out) and have noticed that nearly all of these, have been delayed due to ATC being busy.

I'm no Platinum FF like some here, but I've not ever really noticed SYD being so congested before.. Has something happened lately that's changed?

This weekend gone by, Flying from HVB to SYD was on schedule, but from SYD to ADL was delayed, and then this morning, the 6am from ADL to SYD was pushed back about 20mins due to Sydney being busy.

Thanks!

 

[straitman]

Hi All,

I've been through SYD a few times this year, around 5-10 flights (In+Out) and have noticed that nearly all of these, have been delayed due to ATC being busy.

I'm no Platinum FF like some here, but I've not ever really noticed SYD being so congested before.. Has something happened lately that's changed?

This weekend gone by, Flying from HVB to SYD was on schedule, but from SYD to ADL was delayed, and then this morning, the 6am from ADL to SYD was pushed back about 20mins due to Sydney being busy.

Thanks!

I have been involved in flying in and out of SYD (front and back seats) and SYD has always a pain with delays.

Its always been bad so I don't think it has gotten any worse.

 

[anat0l]

A plane almost never arrives early in SYD. Keep that in mind.

This is my understanding, so happy to be told otherwise here.

The reason is because ATC force-time the departure of every aircraft flying to it so that they should not arrive early, although that could result in the flight being delayed at the origin port further past the scheduled departure time. For example, if scheduled departure is 1500 but a plane is ready and could depart 10 minutes earlier, SYD ATC rules will "force" the plane not to take off until 1500 or later. Due to slot controls at the origin airport, this could mean that the opportunity to leave at 1500 precisely may be lost, resulting in a further delay.

As we all know, it takes just one delay to push everything slightly out of kilter. This has a larger effect on the domestic carriers of course who utilise their aircraft frequently to and from SYD during the whole day, so a delay in one service will carry to the next, and whether the time is made up or not is a whole different kettle of fish.

Apart from that, plenty of pax mistakes (e.g. delayed boarding, misconnects, no-shows), cargo delays (especially in the morning where there could be many, many services that need loading and unloading, the timing between each aircraft is tight and there is close to no room for error) and so on - all of these add precious minutes to delays. When this happens at SYD, everything gradually adds to SYD schedules going slightly out of kilter.

Now not sure why this doesn't happen at some other airports around the world, although it is by no means easy to find a dozen similarly sized or larger airports in the world which has a significantly more impeccable on-time performance compared to SYD.... although SIN, HKG (perhaps) and HND come to mind....

 

[Undercover Brother]

The reason is because ATC force-time the departure of every aircraft flying to it so that they should not arrive early, although that could result in the flight being delayed at the origin port further past the scheduled departure time. For example, if scheduled departure is 1500 but a plane is ready and could depart 10 minutes earlier, SYD ATC rules will "force" the plane not to take off until 1500 or later. Due to slot controls at the origin airport, this could mean that the opportunity to leave at 1500 precisely may be lost, resulting in a further delay.

This is incorrect. In the ideal world this is how the Aus ATC system would like to work, however it is still a few years off being as you describe above. At the moment the SY system can only look ahead a certain amount of time for arrivals, maybe an hour at most.

Travellers into SY are probably experiencing delays due to weather (has been happening a lot this summer), as well as the upgrade & replacement the parallel runways Instrument Landing System. Both of these factors result in a landing rate lower than usual. Combine this with the morning rush = guaranteed delays. I am unsure if airlines factor in a 15 minute taxi back to the terminal if the plane scores the wrong runway on a busy morning/afternoon.

Also an early plane into SY is usually only a couple of minutes early, no one but the pilots would notice! Does not happen much but it does happen.

 

[markis10]

A plane almost never arrives early in SYD. Keep that in mind.

This is my understanding, so happy to be told otherwise here.

As a person who has worked in Sydney tower and area approach control centre, and had an arrivals rating, I can say with absolute authority that this is not the case, early arrivals are quite common and mainly seen when winds are different to that predicted and the flight is a long one, my last international arrival into Sydney was 30 minutes early ex SIN.

In terms of a slot system, there has been one in place for a long time that initially only covered start clearances for aircraft in the golden triangle, this has been expanded. All aircraft landing at Sydney are now required to have a slot which is coordinated by Airport Coordination Australia Airport Coordination Australia - +61(2) 9313 5469 to ensure the maximum number of movements per hour is limited to the legal limit as set by the Sydney Airport Demand Management Act, 1997. From time to time there will be slower movement owing to unexpected staff shortages at ATC as well.

 

[benmay]

Thanks for the comments - I guess it's just a busy airport

What probably makes it worse for me, travelling from HVB to SYD is that the plane that comes here, normally leaves MEL, then goes to SYD, then to HVB then back to SYD, - so has potentially 3-4 delays to avoid

 

[Warks]

I have to say that flying QF out of SYD almost every week for the past 8 weeks I've not had a flight leave on time either. All have been 15 or so minutes late at the gate and then we've had the long taxi and the wait in the queue so it send up closer to 30 minutes. Also noticed flights out of BNE suffer the same fate and the pilot says he'll try and make up time but then gets the slow-down advice around the Hunter and we end up just as a late as expected.

Funny thing I'd had a really good run with my flights last year and at one stage I heard some bloke whingeing on the plane that all of his last ten flights had been late!