Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

A Lufthansa A350's frustrating Oakland diversion

onemileatatime.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

351–360 of 413 posts

Re: A Lufthansa A350's frustrating Oakland diversion

#351

Post by [deleted] »

sneeze-slayer wrote: post #169
nradov wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Crew fatigue is not an ATC concern. Long haul flights like this carry relief pilots and have crew rest facilities so fatigue shouldn't be an issue in the first place. Controllers mostly work for the FAA. They have volume goals to meet, but they aren't accountable to airport or airline management for profit targets.

Crew fatigue is an ATC concern insofar as it contributes greatly to accidents. The controllers may have volume goals, but the ultimate goal is safety.

[deleted]

Re: A Lufthansa A350's frustrating Oakland diversion

#352

Post by briandear »

jakub_g wrote: post #347
systemvoltage wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mostly going to inadequate and incompetent new hires. We're not selecting based on merit and competence. We make a big deal out of interview process in Software engineering. But when it comes to critical life/death situation jobs, we don't.

> "inadequate and incompetent new hires" * *citation needed From what I've read last week [0], the main problem is that there's not enough (qualified) candidates being hired, and current ATC employees are routinely working 6d x 10h weeks. Stressed & overworked employees doesn't seem like a great solution to critical life/death situation either. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38587340

https://opensiuc.lib.siu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=192...

“I found the diversity in hiring air traffic controllers increased after the termination of the AT-CTI. However applicants in underrepresented groups are more likely to be lost through attrition in the FAA Academy Air Traffic Controller Training Program.”

Re: A Lufthansa A350's frustrating Oakland diversion

#353

Post by ExoticPearTree »

katbyte wrote: post #318
tomrod wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aye. Increasing taxes is basically the only way to ensure the system is funded sufficiently to: (1) hire enough people to perform the ops (2) hire enough people to update and modernize the policy Any other solution that doesn't emphasize building up the human capital is easy to argue against, IMO. You simply cannot draw from an empty well, and you really really don't want text GPTs attempting to land you no matter ho…

Why are taxes paying for ATCs at all? The airports/airlines should be footing the entire bill

Because ATC has nothing to do with airports. The only people directly involved from the airports are GND/TWR. APP is not directly related and Centers cover large swaths of territory and just make sure planes fly safe.

Re: A Lufthansa A350's frustrating Oakland diversion

#354

Post by ExoticPearTree »

p3n1s wrote: post #85
michael_j_x wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I meant for the ATC to provide a descent estimate of when Lufthansa should be expected to enter the AERODROME TRAFFIC CIRCUIT (since you want tolink the FAA glossary) in order to land (they had them on a hold pattern for 35+ minutes). This is independent of whether the approach is IFR or VFR. A TOWER controller has all the information necessary to calculate that estimate, and should be expected to do so, the same way…

Aerodrome traffic circuit is the ICAO term for traffic pattern, which is it what it is called in the US (it may be in the glossary but the point is that manual uses "traffic pattern" repeatedly). And this "traffic circuit" you refer to is almost always a VFR thing, as IFR approaches use specific charted procedures that generally do not end with a traffic circuit. https://skybrary.aero/articles/aerodrome-traffic-circu…

Aerodrome traffic pattern is completely different from holding patterns. And this is what LH was instructed to do, keep holding. Holding patterns are published for all airports and usually planes are stacked on those holding patterns and they are emptied FIFO style. Busier airports have multiple holding patterns to accommodate a large number of aircraft in case of on ground emergencies.

Re: A Lufthansa A350's frustrating Oakland diversion

#355

Post by raverbashing »

noxvilleza wrote: post #199
raverbashing wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> reason that Lufthansa wants ILS is to increase safety Yes because "more technology is more better" right? And forgetting about how to do things by hand (or eye) doesn't pose a risk to anyone neither A visual approach is no more unsafe than an ILS one in good weather. Sure, ok, the caveat here is "at night" but I don't think the multiple pilots that were doing it at the time were being risky on purpose (and people a…

> Yes because "more technology is more better" right? And forgetting about how to do things by hand (or eye) doesn't pose a risk to anyone neither That's a very nifty strawman, but that's not my claim (at least not in such a general way). In this case it's become SOP by experts in a field, specifically for safety reasons. Other experts in the field have said "well, we don't think it's necessary - there are downsides…

(speaking about strawmen) I'm not saying ILS is less safe

I'm saying that have people rely on ILS and never practice visual landings, especially when the conditions are favourable, makes pilots lose skill and confidence on it, making the overall situation less safe

Then people wonder how come other pilots miss a perfect good approach on a sunny day.

Re: A Lufthansa A350's frustrating Oakland diversion

#356

Post by ExoticPearTree »

kalleboo wrote: post #249
CaliforniaKarl wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you mean “traffic pattern” (from https://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/publications/media/pcg_10-12... ), that is also something you would do visually, which I don’t think Lufthansa would accept. As for not being able to give an accurate estimate, that is not for the on-the-radio approach controller to calculate, given their view of the airspace. The video posted by parent shows how long the inbound flows were (at least…

> that is not for the on-the-radio approach controller to calculate In that case they should not have given an estimate in the first place if it's just made up

That's why it is called an estimate. It is how much you think it might take, not the exact amount of time.

When asked about how long something it is going to take, everyone is given an estimate, not an absolute value. And this is because a lot of things can happen in between that are out of everyone's control.

Re: A Lufthansa A350's frustrating Oakland diversion

#357

Post by ExoticPearTree »

relix wrote: post #294
Hansenq wrote: post #29

There's a follow up video to the one linked in the story that provides a lot more context missing in this piece. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4zHxdn8oz20 Basically, SFO normally does VFR parallel approaches at night. Approach sequences these approaches miles beforehand, so there can be a chain of 10-20 aircraft all sequenced to land before responsibility is even transferred to SFO's tower. The incident happened du…

I don’t think this makes much sense in the real world. Shit happens and plans change. What if an aircraft needs to do a go-around, do they suddenly face 45m of delay or immediately need to divert, because The Sequence is immutable? No, they’d move things around a bit. SFO decided that this plane wasn’t going to land there as soon as they asked for ILS, instead of doing their job and making a gap.

> What if an aircraft needs to do a go-around, do they suddenly face 45m of delay or immediately need to divert, because The Sequence is immutable?

You would be surprised, but if it is a busy time, they will not be put in the sequence right away and will be put at the back of the line, which will take as long as it is going to take.

If you do a go around, you will be passed to APP which will decide what to do with you.

Re: A Lufthansa A350's frustrating Oakland diversion

#358

Post by wkipling »

philip1209 wrote: post #32

I can't find a source, but I thought I read somewhere that these policies came following the Asiana Flight 214 crash [1], during which a plane did a visual approach to SFO instead of ILS. My understanding was that there was a rule change requiring ILS approaches at night at SFO, then the airlines implemented policies duplicating the rules in their policies, but then the rules were revoked - still leaving airline poli…

Asiana crashed due to poor FMA mode awareness.

Re: A Lufthansa A350's frustrating Oakland diversion

#359

Post by wkipling »

kayodelycaon wrote: post #14
kokken wrote: post #5

I’m sure the industry has standards for assigning blame, but it looks to me that ATC is clearly being assholes here. Even from this article that clearly seems to think Lufthansa is in the wrong I walked away with a feeling that ATC and small town cops are one and the same.

ATC wasn’t been an asshole. The airspace was extremely busy and there wasn’t space between arriving flights for anyone to make an instrument landing. In order to make instrument landing, dozens of other planes would have to be moved out of the way.

Yeah but that's their job

Re: A Lufthansa A350's frustrating Oakland diversion

#360

Post by ta1243 »

thriftwy wrote: post #323
throwaway2037 wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You wrote: > Can you provide more details?

Russia - a history of crashes caused by rapid growth and weird aircraft park, followed by the war where the whole industry is now out of international law.

What does Russia have to do with anything?
Post reply on HN