Qantas slugged with airport curfew

[stryker]

Did I miss something (I often do), but was there any word of what happened to the PAX?

I mean, did they get compensation, a hotel for the night or what?

 

[NM]

I know SYD has a curfew but does not deal in absolutes. There are provisions for unusual circumstances providing exemptions.

But for application for exemption under "exceptional circumstances" requires dispensation to be provided in advance and dispensation can only come from the Minister or his delegate. Try getting that at 11pm while an aircraft is en-route.

I had a BNE-SYD flight that was going to miss the curfew by less than a minute. Dispensation was requested from the Minister during the flight but was not forthcoming (not sure if it was refused or just not able to be obtained in the required timeframe). We had a very fast flight, late top-of-decent and straight in approach to try to beat the 11pm deadline. It was not until we were down to "a few thousand" feet (can't remember the exact number now, but it was something like 2000 feet) and it became obvious touchdown was going to be after 11pm (just), the engines spooled up and we returned to BNE.

of course the crazy part was that we probably made more noise climbing out than we would have made landing. But logic is not always applicable in these circumstances.

The original delay was due to an electric storm in BNE. That was compounded by an equipment fault and last minute aircraft sub. The straw that pushed us beyond the 11pm "arrival" was two passengers to didn't follow the direction to remain in the gate area during the aircraft sub (to one at the adjacent gate) and decided to go find the bar. Their tardiness in getting back to the gate while everyone else was on-board and ready to go meant the difference between arriving before or after curfew.

This was quite some years ago, but the rules are the same now. The aircraft sub was from a 763 to a 762, so that shows the timeframe. Being a smaller aircraft, I was op-upped for the BNE-SYD-BNE scenic tour that night. But due to the last minute aircraft sub, it had not been cleaned nor catered. So no food. They ran out of clean glasses very quickly, but continued with top-ups for the outbound and return legs.

 

[Mrmaxwell]

It really is absurd to refuse the plane to land being only a minute late...especially when non-PAX aircraft are not subject to curfew.

My idea of curfews is to limit SCHEDULED flying at certain airports in residential areas. All airlines adhere to this and as such commercial air traffic is non-existent during these times. If a flight is SCHEDULED to land at 10.45pm but does not arrive until 11.01pm who does this effect? Not the residents...if cargo planes are able to land at all hours then it's a not a noise issue is it? It only effects ALL the PAX and crew by forcing them back to CBR.

Dave....Absolutely stupid.

 

[markis10]

But for application for exemption under "exceptional circumstances" requires dispensation to be provided in advance and dispensation can only come from the Minister or his delegate. Try getting that at 11pm while an aircraft is en-route.

Its quite possible for a last minute dispensation to be granted in the air or on the ground as the circumstances for approval in many ways would require it to be made that way (ie unforseen events), there are quite a few examples here including a close to midnight departure:

https://secure.infrastructure.gov.au/webforms/infopages/Webreport08.pdf

I am not sure how many occurances involve the minister at the actual time of the event, the senior ATC on duty at Sydney is delegated power to make such approvals in reality.

 

[Dave Noble]

It really is absurd to refuse the plane to land being only a minute late...especially when non-PAX aircraft are not subject to curfew.

Whether non passenger flights have different rules is irrelevent

My idea of curfews is to limit SCHEDULED flying at certain airports in residential areas. All airlines adhere to this and as such commercial air traffic is non-existent during these times. If a flight is SCHEDULED to land at 10.45pm but does not arrive until 11.01pm who does this effect? Not the residents...if cargo planes are able to land at all hours then it's a not a noise issue is it? It only effects ALL the PAX and crew by forcing them back to CBR.

So what about flights that get delayed 2 hours, 3 hours etc... also, what about airlines that start putting unrealistic schedules where they can make it in time of everything is perfect, but with a reasonable chance of missing it. They are not being forced to go elsewhere, they are taking a gamble that they may make it. They could just have easily decided that it was too close and just put the passengers up overnight before departure rather than doing a south east australia tour

Make the rules less clear and well defined and then people will be trying to see how they can get around it

As it stands, it is simple... arrive by specified time or go elsewhere.

 

[Mal]

Well there is a dispensation process for Adelaide to be allowed to land or take off during curfew:

https://secure.infrastructure.gov.au/webforms/infopages/AdelaideCurfewDispensationGuidelines.htm

I wonder if Qantas applied, and was refused, or they didn't apply. Only being late by 1 minute or so probably means that they didn't think they'd be late.

 

[NM]

And of course the aircraft is allowed to land after curfew. They are not denied landing by ATC. The pilots will be notified by ATC that if they do land and do not have dispensation, they may be subject to a significantly increased landing fee (read: fine). It then becomes the pilots choice, and they will generally refer back to their company for direction.

 

[medhead]

Whether non passenger flights have different rules is irrelevent

Dave, I sort of agree with you on applying the rules, in this case.

But this statement just reminds me of the greenies objecting to uranium mining. They are opposed to the dangerous radiation from uranium, but when asked they are not opposed to good radiation from x-ray machines or nuclear medicine.

Is that non-passenger flights have good noise, the kind of aircraft noise that isn't annoying at 11 pm at night?

 

[Mrmaxwell]

Whether non passenger flights have different rules is irrelevent

Dave this is fundamental to the whole argument.

WHY is the curfew in place? To restrict noise? NO - as non-commercial aircraft are allowed to land outside these curfew hours

SO....WHY the hell does Adelaide airport have such a stupid curfew for PAX-ONLY aircraft?

The fact that the QF flight was turned away because they missed the curfew by 1 minute highlights the stupidity of the curfew in the first place.

The Adelaide Airport curfew act states that 'international aircraft' and/or 'freight aircraft' may land during curfew shoulder hours (11pm-12am and 5-6am) with no prior approval needed provided the landing stays under the maximum allowed noise level of 95 EPNdB. But this does not apply to domestic carriers...perfectly alright to divert our own citizens but not overseas cargo boxes.

Either apply the curfew to ALL aircraft or get rid of it.

Just because it is a rule does not mean we all should lie over and accept - stupid rules/restrictions MUST be questioned by us AT ALL TIMES as part of our democracy.

 

[dajop]

Just because it is a rule does not mean we all should lie over and accept it.

Aaah, the Australian attitude how refreshing. Try living (and working with others) in a place where rules are followed almost religiously and hardly ever questioned. Although rules are never easy to change and it's probably easier in the case to let sleeping dogs lie re the cargo planes ... any debate will probably only end up in tightening rather than relaxing curfews, depending on where marginal electorates are located.

Maybe they should make the curfew 10:55pm in statute and in enforcement apply a five minute tolerance, and be like speed camera enforcement. Then a plane landing at 11:01 is actually not just one minute outside the curfew it is 6mins over.

 

[Mrmaxwell]

Aaah, the Australian attitude how refreshing.

I didn't know democracy was an 'attitude' and that 'attitude' was Australian???

 

[dajop]

I didn't know democracy was an 'attitude' and that 'attitude' was Australian???

I wasn't referring to your democracy comment, but the preceding comment about not accepting rules, which I was being serious about - that I do find the attitude refreshing and think it is an extremely healthy attitude. I work in Singapore (which is really democracy in name only), and the vast majority of people just blindly accept rules without question (and that's not just government rules, I see it at work as well). In my company (an American MNC), we Aussies are often seen as a pain in the backside as we are always challenging things (may be though that's just our pigheadedness)!

 

[Flashback]

I wasn't referring to your democracy comment, but the preceding comment about not accepting rules, which I was being serious about - that I do find the attitude refreshing and think it is an extremely healthy attitude. I work in Singapore (which is really democracy in name only), and the vast majority of people just blindly accept rules without question (and that's not just government rules, I see it at work as well). In my company (an American MNC), we Aussies are often seen as a pain in the backside as we are always challenging things (may be though that's just our pigheadedness)!

That was one of the first things I learnt when studying Management 100 ; we studied the cultural differences between Australia and Singapore/Malaysia and that was the one thing that stood out.