CALIFORNIA'S WILDFIRES AFFECT AVIATION
Things have returned to "normal" in the skies over southern California, if
you can call flying through thick smoke and dodging fire-related TFRs
normal. As AVweb reported on Monday, California's ongoing battle with
massive wildfires has taken its toll on aviation operations. Things took a
turn for the worse on Sunday when a fire got within two miles of the FAA's
Southern California Terminal Radar Approach Control (TRACON) and it was
evacuated. The facility, which covers a host of major airports and dozens of
GA airports, is the busiest in the country, according to the FAA's William
Shumann. "There were lots of delays but things are back to normal in
southern California," Shumann told AVweb. More...
.LAX BECOMES A PARKING LOT.
The fires also affected terminal facilities on Sunday, as Los Angeles
International Airport officials opted to hold all takeoffs for about half an
hour and then only resume departures on a limited basis. Early Sunday
evening, FAA controllers at LAX were handling about half the normal hourly
arrival rate of 70 aircraft. The reduction in the number of arriving flights
was causing delays or cancellations in outbound flights. According to The
Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones Newswires, once takeoffs resumed, aircraft
were assigned rather unusual procedures, where they were climbing to an
altitude of 5,000 feet or more over Santa Monica Bay VFR with apparently no
radar coverage. More...
.AND AIRLINES CANCEL HUNDREDS OF FLIGHTS
As one would expect, the ATC facility change and the fires themselves caused
major headaches for the various airlines servicing the region. Not waiting
for LAX to ground their aircraft, many carriers opted to cancel hundreds of
flights in the region. As a result, the entire nationwide route system was
affected. At LAX alone, more than 250 flights were canceled. Citing dense
smoke and impaired air traffic control operations, Southwest Airlines
cancelled a total of 152 flights to and from Burbank, Los Angeles, Ontario,
Orange County/John Wayne, and San Diego, while America West Airlines said
most of its flights in and out of the five airports were either cancelled or
delayed. More...
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----- Original Message -----
From: "Allan9" <exatc@xxxxxxxxxx>
To: <AIRLINE@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, October 30, 2003 9:15 AM
Subject: Re: San Diego fire
> Do you belong to or read AVWEB? A couple of excellent articles written on
> this.
> Al
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Alireza Alivandivafa" <DEmocrat2n@xxxxxxx>
> To: <AIRLINE@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Sent: Thursday, October 30, 2003 1:03 AM
> Subject: Re: San Diego fire
>
>
> > In a message dated 10/29/2003 5:46:04 AM Pacific Standard Time,
> > exatc@xxxxxxxxxx writes:
> >
> > << Is the issue that weather restriction reduced the traffic into and
out
> of
> > these airports or the fact that the TRACON has been evacuated? If it
> had
> > not been evacuated would there still be restrictions. ANd yes there
was
> a
> > vocal element that felt the same as you about ACF's versus the smaller
> > facilities. But is the combined facility more efficient and less
> expensive
> > to operate? >>
> >
> > I think that this is one case where spending a bit (not much) more is
> worth
> > it. The main factor was that the TRACON was evacuated. Since LA Center
> took
> > nearly all of the traffic, it had to operate under the more strict,
center
> > rules (more separation, more visibility, and in a facility with not
enough
> > controlers to do both jobs at once. The smoke may have caused some
> delays, but if
> > SoCal was kept open, or there were more redundencies, this would be
> minimal
> >
>