I had 2 dealings with Southend so far and I hate it. Last time I had to go to down to 2000ft and 2 orbits (sleazy jet departure) to go through their airspace. I watched an airprox at the border of their airspace as there are new choking point.
Today I had 2 near misses under their airspace. I was used to the Farnborough → Southend forward handling, which is not working anymore. FB left me quite long on their frequency and I had 2 mins flight time to their border so I had to turn south as someone told his life on the Southend frequency. When it was my turn I was nearly at the southern end of southend airspace and I was quite angry. I started my message, but didn’t request a service anymore as I was too busy to find around their the world is not enough airspace in flight with a shagged AP and 125kts. I was diving down to 1400ft a very uncomfortable altitude.
Nearly hit a C152 with 100m/20ft and later flex wing dived unter my wing. I have no idea how close it was but it was scary. 2 airproxes in 8 mins is a new record.
We can wait for an midair to happen there.
Next time I go for CLN-COA or fly 1400ft with mode A only under their CTA.
Still angry.
mdoerr,
Would you consider making a MOR or an airprox for this? (I think the first might be more appropriate). If nobody makes any report, but everyone winds up thinking the same thing, then the powers that be will either
a) not know that anything is wrong, or
b) know that something is wrong, but be easily able to deny any knowledge when something does eventually happen.
I think it’s worth considering if you feel so strongly about it.
Colm
I agree with dublinpilot.
Did you ask Farnborough to change earlier and were refused?
How could one be refused a frequency change if outside CAS?
If I really can’t get a word in at all (unlikely) and am approaching a CAS boundary, I would simply cahnge over and tell the new controller to inform the former one. All in all, that’s certainly no more efficient than telling the “previous” controller right away, but one has to make choices.
That said, I have flown pretty much all across the place over the last 15+ years, and can’t really recall an occasion where over several (5 or more) minutes I was not able to make any communication due to frequency congestion.
Farnborough on a sunny day might be a bit of an exception (although when I fly down there, I rarely tune them in anymore, since it serves little purpose and is frantic). Still, those that end up in such situation (closing in on CAS without radio contact with the competent ATC unit) will have to ask themselves “was I really sufficiently ahead of my aircraft”??
Assuming this was a VFR flight? Personally I would ‘get rid’ of FB early as they are not going to hand off VFR traffic under a Basic service to the next unit, because they don’t know where you are going or what you want. Yes, that is a whole swathe of airspace that they have grabbed and yes it it dangerous if everyone is going to do the UK thing and not ask for a transit because it cause choke points. Personally I’d rather be talking to Southend early (or Bournemouth/Solent who people try to avoid too) and getting inside their Class D, because in the UK you are de-facto ‘separating’ yourself from all the people who won’t ask.
I’d be mad if I’d had 2 near mid-airs and they probably should be reported, but there are ways to mitigate risk. If you were calling 10 miles out and being refused a transit, that would be truly dangerous and warrant reporting to find out why.
and can’t really recall an occasion where over several (5 or more) minutes I was not able to make any communication due to frequency congestion.
I can. At one very busy airport with ATC I was told to report overhead the airport and could not get a single word in. I remember crossing what appeared to be two streams of traffic at some ill-defined hold overhead. I ended up overshooting that overhead by several minutes and several miles. This was very serious in my opinion as lots of traffic were converging and doing all sorts of weird things. Given I had seen something similar happen before and also at the same airport, I filed a report which was acted upon.
On a number of other occasions I have found it tough trying to come off London Info or Farnborough having noted they weren’t going to pass me to the next frequency for VFR transit through controlled airspace. On one occasion I had to set up orbits outside the airspace until I could get a word in to come off who I was speaking to so I can switch to the next unit to get a clearance through that. Sometimes these issues can occur from time to time and when en-route I’m somewhat less concerned than if the situation were to arise on approach, but now as I have seen it happen to me on more than one occasion in the past few times I have been flying, I feel this could have an impact to flight safety and economy in the long run. Perhaps even more so if the problem were to magnify as flights generally only get busier over time.
I have been pondering trying to work out whether such occurrences should be reported. There is also a risk of infringement which may lead up to a risk of collision. Having seen some of the replies from another forum I’m now more inclined that I should.
Given that London Info cannot give traffic information why bother talking to them at all? Why not maintain a listening watch only?
I agree – London Info with their “we can see you on radar but we aren’t allowed to tell you because we are only FISOs and not the more expensive radar qualified ATCOs, because NATS are tight b******s and won’t do ICAO FIS properly” policy is a total waste of time talking to. Listening watch maybe, for a Mayday call.
I have never had a problem getting through Southend (one needs to start calling say 20nm beforehand) but Solent (Southampton) have often been too busy to reply, so Plan B and a rapid descent to 1900ft and a dogleg near the Isle of Wight.
How could one be refused a frequency change if outside CAS?
I guess that is what I was getting at.
