Peter wrote:
Shouting and such is pretty common in the FISO world; including here in the UK. All professions tend to recruit for personality and accordingly the FISO community (which has a relatively low barrier to entry, and a high acceptance of “strange personalities”) has a lot of “little men”. Much less common in the ATC world, although there are examplesThe problem is working out whether this is a systematic thing at a specific airport, or just one oddball character. The latter, you get everywhere.
The agitation I felt was, as I understood it, because the person on the radio was concerned that the director would be issuing a fine which, especially in view of the pettiness of the rules, tended to cause a lot of resentment from the recipient of the fine and they typically have to explain WHY the fine has been issued which makes their job a lot harder…..
No shit, Sherlock…..
The people there on the radio, when I refuelled, when I paid, were friendly enough, it didn’t seem to be a controller who was running amok, but more the director of the airport, drunk on his power of being able to issue incontestable fines at his will… this was September 2021….
Shouting and such is pretty common in the FISO world; including here in the UK. All professions tend to recruit for personality and accordingly the FISO community (which has a relatively low barrier to entry, and a high acceptance of “strange personalities”) has a lot of “little men”. Much less common in the ATC world, although there are examples 
The problem is working out whether this is a systematic thing at a specific airport, or just one oddball character. The latter, you get everywhere.
Personally, if I was not based there, I would write to the management.
Probably the above mentioned manager. Or maybe, for some reason, the attention these tiny „incidents“ receive from the Czech CAA for some reason. But all this shouting, pointing at regulations, fines, and general lack of friendliness… no thanks.
boscomantico wrote:
All the stories of LKLT have been too much for me. There is something awry there. I will not go there in the foreseeable future.
Has something happened during the last few years? I was there in 2019 and it was totally normal. (Well, en route to LKLT they closed the airport for emergency because an aircraft couldn’t get its landing gear down and was circling the airport. I thought that was a bit exaggerated. Fortunately it was sorted just as I was about to start my approach into a diversion airport…)
It is most important that these things are added to reports in our airport database.
For next time I go to Prague I will investigate LKPR again.
I flew to Letnany twice – the first and the very last time. I was unfortunate in that I also fell foul of the markings – after landing, I asked where I should park. The message over radio was to taxi and park alongside the aircraft parked parallel to the runway, in front of the cones. Now, seeing there was sufficient space beyond the cones, I thought: no problem, will taxi past the cones, turn 180 degrees and line up with the other aircraft parked there. Once I proceeded past the cones I heard much shouting and agitation over the radio telling me to shutdown, which I did – obviously this seems to be a regular occurrence else why would they be watching me taxi in? Either way, someone came up to me and told me that I was outside the markings therefore “off base”. I pointed out that in certain German airfields, little cones mark where the individual aircraft parking spaces are so I naturally assumed that, as there was a few metres space beyond the cones, I should taxi past and spin around to line up next to the aircraft parked there.
No, the employee exclaimed, I should park in front of the line of aircraft and push the aircraft backwards into line. I was told very bluntly that I should be grateful that the director of the airport wasn’t there because taxying beyond the cones is basically a capital punishment for him; in fact, he considers it the most heinous of all crimes and it is punishable with a fine of CZK10.000 (about €400). And as the fine is mentioned in their rules, you can’t challenge it. I’m just grateful I landed during the director’s lunch break…..
Kbely also used to be possible if you had a business contact. I had that once but for unrelated reasons didn’t go.
Vodochody has been a complete mess. I posted previously that once I called and some security guard said the boss wants a quiet weekend…
Ruzyne is less than it used to be. I used to pay ~ €500. No idea of the current price. It was a scam, involving one department pretending they were not responsible for charges from another. One just had to pay it, although @Vieke did not let them get away with it and paid only the quoted amount Then they did nasty stuff like this. But today’s LKPR may be fine. It was a great airport; everything just worked perfectly.
It might, just might also be that some foreign pilots do not read the info pages well… and/or expect large airport signs..
Have been there 4 times and never had an issue – but when uncertain, I stop and ask. Including easy/dumb questions.
But each to his own ;-)
All the stories of LKLT have been too much for me. There is something awry there. I will not go there in the foreseeable future.
So, the situation in Prague is:
Letnany: grass and weird
Vodochody: no weekends
Ruzyne: expensive
At LKLT it can happen that RWY 05L/23R is closed when a concert is taking place at Letnany Expo, after long lasting rains or maintenance (grass cutting) however it’s in NOTAM. If it’s not the case and the other one is in use you can always ask the controller if 05L/23R is possible.
We had recent incident with foreign airplane landing and taking off from the parallel taxiway…
Some of the cones are present (especially at the northern part of the taxiway) because of me 😅 As per airport map I was still using the defined area to taxi and turn however the soil is too soft there so I got stuck and had to be towed away. Airport management reviewed and week later the cones were installed and still present 😊
I prefer to double check the airspace use in AisView before my flight especially during weekdays or when know military exercise is taking place, had a two occasions where SkyDemon was not showing the same as AisView and I’ve double checked on the frequency and AisView information was up to date. Besides that no issues with SkyDemon when flying in CZ – I know some pilots got confused with the TRA GAs but you’ve read the AIP so you will be fine.
