Medevac

N90-EWR said:
All I'm saying is, that is not a fight for individuals to bring on against the FAA machine. There is a lot of special interest lobby pressure on keeping those airliners moving. You need NATCA national behind this, and you'll need to get the top hats on central flow to buy off on it too.
Click to expand...

You think the special interests behind the medical industry carry any less weight? Or the multi million dollar lawsuits the families file that get national media attention? I agree that this has to come from the top. Our local just doesnt have it in its best interests to do it so the "individuals" are going to have to take it to the FAA machine.

N90-EWR said:
I don't know about how things are done on your side of the country, but over here, more often than not there is piss poor coordination between ZNY and N90, and medevac flights get dumped on the wrong sector, without a proper handoff or verbal coordination, because automation can't figure out what sector is the right one to handoff.
Click to expand...

Piss poor coordination and a lack of operational priority being respected is exactly what needs to be changed. That's our point. But it won't happen until the primadonnas are MADE to do it.

N90-EWR said:
There's no wrongful death lawsuit that would stand the test of public safety. You can argue until the cows go home about this, but at the end of the day, the needs of the many outweight the needs of the few, and if a medevac is delayed a few minutes, because the controller is trying to avoid a collision, you got nothing.
Click to expand...

Vector your way out of a wet paper bag and there's no public saftey issue. Controlled vectors and flow control to provide expeditious handling doesn't compromise anything. If a medevac is delayed to prevent a collision, you're right, no ones going to question it. How about you be a controller and clear the way before hand so that situation doesn't develop?

N90-EWR said:
I know the PATCO and NATCA history better than you do.
Click to expand...

You've read it from the history books or watched it on the news. I LIVED with it and it's after affects. My Father is the Last Active PATCO controller we lived with the black mark. Did you? Tell me again how you know it better than I do? I left out the SCAB comment the first time. I'm not so inclined this round.

greg1016 said:
do you see anything about direct destination in there? Maybe I need my eyes checked. And yes this was copied from FAA.gov today, LIFEGUARD and all.
Click to expand...

The information you copied "today" is old. The current order changed lifeguard to medevac. I know it's splitting hairs but if youre going to use it to argue a point at least be current and right.

"without compromising safety, good judgment must be used in each situation to facilitate the most expeditious movement of a lifeguard aircraft."

Ie: your good judgment would be to not descend through them. Your good judgement would be to get everyone out of their way. Your good judgment would be to create the biggest hole you can because it "MUST be used in each situation to facilitate the most expeditious movement of a lifeguard aircraft." It's not optional. IT MUST be done. "heavy traffic flow may affect the controller's ability to provide priority handling" but it MUST be done.
 
Greg, there is an entire chapter on Emergencies, and nowhere in that chapter or anywhere else in the book does it say that aircraft in distress must be cleared to the destination airport either. You going to leave them on course too?

As my esteemed colleague noted, you are REQUIRED by the very document you quoted to provide expeditious handling to medevac aircraft. REQUIRED. Leaving them on course because you're too lazy to vector a few planes and make some landline coordination, is not providing them expeditious handling. Doing nothing for them is not providing expeditious handling.

You know good and well that you would never be lazy with an emergency. The only reason you are lazy with the medevacs is because nobody is holding you accountable. It's too bad you don't have the personal or professional integrity to do the right thing.

We get paid $150k+ a year to make things happen. Earn it for a change!
 
I love how the actual medevac pilot's in here backing what we've said about atrocious treament have been ignored yet the lynch mob has attacked the crusade for change because it "just won't work that way" because we can't be the "Purveyor of fine vectors and clearances" to provide a service. I'm pretty sure none of your sectors are less than 20 miles wide (center) or 12 miles for approach. Cause that's the minimum you'd need to provide a medevac a sterilzed direct route without having to make point outs and to accommodate dual opposite direction radar vectored departures. Yeah it'd be a pain but that's what we get paid for. To be the Purveyors of fine vectors and clearances.

I'll admit that my orginal post was directed to "Dear Center Controllers" but this really is about the pilots and not a pissing contest for the controllers.
 
I don't have my new .65 in front of me but I'm with Greg. Priority handeling does not mean they go direct in the dep gate, priority handling does not mean they get direct in the face of a one way sector...and so on. That is not priority handling.

What Priority handling is; not making the medivac slowtation last in a string of arrivals or, when you have a traffic confliction you try other means to resolve it besides playing with the ln. Doing what some of y'all are saying and comparing them to an emergency is silly. Apples and oranges.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using Tapatalk 2
 
Not apples and oranges at all. Medevacs are one step down the priority chain from an aircraft in distress (emergency). That means you vector Air Force One to let that medevac go first. I know none of you would do that either. ;). Medevac aircraft are specifically defined as "life critical flights". Sounds pretty darn close to an emergency to me.

Your definition of priority handling sounds more to me like the definition of "no undue delay"...what you would provide for an aircraft declaring minimum fuel. Medevacs have priority over them as well. No undue delay is absolutely not expeditious handling. Two very different things. So no, I disagree with your definitions.
 
I am aware there is a whole chapter on emergencies, and not once is the word lifeguard or medevac mentioned.
 
What I teach other pilots regarding emergencies airborne is that one HAS to temper this "move everything out of the way for me NOW" attitude, with understanding that it might take a little time to do that.

Years ago, I heard something on the ATC freqs that caught my attention. There was an IFE in progress. In that instance, an aircraft declared an emergency in Class B airspace. The weather was broken CB with rain, enough-so that IFR aircraft were being vectored to instrument final, with no visual approaches being issued. The aircraft involved (a twin Cessna) couldn't understand why he wasn't getting immediate vectors to final to land, and why he was told to "stand-by momentarily" by ATC. He raised hell a few times about it to ATC. But there seemed to be, from my perspective, a few things he was failing to understand about ATC and whats going on on their end. Now, I fully understand that anytime someone declares an IFE, they expect, and should receive, priority handling to the maximum extent possible. Keep in mind the last part of that sentence: "to the maximum extent possible." When someone has an IFE, their only worry is (rightfully) their aircraft and themselves, but they've got to understand why some things may happen that may not initially go their way.....and are taking just a bit of time to get. I teach my students that when an IFE gets declared to ATC, the controller's entire scope doesn't come to a grinding halt. He still has those (possibly) 10+ MTI blips to sequence and separate, especially when the WX is low. Once someone declares an IFE, chances are, they've now thrown a monkey wrench into the controllers sequence/separation plan; they're a pain-in-the-ass now for all intents and purposes, but of course not of their own doing. He still has his other traffic to work while he works to prioritize the IFE, and may very well have to have the IFE "stand by" for a second while he coordinates with other sectors/tower for the IFE, etc; this workload being possibly multiplied ten-fold if the WX is actual IFR due to sequencing needs and the lack of visual approaches/separation available. Often times, an IFE may just have to recover within the flow that's already in place. It's a crap-sandwitch, I know, but you play the cards you're dealt.

Even when exercising emergency authority as a pilot, one has to do it smartly and with some semblance of SA (that which isn't being used to handle the emergency), rather than just barelling down through traffic. Because if you cause another accident while exercising your emergency authority, that will get classed as careless and reckless regardless of the overriding circumstances.......assuming, of course, that you survive for it to matter. If you're dead, then hells bells.

And yes, I've been an emergency before a number of times, only to be told (in one case) I was the #7 IFE in progress, and to proceed to a holding fix and hold as published, due to the nature of my emergency being deemed less priority than the other 6 emergencies in progress and airborne at the time.

Having an IFE isn't any fun for the crew involved, but it can be not-so-fun for ATC also, due to their responsibilities. In the heat of the moment, both sides will have to do the best they can with the situation at hand. Hopefully, reading this, pilots can understand what's going on with that voice that may be telling them to "stand by" during their IFE.
 
BWER said:
I don't have my new .65 in front of me but I'm with Greg. ... Doing what some of y'all are saying and comparing them to an emergency is silly. Apples and oranges.
Click to expand...

You don't have to if you were paying attention to the briefing when they changed lifeguard to medevac. That's the last time the FAA told you the score.

So my Brother who was burned alive on the freeway for 90 seconds then transported via ambulance then MedEvac'd to the Burn Center disagrees that he wasn't an Emergency. So does his Doctor. You still wanna play Arm Chair Jesus?

You have no idea what's going on on those flights and the pilots Priority Handling is implied with the use of the MedEvac call sign. If they don't want it, they'll tell you but they don't have to declare an Emergency since they are afforded that priority unless you have an "Aircraft in distress".

The bottom line here is that the mentality & procedures need to change. If you won't change the way you control simply because you put the onus on the pilot to key up and declare before you'll take the necessary measures to do your over paid job then you deserve to share the responsibility when a life is lost.

I just hope that the policy change holds you accountable so maybe then... you'll do the right thing.
 
ATC Jesus, I don't know where you work or where your head is burried in the sand but it is obvious you do not work busy airspace. I would invite you to go to just about any center with one way sectors and ask any controller if they would let a ln climb/decend in the face traffic.

I'm the .65 text Greg quoted was a note about making sure that safety is number one and that trumps any request. I understand what you are trying to say about ln flights being time sensitive. On the flip side you do not put yourself, or someone else down the crapper because he requested a shortcut or priority handling.

Go ask A80 for direct to the airport and they will laugh and tell you to spin em of he is not in the gate.

Yes ln and emergency is two completely different things.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using Tapatalk 2
 
greg1016 said:
MikeD Thanks for sharing Mike. I think you posted it before but thanks for the refresher.
Click to expand...

I have. I posted that before a couple years ago, but wanted to repost it here because I believe it applies to the conversation at hand, regarding "both sides of the equation" of pilot and ATC, when an IFE is declared, and how there needs to be some understanding on both ends, in my humble opinion.
 
DvLzArchAngL said:
You don't have to if you were paying attention to the briefing when they changed lifeguard to medevac. That's the last time the FAA told you the score.

So my Brother who was burned alive on the freeway for 90 seconds then transported via ambulance then MedEvac'd to the Burn Center disagrees that he wasn't an Emergency. So does his Doctor. You still wanna play Arm Chair Jesus?

You have no idea what's going on on those flights and the pilots Priority Handling is implied with the use of the MedEvac call sign. If they don't want it, they'll tell you but they don't have to declare an Emergency since they are afforded that priority unless you have an "Aircraft in distress".

The bottom line here is that the mentality & procedures need to change. If you won't change the way you control simply because you put the onus on the pilot to key up and declare before you'll take the necessary measures to do your over paid job then you deserve to share the responsibility when a life is lost.

I just hope that the policy change holds you accountable so maybe then... you'll do the right thing.
Click to expand...

Ahh the old someone I know argument. Well, it seems to me we were talking about jets going into satellite airports in busy metro areas, and not helicopters going from the scene of an accident to a hospital.

And I am not arguing that LIFEGUARD is the proper phraseology, I am aware it has been MEDEVAC for something like a year and a half (thank you ICAO). My point was the current publication still says LIFEGUARD. Maybe we should bust out the 4444.
 
DvLzArchAngL said:
I love how the actual medevac pilot's in here backing what we've said about atrocious treament have been ignored yet the lynch mob has attacked the crusade for change because it "just won't work that way" because we can't be the "Purveyor of fine vectors and clearances" to provide a service. I'm pretty sure none of your sectors are less than 20 miles wide (center) or 12 miles for approach. Cause that's the minimum you'd need to provide a medevac a sterilzed direct route without having to make point outs and to accommodate dual opposite direction radar vectored departures. Yeah it'd be a pain but that's what we get paid for. To be the Purveyors of fine vectors and clearances.

I'll admit that my orginal post was directed to "Dear Center Controllers" but this really is about the pilots and not a pissing contest for the controllers.
Click to expand...



Despite the arguments, which to be fair, whichever one of you made the approach does nothing all day but issue descend via and watch airplanes clear themselves for the ILS comment boiled my blood. I entirely agree that under no reasonable circumstances should a Medivac be delayed, turned or denied a climb or decent.

I didn't care for the idea of just look and go driving airplanes into another facility especially as neither of you seem understand why every facilitie's set up isn't like the one you have. Your 12 mile wide sector comment encapsulates why it isn't ALWAYS possible at every ATC facility to run direct.

I have one airport that I have 10 miles to work with and another that I have 8. At the one I have 8, its so far out and with terrain I don't see airplanes until they're 3 from the boundary half the time. The one that I have 8 miles at? Its constantly humping heavies and its a straight in coming from the east 80% of the time, which every Medivac is, (Evac actually). Now let me see. I'm blind to a Medivac inbound until a heavy has dumped their gear and flaps, inside the marker and on tower. If I say to heck with it and run the Evac direct (its a small, its always a freaking small) I'm going to bust 6 miles on final in about 40 seconds. If I spend a minute to hit that tower on the land line to break out the heavy I bust 5 miles in about one minute.

Now if what I remember from flight training is correct, dirty and high power = more wake. Jamming a Citation 3 miles behind a heavy = pretty bad wake anyway. If someone is in condition bad enough to be Medivaced, they probably don't need to be exposed to what being close in trail of a C-5 feels like in a Citation.

Oh, I turned a Medivac today for 30 seconds for divergence BTW. I have two altitudes when I'm lucky for sep. My options were leave him at the MVA for 3 minutes until he broke away, turn him and send him direct again less than a minute later, or use a couple of SAM missiles to bring down the dual conflicts. I didn't like it, but that was the resolution.
 
DvLzArchAngL said:
You've read it from the history books or watched it on the news. I LIVED with it and it's after affects. My Father is the Last Active PATCO controller we lived with the black mark. Did you? Tell me again how you know it better than I do? I left out the SCAB comment the first time. I'm not so inclined this round.
.
Click to expand...
Even though technically my hire date is 1982, my paperwork was already in file prior to the strike, my older bother was in ZNY at the time, and he ended getting fired too. The east coast was the frontlines. I know what carrying the black mark means. my brother never got his job back.

We're on the same side my friend, no need to pick a fight or name call. Our disagreement is in our level of expectations when it comes to the FAA. You still think you can make a difference, and fix this issue, and while I applaud you trying, I don't have the same confidence anymore. Good luck and /salute your dad for me.
 
greg1016 said:
Ahh the old someone I know argument. Well, it seems to me we were talking about jets going into satellite airports in busy metro areas, and not helicopters going from the scene of an accident to a hospital.

And I am not arguing that LIFEGUARD is the proper phraseology, I am aware it has been MEDEVAC for something like a year and a half (thank you ICAO). My point was the current publication still says LIFEGUARD. Maybe we should bust out the 4444.
Click to expand...

Current Pub... Effective 8/22, signed 7/1, briefed the change over a year ago...

http://www.faa.gov/documentLibrary/media/Order/7110.65UCHG3.pdf

Screw you and the "I know someone" argument. What part of "pilots delayed 4-12 mintues ON THE GROUND" did you not get? It was an example. The chopper had to leave the ground after someone had been burned alive. LAX was the closest "satellite airport" to the scene. Busy metro doesn't trump major just as lear doesnt trump king air as a Medevac type. As controllers you don't know what the reason they're requesting direct routing. As far as I know the chopper in our situation wasn't delayed but who knows what the impact was to the family that it did happen to?

BWER said:
ATC Jesus, I don't know where you work or where your head is burried in the sand but it is obvious you do not work busy airspace. I would invite you to go to just about any center with one way sectors and ask any controller if they would let a ln climb/decend in the face traffic.

I'm the .65 text Greg quoted was a note about making sure that safety is number one and that trumps any request. I understand what you are trying to say about ln flights being time sensitive. On the flip side you do not put yourself, or someone else down the crapper because he requested a shortcut or priority handling.

Go ask A80 for direct to the airport and they will laugh and tell you to spin em of he is not in the gate.

Yes ln and emergency is two completely different things.
Click to expand...

We dont work busy airspace?

High altitude departures and arrivals is what we do all day everyday. But I guess descend via is what really makes you an air traffic god.

Our Area's traffic flow is primarily responsible for our facilities Level 12 traffic count. From Vegas to Thermal to Blythe to Needles we account for more Los Angeles & the major metropolitan area arrivals than any other area in the house, all the way to Mexican border. Not to mention we're responsible for the primary sequence to Phoenix as well as San Diego & Denver.

And as for one way sectors how about the entire Northeast departure flow out of all those airports. Yeah, that's us too. Some of us actually move traffic and the Medevacs descend in the pretty little corridor we provide. And if that's not an option there's always... I don't know, altitude separation?

I don't need to talk to a one way sector controller because I am one. And if I'm not that I'm a High Alt cross traffic controller, and if not that a High Alt Arrival, or Low Alt Arrival or a High Altitude Departure controller. Of our six sectors we have it all; from the ground to the moon.

We're the most diversified area in the Facility. We make it work cause we're paid to.
 
Gentlemen, a note to all. Keep it civil and keep the emotions in check.

Continue.
 
N90-EWR said:
Even though technically my hire date is 1982, my paperwork was already in file prior to the strike, my older bother was in ZNY at the time, and he ended getting fired too. The east coast was the frontlines. I know what carrying the black mark means. my brother never got his job back.

We're on the same side my friend, no need to pick a fight or name call. Our disagreement is in our level of expectations when it comes to the FAA. You still think you can make a difference, and fix this issue, and while I applaud you trying, I don't have the same confidence anymore. Good luck and /salute your dad for me.
Click to expand...

As you would know then, Patco arguments and the lack of appreciation for what they stood up for by the next generation can be a sore subject for those directly affected. My Pops is the Last of the Breed retiring this September. It's been a long road.

Cheers!
 
It turns out that my dead uncle, by marriage, supervisor at MIA center, was a PATCO scab.

WTF.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top