Oh SWA…how many is this?

Richman said:
I treat uncontrolled fields just like a railroad crossing: Stop, look, & listen. Double check the NOTAMS, make sure we're dialed up on CTAF, figure out the clearance/release freqs.
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There’s the helpful mnemonic:

SLOLI NOCTAFF
 
MikeD said:
Might not be a requirement for short term runway closures, not sure of that specifically though. For example, at night, some airports will close a runway and just have the runway lights for that runway selected to off, so it can’t even be seen.

The biggest casual issue will be the CTAF, in terms of just normal ops requirements for the field and the overall lack of SA exhibited. The other factors are mostly secondary and/or tertiary.
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Slow down. Smoooooooth jazz it.
 
Richman said:
I have never once said “wow, extending my FDP really worked out for the best”.
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Except “I’m in a green slip and the entire operation is a mess, I wouldn’t extend but I don t know how it affects my premium pay” types are out there. Ick.
 
derg said:
Except “I’m in a green slip and the entire operation is a mess, I wouldn’t extend but I don t know how it affects my premium pay” types are out there. Ick.
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“You’re on a green slip, and we have guys out on furlough.”

“Well, maybe they should’ve tried being more senior, and they could be here getting green slips too!”
 
MikeD said:
“You’re on a green slip, and we have guys out on furlough.”

“Well, maybe they should’ve tried being more senior, and they could be here getting green slips too!”
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We DO have an individual upset not because we were able to negotiate holiday pay, but since it incentivized people working on holidays, staffing is stable, and he wasn’t able to get a green slip.

Even though the airline is properly staffed.
People got to where they were going…
Cancellations were minimal…
A big storm hit our main base…
People that had to work over the holiday were awarded a financial benefit
The operation stabilized…

But he didn’t get a green slip to leave his family over a holiday. WOW!
 
bimmerphile said:
just spitballing here, but doesn't the center have access to notams? swa reported runway 29 for departure and got a clearance before the runway was opened
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We show the NOTAMS in just as stupid of a format as you guys do, it could've been buried somewhere way down in the middle of a bunch of other useless stuff.

I work the central coast airports uncontrolled early in the AM, it gets busy and you read a ton of clearances to the morning departure wave. If we had a planned runway closure like this, most of us would write a note on the scope like SBA RWY7/25 CLSD /1400Z or something like that. Surprising to me that all parties between SWA and ATC missed it here, but Im not familiar at all with ZBW's operation so I cant really speak to how they do things or what their procedures for Nonradar clearances off the ground are. My facility, I feel like I would be expected to catch something like this if the pilot told me he was planning to depart a NOTAM'd closed runway.
 
derg said:
We DO have an individual upset not because we were able to negotiate holiday pay, but since it incentivized people working on holidays, staffing is stable, and he wasn’t able to get a green slip.

Even though the airline is properly staffed.
People got to where they were going…
Cancellations were minimal…
A big storm hit our main base…
People that had to work over the holiday were awarded a financial benefit
The operation stabilized…

But he didn’t get a green slip to leave his family over a holiday. WOW!
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He needed that money, dude
 
MikeD said:
“You’re on a green slip, and we have guys out on furlough.”

“Well, maybe they should’ve tried being more senior, and they could be here getting green slips too!”
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We are about to have a few grumpy pilots. Management chose to end our contract with Amazon so we are parking most of the 767s and all the 737s. The union negotiated a letter to avoid furloughs and reduced downgrades, but part of that is nobody is allowed to outbase for an entire year.

Outbasing is pretty popular to some. You literally owe every day of the month to the company.
 
bimmerphile said:
insightful, thank you
I guess they should just give approach clearances to closed runways then
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Well you're kind of proving his point here to be fair.... You absolutely can clear someone for an approach to a closed runway.... Because what happens from the MAP into the airport environment at an uncontrolled field is entirely on the pilot. Now we are required to issue notams for an approach clearance and obviously I'd be pretty specific about making sure the pilot is aware of the closure but it happens all the time. Guys will circle to another runway. Not as much now that everywhere has straight in rnavs but guys will still do practice approaches to closed runways. We work a joint air base that has a bunch of runways but is uncontrolled outside of banking hours basically. We tend to be more aware of any closures there but most of the time have no idea what runway a guy will use and it's not really what you'd be paying attention to when the guy is requesting clearance. You blocked the airspace to whatever you can approve and give him the clearance.
 
cmac88 said:
Well you're kind of proving his point here to be fair.... You absolutely can clear someone for an approach to a closed runway.... Because what happens from the MAP into the airport environment at an uncontrolled field is entirely on the pilot. Now we are required to issue notams for an approach clearance and obviously I'd be pretty specific about making sure the pilot is aware of the closure but it happens all the time. Guys will circle to another runway. Not as much now that everywhere has straight in rnavs but guys will still do practice approaches to closed runways. We work a joint air base that has a bunch of runways but is uncontrolled outside of banking hours basically. We tend to be more aware of any closures there but most of the time have no idea what runway a guy will use and it's not really what you'd be paying attention to when the guy is requesting clearance. You blocked the airspace to whatever you can approve and give him the clearance.
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And to this point, as it goes for departures, center doesn’t issue a runway to takeoff from. It’s the pilots job to get the plane safely off the ground and into the air, in order to make the void time for the clearance, and Center’s (or RAPCONs) job doesn’t really begin until that pilot makes contact airborne and is radar identified for IFR? At least that’s how I envision it working at uncontrolled satellite fields or same fields whose towers aren’t open at the time. VFR, it’s men’s freestyle.

My point being that I figure Center would have no immediate idea which runway SWA would have been using had both been open during tower closure time. And in this specific case, would assume they would be using 18/36 due to the NOTAM. In that, it’s SWAs job to get safely airborne in the correct manner.
 
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