Why are people so scared to declare? (SWA case)

[GolfChuck]

I was doing a tower visit at RHV and an aircraft on the edge of the (then) ATA squawked 7700.

I asked the controller “So what happens now?”

“Uhh, nothing really. I’m not talking to him”

“Isn’t he in your airspace”

“Yup”. Keys Mic: “Cessna 123AB runway 31R cleared for the option”

Yep...it will help us find you if you are VFR flying around and broadcasting in the blind on guard.

A 7700 code with no coms is worth about as much as a $3 bill

 

[juxtapilot]

I’ve declared, twice in my career, not that big of a deal.

The IROP form we fill out has yes/no boxes for “did you declare an emergency?”

That’s the extent of the additional paperwork…

 

[MikeD]

@MikeD we are a relatively busy GA airport with a mixed fleet. No 121 ops. We have 2 ARFF vehicles and 2 FBOs and plenty of space to move aircraft on one side of the field while an emergency is tended to on the other side. There was a NOTAM about ARFF being index A (whatever that means, I am sure you do) because the big truck was OTS to be cleansed of PFAS from the older foam. I am sure it affected exactly zero primary flight planning. Maybe it excluded us an alternate to some flights, who knows?

With no 121 ops, there’s actually no requirement to have any fire trucks at the field. If the airport operator chooses to have them, fine. Index A is just the 14 CFR 139 index rating, A to E, of required number of vehicles, and amount of water and dry chemical fire suppression kit, for different aircraft lengths and amount of daily departures. Places like DFW are Index E, smaller regional airports with airline ops of often B or C. Index A, if there’s airline ops for the average airliners, generally means not sufficient to cover those, as that’s normally at GA airports who happen to have a CFR truck

So you are correct, no legal effect to GA ops regardless of what the state of the fire trucks are. But can affect planned alternates. Unplanned alternates for an emergency, falls under the emergency exemption. For example, when United 232 diverted to SUX during their major emergency in 1989, the airport was only Index B, but a DC-10 falls under Index D. But no one was going to tell them to go somewhere else to try and land just because of that. However, the USAF CFR was pretty overwhelmed with their few CFR trucks after 232 made its crash landing and broke apart. But, nothing could be done about it.

 

[MidlifeFlyer]

When it comes to en route, I can see why a pilot may not want to answer 20 questions while they are trying to work through an emergency

What 20 questions are those?

 

[GolfChuck]

What 20 questions are those?

Souls on Board and Fuel remaining in time. Yes I know that is 2, but very often when listening to recordings of emergency, the flight crew is asked multiple times because a) they haven't given the answer yet, or b) they've changed to a new controller and the information hasn't been passed along.

I realize this information is good for S&R and FF purposes, but it does almost nothing to help the aircraft in distress in the moment, just puts more work on the crew. It's completely irrelevant if it's a medical emergency. The fuel in time might be useful if it's something like a VFR aircraft stuck above a cloud layer.

 

[ahw01]

Souls on Board and Fuel remaining in time. Yes I know that is 2, but very often when listening to recordings of emergency, the flight crew is asked multiple times because a) they haven't given the answer yet, or b) they've changed to a new controller and the information hasn't been passed along.

I realize this information is good for S&R and FF purposes, but it does almost nothing to help the aircraft in distress in the moment, just puts more work on the crew. It's completely irrelevant if it's a medical emergency. The fuel in time might be useful if it's something like a VFR aircraft stuck above a cloud layer.

'But how does the emergency make you feel?'

 

[MidlifeFlyer]

Souls on Board and Fuel remaining in time. Yes I know that is 2, but very often when listening to recordings of emergency, the flight crew is asked multiple times because a) they haven't given the answer yet, or b) they've changed to a new controller and the information hasn't been passed along.

I realize this information is good for S&R and FF purposes, but it does almost nothing to help the aircraft in distress in the moment, just puts more work on the crew. It's completely irrelevant if it's a medical emergency. The fuel in time might be useful if it's something like a VFR aircraft stuck above a cloud layer.

The reality is that most controllers are not pilots and have no idea what's happening on the flight deck. I heard a recent podcast discussion where a single was having an engine failure and the controller kept on giving "descend and maintain" instructions. In my power emergency, the controller at one point said, "I need you above 10,000'." I replied, "I need me above 10,000' too."

So they are going to check their boxes for their report unless we tell them to stand-by because we're busy.

 

[NovemberEcho]

It's completely irrelevant if it's a medical emergency.

I’ve never asked fuel/SoB for a medical emergency. I do ask for any patient info (age/gender etc), gate number, and if they have medical personnel on board though.

 

[derg]

Speaking of that, how accurate must those numbers be?

 

[ChasenSFO]

I think I told this story before, but a ramp controller at SFO once took an IFR lesson in a 152 with a jackass CFII from RHV-SCK in a gnarly storm with SFO landing/departing 19s and sideways sustained rain. Coming back they couldn't stay on course and had were running out of fuel so they decided to declare then did OAK-SFO-SQL-PAO-NUQ-SJC-RHV just in case. SFO had to hold departures for almost 20 mins. Nothing happened to either one of them. Not even the CFII who signed off on this stupid lesson. There was even an A.net thread full of "wtf happened why was a 152 up in this?". Not even a phonecall or email for my buddy.

 

[Maurus]

A bit of paperwork I’m sure, if only to detail what the circumstances were for record purposes. Yet I’ve run into some pilots that think the paperwork narrative is some kind of punitive gotcha that’s going to earn them some kind of violation or something.

Never a problem for me. Even with my emergency at a regional (it was caused by incompetence by them) I didn't hear a word.

My ASAP after an emergency at a legacy closed with a "good job captain" note. No second guessing or anything. There were some phone calls and basic forms as well after the event but again it was a big nothing burger

If you’re already talking to ATC (in the US anyway) the only reason you should squawk 7700 is because you can’t get a word in to declare your emergency. If you’re already talking, have a squawk code etc, please don’t change to 7700. If you’re putzing around VFR on a 1200 code and have an emergency, then squawk 7700 because we’ll immediately know who you are.

Honestly, in my emergencies it never even dawned on me to throw in 7700. Maybe if ATC wouldn't respond then sure but once I get a response I really don't care about the squawk. The person that need to know on your side now knows.

Hell, we don't even train to use 7700 in the sims. We just declare via voice and move on to more important matters.

Why? The myth of the “mountain of paperwork.”

Never been anything crazy. I have declared 2.5 times (one was medical and I was an FO) and the paperwork wasn't bad. In the 121 world you can easily get it done by the time scheduling and the OCC figure out what to do with you and your flight.

Speaking of that, how accurate must those numbers be?

I imagine "close enough" is the answer. Honestly I think a time based number is just dumb.

I get that if you say you have "two hours" on board it could be good information for ATC planning but the actual fuel will be quite different for two hours if you are at 35000ft instead of 3000ft.

 

[Pilot Fighter]

Souls on Board and Fuel remaining in time. Yes I know that is 2, but very often when listening to recordings of emergency, the flight crew is asked multiple times because a) they haven't given the answer yet, or b) they've changed to a new controller and the information hasn't been passed along.

I had this in mind in my previous post. If an en-route guy will get me turned around immediately I might hold off on having that exchange for a bit.

“I need to get turned around and head back to …” is kinda code for I’m probably gonna declare but too busy at the moment.

 

[MikeD]

Never a problem for me. Even with my emergency at a regional (it was caused by incompetence by them) I didn't hear a word.

My ASAP after an emergency at a legacy closed with a "good job captain" note. No second guessing or anything. There were some phone calls and basic forms as well after the event but again it was a big nothing burger

Not sure where the whole fear thing of paperwork, scrutiny, FAA boogeyman, or whatever, came from that has generated the hesitancy with pilots; but it’s still a thing apparently. And unfortunate. More situations with the outcome you had, need to be told to the pilot world.

Honestly, in my emergencies it never even dawned on me to throw in 7700. Maybe if ATC wouldn't respond then sure but once I get a response I really don't care about the squawk. The person that need to know on your side now knows.

Hell, we don't even train to use 7700 in the sims. We just declare via voice and move on to more important matters.

7700, as you allude, is for an aircraft not communicating with ATC, such as VFR traffic, and who needs to get the attention of ATC. Especially in any NORDO or communications issues situations. Most aircraft talking to ATC, already, just communicate a problem to ATC, hence how it’s trained. Makes sense.