DispatcherSam
Well-Known Member
Just be thankful that you have less flights to do and work the flights on your desk that aren’t cancelled.
D
Deleted member 27505
Guest
Did you mean fewer? Or were you just attempting snide?
I guess if you actually care that little about the people who are actually, ultimately paying you to do your, er, job, then rock on broheme!
DispatchDan
Well-Known Member
Different airlines have different names for departments and positions of people who make cancellation decision, but it’s not dispatchers or the pilots that get paid to make that decision. If a flight is not legal or safe to operate I will start delaying that flight until the conditions improve. Eventually the crew will timeout or the “company” will make the decision to cancel that flight. This is standard procedure at passenger airlines (major and regional). I don’t know how it works at other airlines like cargo or part 135.
At part 121 it’s not the dispatcher’s job to look at WX that far out (unless it’s a flight across the world, but that’s not what you were talking about). Just like someone else said, it’s a business decision that the company makes and it’s based on operational needs of that company. Every major looks at weather (possible bad weather) ahead and plans for IROP situations with involvement and input from multiple different departments.
Me, as a dispatcher, worry only about the flights that are taking off (departing) in the next 2-3 hours... Not looking at canceling flights tomorrow afternoon.
Only reason o would look at the WX tomorrow afternoon is if I’m coming back to work tomorrow, I want to know how crappy my day will be.
Luigi
Well-Known Member
I make a serious effort to never look at my next day. I don’t look at the weather until I get to work. We get ample time for turn over and weather briefings so I make it an effort to do my briefings on the clock.
I’d rather be surprised then sit around dreading a work day.
D
Deleted member 27505
Guest
Yeah, I'm a bit miffed by this. This seems like a scam by the airlines - well, an airline in this case - to reposition its planes for business purposes while blaming cancellations of confirmed flights on Wx so no Pax have to be made good. (Flights that were later proven to have been perfectly possible and legal given the weather at the actual times of the flights.) That kind of stuff really rubs me the wrong way. It profoundly disrupts folks' lives. And it seems like fraud.
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DogwoodLynx
Well-Known Member
Cancellations are always about business decisions (WX or otherwise). Don’t get that twisted.
Capt can/does make game time play calls for weather but company always dictates whether the game will be played in the first place.
There are huge considerations - passengers, crews, aircraft, station capacity and capability, area hotel availability, service vendors, TSA, Customs, etc and keep in mind the decision makers aren’t just looking at “day of”, they are looking at today and the next few days.
who'swho
Don't hesitate. Penetrate!
I said a wx issue is now a crew legality issue. When you have regional pilots flying 4-5 legs they can easily be times out after you slap a wx delay on them right at the start of their day. You simply cannot have enough crew and aircraft sitting around to cover every scenario some days.
Look at it this way... If you have a mx delay driving a crew legality then the flight now cancels for mx, although nowadays everyone just delays until the next for controllable delays.
Is some of it a scam as to whether to cancel for wx vs a controllable cancel? Probably, but most are honestly just good customer service. I'd rather my flight cancel before I go sit at the airport for 6 hours waiting on an aircraft that won't make it because the blizzard timed the crew out.
fsxflyhigh
Well-Known Member
Every airline has their own policies and strategies for wx cancellations. As a few have said, it is not the lone dispatcher who makes the official call to cancel. If they have any concerns about the flight (unable to dispatch) they communicate that to usually the Dispatch Coordinators, Superintendents of Dispatch (SODs), or whatever that airline calls them. Those people then make the cancellations in conjunction with operational management. I've seen one airline pre-cancel 18-24 hours out while others won't cancel till the airport is NOTAM'd closed or below landing mins. When prepping for a Wx event it comes down to impact and confidence of impact. For major winter storms, the fine details of timing and impact don't become somewhat solid till really 1-2 days out and some airlines will pre-cancel once they are confident. On the other hand, fog is extremely hard to predict (coming from a man who had to forecast fog at DEN). You will almost never see preemptive cancellations due to fog.
bbmikej
Well-Known Member
I've also been at a place that had a bunch of MX and as soon as a forecast came out that made a destination illegal, they cancelled that due to weather instead of maintenance. 30 minutes later an updated forecast came out that removed the worst of it but the cancel was already justified.
At a regional you always find a way to make a cancel uncontrollable.
At a regional you always find a way to make a cancel uncontrollable.
CF34-3B1
Well-Known Member
You make it sound like the airlines are all like “what flight is crop duster on 2 days from now? Ok yeah he’s trying to go to xyz. FK that guy let’s cxl his flight... yeah there’s probably some clouds that day so cxl for wx.. that’ll really piss him off”
When in reality they are looking at the whole system and analyzing the possible outcomes from each scenario trying to ride it out as long as possible on the decision to cxl or not. They don’t want to cxl and lose the revenue, but like what who’swho mentioned earlier: they don’t want to string you along and then cxl after you are already there and have been getting told for 10 hours by the gate/ops/counter whatever else the other airlines call them, agent that your flight has been delayed again.
Can you think of one industry that provides a service for money that doesn’t occasionally have to disrupt that service, inconveniencing their customer in some way?
At the end of the day sometimes airlines cxl flights and sometimes it is directly or indirectly because of weather. No they most likely won’t provide food vouchers or hotels for that, but they will rebook you or give you your money back and you can move on to plan B.
When in reality they are looking at the whole system and analyzing the possible outcomes from each scenario trying to ride it out as long as possible on the decision to cxl or not. They don’t want to cxl and lose the revenue, but like what who’swho mentioned earlier: they don’t want to string you along and then cxl after you are already there and have been getting told for 10 hours by the gate/ops/counter whatever else the other airlines call them, agent that your flight has been delayed again.
Can you think of one industry that provides a service for money that doesn’t occasionally have to disrupt that service, inconveniencing their customer in some way?
At the end of the day sometimes airlines cxl flights and sometimes it is directly or indirectly because of weather. No they most likely won’t provide food vouchers or hotels for that, but they will rebook you or give you your money back and you can move on to plan B.
DispatcherSam
Well-Known Member
Just remember, as a Part 121 dispatcher, you hold operational control, but not business decisions. What that means for the person that doesn’t seem to understand is that while some regulation says you have the ability to cancel flights, you actually have the ability to relay those wishes to someone who will make a business decision, which is beyond your control. Your job is to make sure your active flights are completed safely, their job is to provide you with flights. You see small scale, they see large scale. Was that clear enough?
DogwoodLynx
Well-Known Member
The good ole next day delay.