6 ms·

I find it amazing that scheduled flights with an A320 would happen at an airport without control tower. I don't think this happens in Europe, I trained at a tin

I find it amazing that scheduled flights with an A320 would happen at an airport without control tower. I don't think this happens in Europe, I trained at a tiny airport that only had some small 40pax regional turbojets and the local tower and CTR (only 10 miles!) was always in operation when they were active. There was ILS as well, though only CAT 1.

hugh-avherald 5y ago
FWIW it happens in Australia. Here's a very similar incident, same aircraft, (even the airline has a similar name!): https://avherald.com/h?article=4e3be6f0 https://avherald.com/h?article=4e3be6f0
thetinguy 5y ago
There are non towered airports in Europe as well.
- rafale 5y ago
  Where airliners with passengers land and take off? I doubt Europeans are that irresponsible.
  - dghlsakjg 5y ago
    The island of St. Barths, an EU member in the Carribean, has a famously difficult airport that operates scheduled passenger flights with no tower. Technically part of Europe. There’s nothing inherently dangerous about an untowered airport, or anything inherently safer about towered ones. In the US and Canada, untowered airports account for a majority of takeoffs and landings. Also keep in mind that untowered doesn’t mean not talking to ATC. Someone here fucked up severely, but keep in mind that the deadliest aviation incident ever happened in Europe at a towered field (Tenerife).
    - fulafel 5y ago
      Using "technically" is a license to nitpick! So, Europe by default means the continent. It doesn't include territories elsewhere and includes eg most of Russia, but not Caribbean or African islands (St Barths / Tenerife).
      - seszett 5y ago
        That's like saying Hawaii isn't America though. It's technically true but when saying something doesn't exist in America, I think raising Hawaii as an exception is still valid or at least interesting. The reference to "Europe" was likely more about political Europe than geographical Europe.
        js8 5y ago
        Wouldn't Puerto Rico be a better analogy than Hawaii? Hawaii is more like Malta in EU, a full member state.
        seszett 5y ago
        Saint Barthélémy is closer to Hawaii in status. Puerto Rico doesn't have much representation at the federal level as far as I know, I'm not even sure if people there are full US citizens. People in Saint Barthélémy are just regular French and EU citizens who live far away from the mainland. The territory does have some degree of autonomy (more than other overseas départements) but still less so than a US state relative to the US federal government. In that, most French territories would have a status maybe more comparable to a county within a US state (afaiu the US system) than to a US state within the US. The whole comparison is a bit sketchy but France isn't a federal state and only New Caledonia and Polynesia have local legislation, all the rest of the country is very unitary in political and administrative aspects.
        rosndo 5y ago
        Yep, I was in St Barth when Macron ordered countrywide lockdowns from his throne in Paris. I was really surprised to see all the local businesses immediately complying, they sure seem OK with being French.
  - kortilla 5y ago
    It has nothing to do with responsibility. A tower is not magic. There are well defined protocols for using an airport with a tower that are perfectly safe. A tower only allows more efficient usage of the runway without a bunch of distributed coordination over a general radio frequency.
  - pigbearpig 5y ago
    Why would it be irresponsible? It's a matter the amount of traffic an airport gets. My guess is Europe's population density means less non towered aerodromes exist. There are many airports in the US, Canada, and elsewhere that receive a couple of commercial flights a week and it's not really feasible to have a control tower.
  - supernova87a 5y ago
    You may have an inflated sense of what a tower is for, and whether Europeans are better at it than Americans or v.v. Air traffic control (at least in the US) has the purpose of ensuring separation of air traffic. That is, to help ensure that aircraft do not hit each other, by coordinating when there could be conflicts. They do not primarily exist for (or were not at least created for the purpose of) helping aircraft fundamentally navigate and or avoid non-aircraft obstacles. Or controlling an aircraft's every permissible action in the air. So, if an airfield has little traffic, in general or such as in off-hours, there may be no tower, or the tower may be unmanned. Aircraft then are responsible for coordinating themselves by announcing their activities, and taking the observation of the airport conditions into their own responsibility. It may be you believe that because European airspace is a bit denser, and in general the airports with scheduled commercial service are busier because of the density. But as others noted, there are uncontrolled/untowered airports just as in the US.
    - GekkePrutser 5y ago
      There are uncontrolled airports here yes but I haven't seen any with airline traffic that were uncontrolled during the time of airline operation. In fact even when a private jet would come in after hours the tower would be active. It was really for all kinds of commercial activity. I'm not saying that Europe is better at this than the US but I do think it makes sense to have someone watching especially to ensure separation of traffic as you say. Especially with something as big as an A320. In this case especially a tower assigning an active runway would have prevented the Beechcraft approaching from the opposite direction. I have to say also that GA is not as big as in the US and that makes GA pilots in general less vigilant and experienced with proximity to airline traffic so that's another factor.
  - FabHK 5y ago
    FWIW, if I'm not mistaken, the accident rate for general aviation (=not military, not commercial/scheduled airlines) is higher in EASA land than FAA land, one reason being that FAA regulation is fairly pragmatic and goal oriented. If you read German, you can check out the magazine Pilot und Flugzeug, it reports frequently about rather insane regulation in Europe (for general aviation). https://www.pilotundflugzeug.de https://www.pilotundflugzeug.de
    - GekkePrutser 5y ago
      I think this is partly because flying is so expensive in Europe and as a results pilot tend to have a lot less experience. It's really a hobby thing only. Not a "Hey I have a business meeting in Hamburg, let's take my Cessna" thing. The EASA/JAR tends to be very strict on the commercial thing so even taking a colleague on board a private plane to a business meeting would count as commercial use and thus require a CPL (in fact I wouldn't be surprised if flying yourself to a business meeting would count as commercial!) Part of this is because of the strict regulation. Most pilots only do VFR because getting IFR rated is so expensive and not really interesting from a hobby perspective (no nice views, you can get the same experience in a simulator). Some would do special VFR but it's generally frowned upon. Also, GA aircraft are generally not welcome at major airports unlike in the US where airport access seems to be viewed more as a right than a favour. So the processes around them tend to not be understood very well. This is another reason nobody opts for IFR ratings, there's not much you can actually do with it anyway, they're not going to let you land at Amsterdam with a Cessna 172 :P They definitely wouldn't carry avgas either. So, basically we have a whole continent full of "sunday pilots" in terms of GA. And I think the strong legislation and thus costs are part of the cause for that. PS I've never flown in or even visited the US so perhaps my understanding of the GA landscape there is wrong. But AFAIK it's really used for personal transportation there, which is kinda cool IMO.
throckmortra 5y ago
happens all the time actually. Especially seasonal locations like areas surrounding ski resorts
FL410 5y ago
Happens pretty often at class Ds. Flying into my home drome late at night and I’ll often be in the pattern on CTAF with an airbus.

hugh-avherald 5y ago

FWIW it happens in Australia. Here's a very similar incident, same aircraft, (even the airline has a similar name!): https://avherald.com/h?article=4e3be6f0 https://avherald.com/h?article=4e3be6f0

thetinguy 5y ago

There are non towered airports in Europe as well.

rafale 5y ago
Where airliners with passengers land and take off? I doubt Europeans are that irresponsible.
- dghlsakjg 5y ago
  The island of St. Barths, an EU member in the Carribean, has a famously difficult airport that operates scheduled passenger flights with no tower. Technically part of Europe. There’s nothing inherently dangerous about an untowered airport, or anything inherently safer about towered ones. In the US and Canada, untowered airports account for a majority of takeoffs and landings. Also keep in mind that untowered doesn’t mean not talking to ATC. Someone here fucked up severely, but keep in mind that the deadliest aviation incident ever happened in Europe at a towered field (Tenerife).
  - fulafel 5y ago
    Using "technically" is a license to nitpick! So, Europe by default means the continent. It doesn't include territories elsewhere and includes eg most of Russia, but not Caribbean or African islands (St Barths / Tenerife).
    - seszett 5y ago
      That's like saying Hawaii isn't America though. It's technically true but when saying something doesn't exist in America, I think raising Hawaii as an exception is still valid or at least interesting. The reference to "Europe" was likely more about political Europe than geographical Europe.
      - js8 5y ago
        Wouldn't Puerto Rico be a better analogy than Hawaii? Hawaii is more like Malta in EU, a full member state.
        seszett 5y ago
        Saint Barthélémy is closer to Hawaii in status. Puerto Rico doesn't have much representation at the federal level as far as I know, I'm not even sure if people there are full US citizens. People in Saint Barthélémy are just regular French and EU citizens who live far away from the mainland. The territory does have some degree of autonomy (more than other overseas départements) but still less so than a US state relative to the US federal government. In that, most French territories would have a status maybe more comparable to a county within a US state (afaiu the US system) than to a US state within the US. The whole comparison is a bit sketchy but France isn't a federal state and only New Caledonia and Polynesia have local legislation, all the rest of the country is very unitary in political and administrative aspects.
        rosndo 5y ago
        Yep, I was in St Barth when Macron ordered countrywide lockdowns from his throne in Paris. I was really surprised to see all the local businesses immediately complying, they sure seem OK with being French.
- kortilla 5y ago
  It has nothing to do with responsibility. A tower is not magic. There are well defined protocols for using an airport with a tower that are perfectly safe. A tower only allows more efficient usage of the runway without a bunch of distributed coordination over a general radio frequency.
- pigbearpig 5y ago
  Why would it be irresponsible? It's a matter the amount of traffic an airport gets. My guess is Europe's population density means less non towered aerodromes exist. There are many airports in the US, Canada, and elsewhere that receive a couple of commercial flights a week and it's not really feasible to have a control tower.
- supernova87a 5y ago
  You may have an inflated sense of what a tower is for, and whether Europeans are better at it than Americans or v.v. Air traffic control (at least in the US) has the purpose of ensuring separation of air traffic. That is, to help ensure that aircraft do not hit each other, by coordinating when there could be conflicts. They do not primarily exist for (or were not at least created for the purpose of) helping aircraft fundamentally navigate and or avoid non-aircraft obstacles. Or controlling an aircraft's every permissible action in the air. So, if an airfield has little traffic, in general or such as in off-hours, there may be no tower, or the tower may be unmanned. Aircraft then are responsible for coordinating themselves by announcing their activities, and taking the observation of the airport conditions into their own responsibility. It may be you believe that because European airspace is a bit denser, and in general the airports with scheduled commercial service are busier because of the density. But as others noted, there are uncontrolled/untowered airports just as in the US.
  - GekkePrutser 5y ago
    There are uncontrolled airports here yes but I haven't seen any with airline traffic that were uncontrolled during the time of airline operation. In fact even when a private jet would come in after hours the tower would be active. It was really for all kinds of commercial activity. I'm not saying that Europe is better at this than the US but I do think it makes sense to have someone watching especially to ensure separation of traffic as you say. Especially with something as big as an A320. In this case especially a tower assigning an active runway would have prevented the Beechcraft approaching from the opposite direction. I have to say also that GA is not as big as in the US and that makes GA pilots in general less vigilant and experienced with proximity to airline traffic so that's another factor.
- FabHK 5y ago
  FWIW, if I'm not mistaken, the accident rate for general aviation (=not military, not commercial/scheduled airlines) is higher in EASA land than FAA land, one reason being that FAA regulation is fairly pragmatic and goal oriented. If you read German, you can check out the magazine Pilot und Flugzeug, it reports frequently about rather insane regulation in Europe (for general aviation). https://www.pilotundflugzeug.de https://www.pilotundflugzeug.de
  - GekkePrutser 5y ago
    I think this is partly because flying is so expensive in Europe and as a results pilot tend to have a lot less experience. It's really a hobby thing only. Not a "Hey I have a business meeting in Hamburg, let's take my Cessna" thing. The EASA/JAR tends to be very strict on the commercial thing so even taking a colleague on board a private plane to a business meeting would count as commercial use and thus require a CPL (in fact I wouldn't be surprised if flying yourself to a business meeting would count as commercial!) Part of this is because of the strict regulation. Most pilots only do VFR because getting IFR rated is so expensive and not really interesting from a hobby perspective (no nice views, you can get the same experience in a simulator). Some would do special VFR but it's generally frowned upon. Also, GA aircraft are generally not welcome at major airports unlike in the US where airport access seems to be viewed more as a right than a favour. So the processes around them tend to not be understood very well. This is another reason nobody opts for IFR ratings, there's not much you can actually do with it anyway, they're not going to let you land at Amsterdam with a Cessna 172 :P They definitely wouldn't carry avgas either. So, basically we have a whole continent full of "sunday pilots" in terms of GA. And I think the strong legislation and thus costs are part of the cause for that. PS I've never flown in or even visited the US so perhaps my understanding of the GA landscape there is wrong. But AFAIK it's really used for personal transportation there, which is kinda cool IMO.

throckmortra 5y ago

happens all the time actually. Especially seasonal locations like areas surrounding ski resorts

FL410 5y ago

Happens pretty often at class Ds. Flying into my home drome late at night and I’ll often be in the pattern on CTAF with an airbus.