EI Fuel Emergency Barcelona - Not helped by Spanish ATC

APM

Seems an Aer Lingus A320 was on approach to Barcelona recently, and due to foggy conditions required a CAT 3 approach. The Spanish ATC wouldn't allow them use the required runway for CAT 3, which eventually ended up in the crew having to declare a Pan Pan.

Notably the Runway was available to use but the controllers were just refusing to approve the aircraft to make an approach. (Spanish ATC are on a semi-strike/work to rule and to let an aircraft use a different Runway than the one in use is too much work. They would have rather see the a/c divert)


http://www.avherald.com/h?article=44df086f&opt=0

Cessna_Pilot

Shocking on the Spanish ATC's behalf, but from experience I am not surprised in the least. They do not care about any aircraft in their airspace unless it's an Iberia or other local aircraft.
We were recently in Madrid's airspace at FL3xx enroute to the Canaries when we encountered Moderate turbulence that was very quickly worsening.
Reported to ATC and requested immediate descent to lower level. ATC's response was , we have not had any turbulence reported on your route!!! So we requested lower again. They asked us to standby and then asked an Iberia aircraft in the area were they experiencing any turbulence. The Iberia said NO, so ATC told us again there is no turbulence reported you must maintain your level.
By this stage we were in severe turbulence, couldn't maintain alt so descended with an emergency call, and they STILL argued with us.
They are the most unprofessional bunch of overpaid halfwits on the planet, and they are always on strike/work to rule!

drdeadlift

Unbelievable stuff,a good dose of austerity might straighten them out.

eurofoxy

thats shocking in fairness, really unprofessional.. i would love to know what is going to come of it, i doubt any action will be taken against the controller...

MoeJay

And the other question is, how many flights landed when all this was going on....?

tippilot

To say Spanish Air Traffic Control compentency is third world would be an insult to third world ATC.

There was only a matter of time before an incident like this.

What's worse, the level of incompetency stems entirely from disinterest in the job they are doing(and for which they are receiving astronomical money by any standard).

Madpaddy79

Cessna_Pilot wrote: »

Shocking on the Spanish ATC's behalf, but from experience I am not surprised in the least. They do not care about any aircraft in their airspace unless it's an Iberia or other local aircraft.

Like Some DUB controllers boxing off EI flights😱

APM

tippilot wrote: »

To say Spanish Air Traffic Control compentency is third world would be an insult to third world ATC.

There was only a matter of time before an incident like this.

What's worse, the level of incompetency stems entirely from disinterest in the job they are doing(and for which they are receiving astronomical money by any standard).

From another pilot operating into BCN the same night....taken from pprune

http://www.pprune.org/atc-issues/482546-aer-lingus-had-declare-pan-land-bcn-14-march.html

I was flying that night into BCN and was in the hold at CLE with the Lingus.

Usual ops in BCN is 25R but you need 400m rvr to land and as it was down to 325m I explained to ATC that we needed 25L so we could do Cat 3 approach. They said no.. I informed them that if we couldn't land on 25L we would have to divert. As you would expect they didn't give a s**t.

All Navaids were serviceable, after about 5 -10 minutes in the hold we bugged out to LEGE, gave up asking for 25L it was like banging my head against a brick wall.

LEGE ATC were equally cack, put in the hold while diverting to them as well...used over a 1000kgs just going from CLE to LEGE!

Fortunately we diverted with fuel well above CNR as I could see it was about to kick off as the hold was getting busier with other aircraft asking the same questions to ATC, I think we were the first to give up and divert..quite glad we did really after reading the report.

Also to add to the fun, fog on the earlier TAFs was not expected..fortunately we got an updated one just before departing and gassed it up.

kub

Cessna_Pilot wrote: »

Shocking on the Spanish ATC's behalf, but from experience I am not surprised in the least. They do not care about any aircraft in their airspace unless it's an Iberia or other local aircraft.
We were recently in Madrid's airspace at FL3xx enroute to the Canaries when we encountered Moderate turbulence that was very quickly worsening.
Reported to ATC and requested immediate descent to lower level. ATC's response was , we have not had any turbulence reported on your route!!! So we requested lower again. They asked us to standby and then asked an Iberia aircraft in the area were they experiencing any turbulence. The Iberia said NO, so ATC told us again there is no turbulence reported you must maintain your level.
By this stage we were in severe turbulence, couldn't maintain alt so descended with an emergency call, and they STILL argued with us.
They are the most unprofessional bunch of overpaid halfwits on the planet, and they are always on strike/work to rule!

As a simple Joe Soap, is there anyway in which this sort of carry on can be complained to the European Authorities, whether by the crew or their airline?
All of the necessary data and conversations are saved....I take it, so is there someone in officialdom that gives two s****?

Suits

kub wrote: »

As a simple Joe Soap, is there anyway in which this sort of carry on can be complained to the European Authorities, whether by the crew or their airline?
All of the necessary data and conversations are saved....I take it, so is there someone in officialdom that gives two s****?

You could report it as an incident to the Spanish Authority.....but the report would be the least of their issues with ATC in Spain I'd imagine....

kub

Suits wrote: »

You could report it as an incident to the Spanish Authority.....but the report would be the least of their issues with ATC in Spain I'd imagine....

Is there no pan european atc governing body?

highlydebased

There are some very interesting reads on PPRUNE about atc in Spain. Well worth a look.

David086

highlydebased wrote: »

There are some very interesting reads on PPRUNE about atc in Spain. Well worth a look.

Link?

Tenger

highlydebased wrote: »

There are some very interesting reads on PPRUNE about atc in Spain. Well worth a look.

Or (from Mrs.Tenger's point of view) quite worrying!!!!

highlydebased

David086 wrote: »

Link?

http://www.pprune.org/atc-issues/416995-spanish-atc.html
http://www.pprune.org/atc-issues/275525-takeoff-not-permitted-before-eobt.html
http://www.pprune.org/atc-issues/454249-lepa-palma-slot-complaints.html
http://www.pprune.org/questions/457312-spanish-atc-rant.html
http://www.pprune.org/atc-issues/479206-spanish-atcos-earning-800-000-two-years-ago-anything-changed.html
http://www.pprune.org/atc-issues/459677-spanish-atc-feedback-requested.html
http://www.pprune.org/atc-issues/454465-june-14th-spanish-atc-situation-european-parliament.html

the beerhunter

Madpaddy79 wrote: »

Cessna_Pilot wrote: »

Shocking on the Spanish ATC's behalf, but from experience I am not surprised in the least. They do not care about any aircraft in their airspace unless it's an Iberia or other local aircraft.

Like Some DUB controllers boxing off EI flights😱

potential for thread drift here, but care to provide details?

Madpaddy79

the beerhunter wrote: »

Madpaddy79 wrote: »

Cessna_Pilot wrote: »

Shocking on the Spanish ATC's behalf, but from experience I am not surprised in the least. They do not care about any aircraft in their airspace unless it's an Iberia or other local aircraft.

Like Some DUB controllers boxing off EI flights😱

potential for thread drift here, but care to provide details?

Plenty of priority given on the ground, pushbacks, taxi instructions etc and a certain party which meant everything had to hold with some almost diverting!! Happens everywhere, look after your own first. But not many do it at DUB anymore. Ps soon LH will be given the first priority!!

the beerhunter

hard to imagine how even the weakest ground controller could cause prolonged holding leading to diversions. but good to see the previous preferential treatment claim qualified.