slot restrictions Dub-Malaga

trellheim

Had to wait a substantial time for a slot a few weeks ago for ryanair morning ?

I can understand for example slots into Heathrow but Malaga ? and if its traffic over France ... seems to me there's a big Atlantic ocean to fly around in

what am I missing here folks, why not just turn right and avoid all the traffic ?

Growler!!!

As far as I'm aware the routing over the sea you speak of is T9/T16. These routes require HF comms which Ryanair do not have on board.

goingnowhere

Not uncommon

The T9/T16 oceanic routing requires a trained crew and certain additional equipment. Its also longer. Can be a good trade off if the slot time for transit through French airspace is unfavourable.

Aer Lingus A320/321/330 are equipped and pilots trained, its always been unclear if Ryanair has some/all of its fleet equipped

billie1b

Yeah Ryanairs crew and a/c are equipped, the crew need whats known as a MNPS approval, a good precentage of FR pilots have it, some newer f/o's wouldn't. FR have often used T9 / T16 on the Canary Island runs

bkehoe

Often at peak times in Spanish airports the slots are related to airport capacity (especially if theres a bit of weather in the vicinity) rather than the route. And while the oceanic option enables a sidestep of French domestic airspace, the Spanish domestic sector for the area where T9 and T213 terminate can often be regulated due to capacity issues (they have to do a lot of step climb and descents of traffic to prepare them for their oceanic crossings so it can be busy). The oceanic routing can also be less efficient (due to flying at lower flight levels if its busy), and in the time it would take to generate a new flight plan (once it becomes obvious the slot isn't coming forward), get it to the crew, load extra fuel, etc, the flight would probably have left.

Gaoth Laidir

I would imagine the capacity problem was more to do with the ERATO implementation in the Brest FIR. This has meant reduced traffic flows over the past few months and will continue until July.

https://www.public.nm.eurocontrol.int/PUBPORTAL/gateway/spec/index.html

trellheim

Thanks for the detailed answers folks, appreciate it.