Air traffic control versus pilots.
KLM671, I'm not discussing this any further sir.
Advised your preference for an alternative.
Coming up!
Hey, 74 crew! Welcome back!
If you don't know me, my name's Kelsey.
I'm a 747 pilot.
My channel 74 gear is all about aviation.
In this Air traffic control versus pilots, I got a European airline, KLM,
that's crossing the ocean and arguing with the controller.
I know sometimes in the comment section,
people say: "Oh, this would never happen in Europe"
So, I got that one for you.
And then I have a controller who's putting some pilots in a pretty bad situation
trying to get them to do some things they probably shouldn't be doing.
Let's get into it!
Ground Envoy 4978, we're on taxiway T.
Heading down to 36R as instructed. We got an aircraft in front of us.
Got a standoff at T.
I'm sorry, Delta 1540. Just stand by on ground. Standby.
Envoy 4078, is there any making a 180 or making a right turn, there at J?
It's probably a little too tight to make a 180 for us.
If there's nobody behind us, we might be able to throw all the reversers on
but we can't make the 180.
There's absolutely nobody behind you if you're able.
This audio's coming from CVG.
It's the airport that's nearest to Cincinnati.
And usually what you have in an airport, you'll have a runway.
And if you have two parallel taxiways next to it,
you'll have one taxiway where the pilots are always going on one direction,
and one where the pilots are always going in a different direction.
This is a chart of CVG.
And this is the area where I think this is taking place.
So if they're using this runway here for takeoff and landing,
you could hypothetically use Tango here for the direction going this way.
And then you would use Sierra for all the directional traffic on the taxiway,
going this way.
Now for whatever reason and I don't know the situation behind this,
they could have been landing one direction and they call it "reversing the flow".
So if you're landing on one direction and then you switch the airport around,
now you're landing in different direction.
They'll actually switch the taxiways as far as what direction each one is going.
I don't know if they just kind of made a brain fart and messed up
and put them on the same way.
I don't know what created this situation here.
And that's really not a big deal but what really surprised me
was when the Envoy pilot said this.
If there's nobody behind us, we might be able to throw all the reversers on.
So can jets use the reverses to back up?
Technically, yes.
But in any airline that I've ever been at or anyone that I've ever seen,
you're not allowed to do that.
Now, I never flew for Envoy so I don't know what their procedures are,
but I've never seen an airline where they would allow you
to reverse your jet that way.
Now, let's say zombie apocalypse and you needed to get your jet reversed and
you know, you were getting chased by a bunch of zombie.
Could you do it? Yeah, you could do it.
But you're not typically gonna be allowed by your airline to do that.
So when the Envoy pilot said: "Oh, we could throw reversers on"
I'm sure, what I'm guessing has happened,
is the other pilot was in there saying like:
"No, we don't want to do that".
That is not something that you want to do or say you're doing
because if you get caught doing that, you're gonna be in a lot of trouble.
But then you heard what Air traffic control said next. Listen to this.
There's absolutely nobody behind you if you're able.
So even though it's Air traffic control saying:
"Yeah, go ahead. You can do it. There's nobody behind you".
They're saying that,
the problem with though is that by them saying that,
they don't necessarily know what you're allowed to do or not allowed to do
regarding your airline.
So if you were to reverse your jet and back up,
the controller's not gonna be in any trouble
because he didn't do anything.
Your airline is gonna be upset with you, the pilot,
for making that decision to do that.
The controller's not gonna be in any trouble for him saying:
"Yeah, there's nobody behind you. If you wanna go ahead and reverse your jet,
go ahead and reverse your jet".
That's not gonna be a problem on them.
That's gonna result on you.
The pilot that made that decision to actually reverse the plane
which is not gonna be typically allowed by your standard operating procedures at
the airline that you're working on.
So it's just something that's kind of a,
something to note, even though the controller is saying:
"Yeah, yeah, go ahead and do that".
It doesn't mean that it's gonna be okay.
And ground Envoy 4078, looks like we're not going be able to do that
either from where we're sitting, looks like
Delta might have enough room to make a left turn there.
You guys can't just do a right turn on the taxiway there.
We're already past the intersection right here.
And Delta is unable to make a left or right.
We're stuck where we're at as well.
Okay. Envoy 4078, you're saying there's absolutely nothing you can do
to move because otherwise we're talking about bringing the tug out.
Yes, sir. We thought we could put our reverses on but
there's just too much room to go backwards for us, Envoy 4078.
Okay and Delta same with you,
there's nowhere that you can either make a 180 or head back.
Unfortunately, no. we are unable for the right or the left
from where we're sitting Delta 1542.
Alrighty. I'll start talking ramp tower.
I'll get right back with you.
Alright.
Sorry guys.
This is funny because both pilots are trying to get the other airplane
to commit to doing something.
Listen to what Envoy says to the Delta pilots here.
From where we're sitting looks like Delta
might have enough room to make a left turn there.
So let's say the Delta pilots say: "Okay, fine. Let's do this."
And they put full power and all the thrust on one engine
and leave the other on idle and they stomp on the brake on the inside tire
to try to make a really tight turn.
Let's say they do all those things.
And then they run over a bunch of lights.
They run into the grass,
they break some stuff on the airport area,
as well as something on their plane.
They're gonna need the maintenance guys to come out and expect everything.
Maybe they need to change a tire.
All those things are gonna happen.
Now, when the pilots go in and park that plane,
they're gonna get a call from their chief pilot.
They're gonna have to talk to Air traffic control,
ramp control, fill out a bunch of reports.
They're have to probably fly and talk to the chief pilot back in Atlanta
or wherever they're based.
And then, if they're in that meeting with their chief pilot,
and the chief pilot was like:
"What were you thinking?" And they go,
"Well, these Envoy pilots said that we had plenty of room, that we could make it".
The chief pilot is gonna be very not impressed with the fact that
you relied on somebody else who wasn't in control of your aircraft
to tell you: "Yeah, you could go do this thing".
So even though these Envoy pilots are saying:
"Yeah, yeah, you got some room to make that turn"
If the pilots made that turn, if the Delta pilots made that turn
and then they started to break a bunch of stuff
or anything were to happen besides,
perfectly executing it and staying on the taxiway.
If they were able to do that, then fine.
Nobody knows, it's no big deal.
But if they mess anything up, they're gonna end up talking to their chief pilot.
And then when they tell their chief,
"Well, these other guys said that we could do it. So we did it."
The chief is not gonna be impressed with that.
But then the Delta pilot said the same thing to the regional pilots. Listen here.
You guys can't just do a right turn on the taxiway there.
So Delta does the exact same thing to these regional guys say like:
"Oh yeah, it looks like you can make it, no big deal".
And so, it's funny because they're both trying to set each other up
because they don't wanna,
they don't want to commit and have something go wrong.
They'd rather let the other guys do it.
Now in the case of these regional pilots,
they're going to typically be newer pilots.
Typically, the regionals is your first airline job.
And these Delta guys are either prior military
or they already went to the regionals
or who knows what their situation is,
but they typically are gonna have more experience in the regional pilots.
So, as a regional pilot, when I was there,
when you're at a regional level, you sometimes feel a little bit of pressure.
When someone with more experiences telling you that you can do something.
But these guys are saying:
"Yeah, no. We don't feel comfortable making this turn".
So they really held their ground with that situation.
And so they're saying:
"No, we don't feel good.
And we don't feel like we're gonna be able to safely make this turn here"
And then behind it all of you have Air traffic control,
putting some pressure on both sides.
Like, can you do this? Can you do that?
Okay, well, I'm gonna have to bring the tug out.
Kind of like you guys are gonna be inconvenience if it doesn't work out.
If you guys don't make the turn, we're gonna have to bring a tug out
and you're gonna have to wait some more.
So this controller messed it all up to start with.
And now he's kind of putting some burden on these pilots
to commit and try to get him out of this problem
of having to send a tug out because now he's gonna have to fill out some paperwork
and do all of that stuff.
So he is trying to get himself out of that jam.
Listen to what this controller says here.
Okay. Envoy 4078, you're saying there's absolutely nothing you can do
to move because otherwise we're talking about bringing the tug out.
Yes, sir. We thought we could put our reversers on,
but there's just too much room to go backwards for us Envoy 4078.
The pilots here were a 100% right by saying:
"Go ahead, bring the tug out. That's fine."
Because the truth is that if a tug comes out and it has to push them back
since they were following the instructions
that were give to them by Air traffic control,
which was taxi via Tango
since they were both given that instruction.
And that was incorrect. It's not a big deal,
but they were both given that instruction to taxi via Tango.
And now they ended up on a head on collision
or head on situation where they couldn't back up.
Now, typically while I'm taxing,
I factor that in because I have a, a big plane.
So it's even less maneuverable.
So I'll usually leave some gap in case there is a situation.
If there's a plane that's coming the other way,
I'll usually not commit on a long taxiway
before I get to a point where I can't turn.
I'll stop a little bit earlier or I'll confirm
because I don't want to get into a situation where this exact thing is happening.
But in this case, you had one guy coming off the runway,
you had the other guys going, I don't know exactly all what was transpiring there but
the controller's trying to get himself out of the situation
and the pilots are right to say: "No, go ahead and bring a tug out".
Because if that tug comes out and pushes them back,
and then they continue on, they're not in trouble at all.
They run into the grass, run over some lights.
They're gonna be in a lot of trouble.
Envoy 4078 ramp Tower is advising
You have plenty of room. I'm not sure exactly what they mean by that,
but that does that mean anything to you?
All right. How about this? Have them send us like a wing walker.
Maybe we can do it with somebody out there looking out for us.
Cuz we cannot see so much from here.
Okay. Then would a wing walker be able to help with that?
If I have somebody looking outside, maybe, yeah.
Envoy 4078 and Delta, they're looking to get an escort out there
to be able to look out there for you Envoy.
Roger 4078.
Ops 9, go ahead.
Yeah, I'm right behind them.
I don't think there's any room for him to take a turn to the right.
So if I can run to the ramp real quick, I'll bring a tug out for a quick push back.
Absolutely. If that's what you need.
Roger, I'll be right back.
If you aren't familiar with the term wing walker,
it's not nearly as cool as it sounds.
It sounds super gangster but it's the people that are there
when you're pulling into park your plane,
they're on the side of the aircraft
and they have their two little light sabers.
They're sticks or glow sticks or wands.
And they're there to make sure that your wing doesn't hit anything.
You know, sometimes you'll see canisters or different things
that are on the side of the plane.
So those people will usually be on each side
and they're there making sure that your wing isn't gonna hit anything.
And then there's somebody at the very front of the plane, your marshaller,
who's helping bring you in.
And he's guiding you in to make sure that you're on the line
and you stop where you're supposed to stop.
And then your wing walkers are there making sure your wings don't hit anything.
So what this guy's saying is if we get a wing walker,
basically somebody that can keep an eye out for what's going on around us,
making sure that we don't get into the grass
or go hit some lights or any of that stuff, then we can do it.
So then you heard the ops guy come out and go: "Yeah, there's no room".
That's after the guy said, ramp control said:
"There's plenty of room and you shouldn't have any issues".
So they were really trying to like bait these guys into committing to do something
of trying to make this turn,
which they're not gonna be nearly in the same trouble as,
as what would happen to these pilots if they got into the grass.
So they really held their own saying like:
"Okay, well if you wanna bring somebody out here,
who's there on the ground telling us that we are clear to make this turn
they're trying to get some protection there, right?
But listen here what Ops says again.
I don't think there's any room for him to take a turn to the right.
So at the end of the day, these pilots, on both sides, Delta and Envoy
aren't gonna have any problems or any trouble
because they never committed to do anything.
They made the right decision of just holding their own and saying:
"Hey, yeah, go ahead and bring the tug out".
So they did the right thing here.
KLM671. Our estimate is still showing you at
SUNOT time 15:26. If that doesn't change, I will have to give you a dog leg.
Copy that KLM671, we're working on it.
KLM671.
671 go.
Okay. There's only 390 as an alternative on track C 37 and 38.
Feet are all available on track D advise your preference.
KLM671, no we understand but I think I will file a report about this.
This is not going the way our clearance is.
And I also think this is not the way you cleared the other aircraft.
KLM671 okay. We can speak about this afterwards,
but you need to assure separation at the moment, sir,
I need four minutes at least behind the north shuttle,
which there isn't going to be at the moment.
So we need to find an alternative.
So advise your preference for an alternative, please.
Well, we're graduating to some big league stuff here.
We're gonna talk about crossing the Atlantic and Atlantic tracks.
So it's a little bit more complex than some of these other videos,
but let me show you what they're talking about here.
I pulled this up and these are all different tracks
that we use to actually cross the Atlantic ocean
and they change every single day.
Sometimes you only have five tracks.
You might have eight tracks.
We're in the middle of Covid. You might only have two tracks.
They're always changing the number of the tracks
and where the tracks are based off of weather,
the most favorable conditions and things like that.
Now doing an Atlantic crossing is a lot more precise than some domestic flying
when you're flying around your area.
And what happens is you'll be given a track.
And if you saw my vlog that I did,
you know, when I do a pre-fly and I'm looking at everything,
one of the things that I'll look at,
if I'm doing Atlantic crossing is
what track am I gonna be on?
And that track is gonna have an in entry point and an exit point.
Now you heard them mention SUNOT.
SUNOT is the entry point for the track that they're planning to be on.
And so they're planning to hit SUNOT and they've already loaded this up.
They're already in flight, they've already loaded everything
and they're planning to hit SUNOT and that's gonna be their entry point to cross.
Now the Atlantic crossing is very precise.
You're gonna be given a specific speed that you're gonna be flying on,
a specific altitude that you're flying on.
And then there's gonna be specific times.
If your time changes for whatever reason,
then you need to report that stuff.
They keep very specific distant separation.
So it's a very precise thing that's going on. And that's why he's saying like:
"Hey, these are the altitudes or these are options
and you don't have enough time distance to separate you too"
And then you heard the guy push back with the controller saying like:
"This isn't how you cleared the other plane".
Listen.
We understand.
But I think I will file a report about this.
This is not going the way our clearance is.
And I also think this is not the way you cleared the other aircraft.
Now you may remember one of the things that he mentioned was
they had different altitude options
and you think: "Okay, well that's fine. You just take the different altitude".
When you're dealing with a larger plane,
there's a lot of times that your weight is so high
that you're not able to climb up to that later altitude
because you have so much fuelers,
so much freight or so much stuff that's on the plane that
at this moment in time, you don't have the capacity.
The plane doesn't have the capacity to climb up to that altitude.
Now that's not something that we have to mentally calculate.
There's a little button that we push and that will tell us.
Hey, this is your max altitude that you can go to.
So we click that button and we verify,
okay, we can take that higher altitude.
So it may have been a very small margin there
and that's why they didn't wanna do it.
And then you say:
Okay, well, why don't you just take the lower altitude?
Well, at a lower altitude, you're gonna be burning more fuel.
So they're planning to go at this specific altitude with some minor variations.
So they can go in and put in there.
Okay. Hypothetically, if I fly it this lower altitude, how's it gonna be?
And they can put that in and see, you know, how much fuel they're gonna have
and that type of stuff.
And the it's very quick.
The computer can do it all for you very quickly.
But listen to where he says, these are your different altitude options.
As an alternative on track C 37 and 38
thousand feet are all available on track D. Advise your preference.
So the controller was giving different altitude options.
And if those altitude options weren't gonna fit what the pilots wanted,
then they gave a totally different track that they were gonna have to go onto.
So the altitude, if they couldn't hit the higher altitude,
or it didn't want to take the low altitude, whatever it was for fuel,
then they would've had to reload everything and get onto that different track
that the guy was suggesting.
So every track, like I said, you'll have Alpha Bravo,
Charlie, Delta, etcetera.
And those are all changing every day.
So he was offering him a different track and different altitudes.
The controller was trying to give him some options like
to allow him to make his decision that was best for him.
But instead of saying like: "Okay, let's resolve this problem quickly",
He decided to say: "I'm gonna file a report".
Well, there's really no point in saying that.
You're gonna file a report? Then don't just talk about it.
Go write the report.
There's no reason to argue.
That controller isn't gonna change his mind.
He needs to have this separation.
If you wanna go file a report, then go file a report.
There's no reason to argue about that at this time,
because when you're doing a crossing,
there's a lot of other planes.
Usually for whatever reason, all happens around the same time.
Everyone's trying to check in,
everyone's trying to get their oceanic clearance
and they're trying to do all that.
And you're over there jamming up the airways saying:
"I'm gonna file a report because I'm not getting what I want"
Take what he's gonna give you, make sure that it's safe
and then sort it out after the fact which is what the controller's saying.
I'm not gonna argue about this anymore.
Take. Do you want this or do you want this? That's your option.
I think Norshuttle will be accepting the clearance at 15:22 at SUNOT.
You have four minutes with us almost 5.
KLM671. It looks on my system. Like he's going to cross at 23.
I'm not discussing this any further, sir.
Advise your preference for an alternative.
I can offer you 390 on C or 370 and 380 on D.
We'll take 390, KLM671.
Understood, call you back.
SUNOT, just so you know,
is the entry point in this particular track that he's talking about,
I'm gonna show you what it looks like on our chart.
You can see at this particular time that I'm taking a picture of this,
this SUNOT doesn't have a track associated to it.
But this would be the entry point onto this particular airway
which I've used multiple times.
But this would be the entry point onto this given track.
There's not one here.
Typically you would see a normal line like you see of all these other ones here.
So you heard the pilot arguing with them.
"Oh, well you gave Norshuttle this
at this time. And we're gonna be at that time".
I don't know that. That guy got a lot more situational awareness than I have.
I'm typically aware of the other planes,
but I'm not writing down at the time when they're gonna hit their entry point.
I usually don't care that much,
a little bit up or a little bit down
is not gonna be a big deal.
I think they made the right choice choosing the higher altitude
or choosing that altitude on that track
because when you are in flight and you're getting ready to do that crossing,
reloading up everything for a whole new track,
there's, in my opinion, there's a lot more opportunity for error,
for messing something up while you're doing that
than by taking a higher or lower altitude.
So I'd rather do the same.
I'd rather take a higher or lower altitude.
I have all the wins. I have everything planned for that Pacific thing.
And then I'm gonna be able to know:
"Okay, cool. We're just gonna go up a little bit higher
or we're gonna go a little lower.
This is gonna be our fuel burn on the lower altitude"
which will still give us more than enough cushion once we get to the other side
and our destination, the weather's good.
You know, I'll factor all that stuff in while we're talking about that.
The arguing though, with the controller saying:
"Oh, well, you didn't do this and you didn't do that.
And you gave this guy this thing".
There's really no point of doing that in this situation,
the controller has a job to do.
And so they're not gonna change it.
So take what're give you,
and then if you wanna write a report of it,
you have five or six hours across the ocean with nobody to talk to.
You can just write the nice little long report.
You get to the hotel and you can send it to somebody who probably is not gonna care
because the controllers are doing his job.
He didn't have the space. He wasn't gonna give it to you.
All right. Time for the fun one.
Pack coast 415, I've always wanted to say this
thanks for the opportunity direct to weed.
Yeah. Direct weed. Pack coast 415, right on brother.
Pack coast 415, contact LA on 127.1, you guys have a good night.
"So direct weed".
They're at LA. They in California.
I think the weed they're referring to is this little airport here in California.
I don't have a chart for it because it's only 60 feet wide.
And I would definitely be offroading my 747 over there.
So I don't have a chart for it because we're never gonna fly in there.
But you can see, that's an airport there in California.
If you wanna see some Air traffic controllers
being a little bit more saucy with some pilots,
check out this video here.
And if you wanna see some pilots who are struggling to fly their plane,
check out this video up here.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Until then,
keep the blue side up.