A publication of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association
Issue link: http://natca.uberflip.com/i/812028
The following VORs are now undergoing NR studies for discontinuance: ERY - Newberry, MI BKZ - West Branch, MI WAKE TU RBULENCE Kevin Connelly (SAT) is the Article 114 Representative to the Wa ke Turbulence Office for NATCA. His update for the week is below. March started with a successful IOC for RECAT Phase 2 Appendix B at Minneapolis Tower and TRACON (M98/MSP). The fac ility had all but one member who was out on a medical issue trained by the end of February and RECAT went IOC at 0330 Local on 3/14. I cannot express enough how well the training and IOC went with both the locals at Minneapolis. Every controller was recept ive to the program, understood the benefits of the change, and IOC was very smooth with no major issues. There was a small issue in the morning with AJV - 82 sending the wrong build for the ASDE (Appendix A was loaded and not B) but that was fixed within an hour in the morning with no issues in the operation. After two days of monitoring the operation , the team left the facility and congratulated everyone in the building on an incredibly smooth transition. After IOC of RECAT at MSP, I was at CFS in Vegas but en route issues with the Airbus 388 interrupted the conference. An international incident at FL320 caused a regional jet to have catastrophic failure from a wake turbulence encounter. There was a panel last year about En R oute Wake as a result of it being a to p 5 issue and the major recommendation from w ake r esearch surrounded the A388 after a few incidents had been reported in the past 12 months , including a C560 in ZLA airspace being turned nose down following 18 miles behind, and 2000+ ft above an A388 on the same arrival. The issue with the CL60 internationally drew media attention overseas and in the US and the FAA decided it may need to react. As of right now there is just some discussion going on about increasing separations required for the A388 in En rou te airspace. Some of the numbers that have been thrown around are 20 miles, 2000 ft below, and some other items but Wake Research still stands by the belief that the best way to mitigate A388 wake encounters is to issue traffic as soon as possible when clim b/descending through the altitude of a level 388, climb/descending a 388 through another aircraft altitude, or when merging targets 1000 ft vertically with the 388 above the best fix is an "upwind offset . " We do not have the science or technological ability to measure the effects of wake at high atmosphere at this time but we do know how wake reacts to wind from LIDAR data gathered near the surface at major airports. We are hoping this discussion will continue until a proper mitigation can be found to keep e veryone safe surrounding the A388. The last part of the month was spent working on finalizing documents from RECAT Phase 2.5 to prepare for SRM Panels. We are confident in the data to move forward with "Paired Departures" for Closely Spaced Parallel Runwa ys (SFO likely to be the first site) and intersection departures operating in the same direction of flight. We hope to be moving forward to SRM Panel this summer. Next month MIA Tower/TRACON are set for Phase 2 Appendix A of Wake RECAT but we are unsure o f how the travel stop for the FAA will effect our ability to get MIA trained after April 28th and the end of the C.R. Training at Miami was scheduled to start April