klmml

Hi all

I'm meant to be flying out SH from LGW tomorrow evening (03.02), and the winds look like they'll make for quite sporty conditions, http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/public/w...cast/gcpfgzz2b with a weather warning in place. How concerned should I be about BA cancelling my flight?

Normally I would just take these things in my stride, but I really need to make this journey tomorrow, so I'd rebook to an earlier flight if people feel there's a good chance of cancellations tomorrow night.

Thanks.

mikeyfly

I've got a B2B early tomorrow from LHR so hopefully it is not too bad! I'm sure KARFA will be along shortly with a detailed weather forecast

corporate-wage-slave

The way this tends to work on BA is that at this stage there won't be a lot you can do. If on a Plus ticket then after midnight into the day of travel you can change to another service if you think it would help, which I suspect means a flight earlier on Friday.

If ATC inform BA to cut flights, then this typically means around 17 or 18 hrs today GMT they will be scrubbed from the schedule, and you'll get a text+email if you booked via BA.com and gave the relevant contact information. At that point try BA.com and/or App to rebook, they have genuinely improved the rebooking process there. Then ring up if necessary. If your flight is not cancelled, my experience is that actually that means it may be a bit late but typically it will go. The pro-active cancellation process is a bit of nuisance, but it does have benefits overall, certainly better than a mass pile up of passengers and non moving flights. In particular it's rare for a flight to survive the pre-emptive cull and then get cancelled.

KARFA

Ha, well I am actually flying tomorrow in the evening from Cheshire International so I do have an interest in this one!

The airport forecasts don't quite cover tomorrow yet and those will be the most relevant forecasts. I'll check again later on and I'll copy in the TAFs for those who can read them - but I will make some comments in layman's terms as well

As for some more information, high winds at LHR don't necessarily present as much of a problem as they used to do several years ago due to the introduction of time based separation which means that in some situations the arrivals rate can be maintained whereas before it would have had to be reduced causing the usual delays/cancellations. I am sure some of the professionals in the field who post on here would do a much better job of explaining TBS than me, some more information here on TBS http://www.nats.aero/tbs/

That's not to say high winds can't cause disruption. The winter of 2015/16 we seemed to have constant storms coming through and lots of high winds, whereas this winter seems to be less windy but more foggy.

Anyway, will post the forecast when it comes up

Fitch

I have a DUB b2b this evening ahead of my DXB trip - I will be more than happy if they cancel the positioning flight & let me start my journey from LHR tomorrow

CommanderB

This made me chuckle!

rossmacd

They may have made some improvements, but absolutely anything outside of a simple point-to-point it is still lousy.

corporate-wage-slave

It can handle two sector trips reasonably well now, I had a EDI-LCY-HAM on Tuesday which was seemlessly moved to EDI-LHR-HAM without issues when the EDI-LCY service was cancelled, so there was even a change of airport there. But I've no doubt that if the flight was already outwith the self-serve channel a telephone call would have been needed.

ahmetdouas

I wouldn't worry too much. 40-45kmh winds are not that bad.

Of course, its up to NATS to decide flow restrictions if any.

rossmacd

I guess you were lucky I had 1 booking in December and 1 in January ZRH-LON-GLA with delays/cancellations on several sectors, but the App didn't help at all. Had to call both times and wait time was almost an hour - as expected during periods of wider IRROPs.

LHRATCO

KARFA is correct, we have TBS to mitigate a lot of the strong wind situations that occur from time to time. Where the upcoming weather may differ is that it's projected to be a fairly substantial crosswind, which naturally makes it a touch trickier to land

The spacing in a crosswind could be broadly normal, but the two factors that would decrease the actual landing rate are:

- The increased chance of a missed approach (go-around) due to the actual crosswind short final, I'll leave any further explanation of limits to any pilots who may frequent.

- The likelihood that an aircraft will a spend longer time on the runway after landing due to the lack of headwind causing a higher touchdown speed, and subsequent later exit to vacate, meaning a later landing clearance for the following aircraft, or indeed a missed approach. Add into the mix a probably wet runway, and it's likely there will be a higher number of missed approaches.

On any given, 'normal' day, there might be 2/3 missed approaches at LHR. The last significant crosswind day I was at work, ISTR there being 30+ missed approaches. Which is at least 45 minutes worth of extra traffic back in the sky over a day.

Anyway, we'll use everything we can to keep the delays down, but if you have the (mis)fortune to experience a missed approach, it's probably due to the above

KARFA

Sorry, yes I should have noted that distinction and mentioned TBS is really to deal with strong headwinds rather than crosswinds.

Some more information now, relevant bit bolded:

So wind is forecast to come from 140 degrees tomorrow afternoon in to the evening. Not quite at right angles to the runwys, but still produce a significant crosswind. Wind is forecast to be 18 knots gusting up to 30 knots, which is relatively strong but nothing near any limits. Because of the angle of the wind to the runway the actual crosswind component is up to around 23 knots and headwind component is up to around 19 knots. This is significant, but doesn't seem enough to really present too much disruption?

Actually looking at today's forecast there is a similarly strong wind forecast for the afternoon/evening.

I seem to remember there were days last winter where strong crosswinds really were a problem was when the wind direction was around 180 degrees and around 30-35 gusting to 45+ knots, i.e. as the wind direction was at right angles to the runways it was all crosswind with the issues mentioned by LHRATCO when you have strong crosswinds, either it may be beyond the limits of the aircraft/crew or make landings a lot more difficult.

So I am flying in to LHR tomorrow from MAN about 1800. Looking at the forecast am I concerned? No not really. It is possible my flight may run a little late due to the conditions, but I am not really concerned that it would be cancelled or heavily delayed.

ahmetdouas

Yes I flew in almost identical conditions the same time last year (Jan/Feb), flights were delayed like 30 mins but no significant IRROPS. The landing and take off were 'sporty' = )

T8191

FYI, Gale Force 8 forecast for JER tomorrow. Not a good day for TP runs or positioning!

klmml

Thanks for posting the forecast. For Gatwick we have:

Which, at Gatwick, is almost entirely crosswind...