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-   -   Mess in AMS today - April 2022 onwards (https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/klm-flying-dutchman/2080797-mess-ams-today-april-2022-onwards.html)

BobTL May 25, 2022 1:00 pm


Originally Posted by irishguy28 (Post 34278908)
The issues at AMS at present are largely due to the shortage of security staff. Security is the bottleneck. The workload on these staff will not change or improve on the basis of any aircraft substitutions KLM might make, even if they had the planes and staff that would allow them to do so.




Preparing the aircraft isn't the bottleneck. And neither is the number of aircraft movements or runway congestion.

Again, it's the inability of passengers to get through security on time - and the corresponding delays in departure as some aircraft are held to allow a handful of extra passengers to board - that is the problem.




Aircraft may sit around for extended periods, but they don't have corresponding crewmembers sitting around, ready to be called into action at a moment's notice.

Cancelling 2 Embraer flights will add a nice gap in the schedules of 2 Cityhopper (WA) Embraer crews; but that means that KL would then have to find a "spare" KL Boeing *AND* crew to operate this flight instead. The crews freed up after this cancellation of 2 WA Embraer flights cannot just hop over to a completely different aircraft type and operate a KL Boeing flight.




That was indeed Schiphol's solution during the meivakantie at the start of the current crisis!

Schiphol calls on airlines to cancel flights to prevent chaos and crowds
Schiphol to limit flights this summer to avoid severe delays for travellers
Schiphol security queues will last through the summer: nu.nl

Let’s agree this is situation at AMS is a complex problem where many factors play a role.
Of course security plays a big role but also the fact that some runways are closed for maintenance. You also see on Flightradar24 that many incoming aircraft are heavily delayed even though they left on time from AMs and arrived on time at the destination. This tells that AMS aren’t able to keep the slottimes which can be many reasons for but I am personally quite sure that the closed runways and unfavorable winds aren’t helping.
So that’s why fewer but bigger aircraft could be part of the solution. Yes you need different crew for that but my example regarding BLL was that pre pandemic 3 out of 5 daily flights a day were operated with B738 aircraft whereas yesterday, all aircraft were E175/190/195. In this case canceling one flight and fly with B738 aircraft would give more space on the runways in AMS and therefor contributing to a solution. The security is another story and I don’t have a solution for that except canceling flights as Schiphol already suggested themselves.

Netherlines May 25, 2022 1:17 pm


Originally Posted by BobTL (Post 34279883)
Let’s agree this is situation at AMS is a complex problem where many factors play a role.
Of course security plays a big role but also the fact that some runways are closed for maintenance. You also see on Flightradar24 that many incoming aircraft are heavily delayed even though they left on time from AMs and arrived on time at the destination. This tells that AMS aren’t able to keep the slottimes which can be many reasons for but I am personally quite sure that the closed runways and unfavorable winds aren’t helping.
So that’s why fewer but bigger aircraft could be part of the solution. Yes you need different crew for that but my example regarding BLL was that pre pandemic 3 out of 5 daily flights a day were operated with B738 aircraft whereas yesterday, all aircraft were E175/190/195. In this case canceling one flight and fly with B738 aircraft would give more space on the runways in AMS and therefor contributing to a solution. The security is another story and I don’t have a solution for that except canceling flights as Schiphol already suggested themselves.

Load factor at KL is still 10-20 % less than pre-Covid.
The E jets are fuel efficient and even with only a 50% load factor KL breaks even

BobTL May 25, 2022 1:24 pm


Originally Posted by Netherlines (Post 34279926)
Load factor at KL is still 10-20 % less than pre-Covid.
The E jets are fuel efficient and even with only a 50% load factor KL breaks even

yes I know. It’s not about saving the fuel but avoiding delays.

Netherlines May 25, 2022 1:44 pm


Originally Posted by BobTL (Post 34279945)
yes I know. It’s not about saving the fuel but avoiding delays.

I beg to differ,KL's first objective is to make money,flights are being cancelled on a daily basis for weeks now and the situation is not improving.Even if you cancel 2 Embraer services and fly 1 B-737 instead KL loses an incredible amount of money.It's never going to happen.

BobTL May 25, 2022 1:49 pm


Originally Posted by Netherlines (Post 34280012)
I beg to differ,KL's first objective is to make money,flights are being cancelled on a daily basis for weeks now and the situation is not improving.Even if you cancel 2 Embraer services and fly 1 B-737 instead KL loses an incredible amount of money.It's never going to happen.

in that theory they wouldn’t fly with B738 at all to the same destination as with a E aircraft?
How do you know what the break even is on a E aircraft?

johan rebel May 25, 2022 2:07 pm


Originally Posted by BobTL (Post 34279883)
I am personally quite sure that the closed runways and unfavorable winds aren’t helping.

That was certainly the case yesterday and today. 18L/36R closed for maintenance, southwesterly winds, so for most of the day only 27 was available for landings, and 24 and 27 for departures. Enough to severely limit capacity. One wonders how LHR seems to do reasonably well most of the time with only two runways.

As for the aircraft substitution issue, KLM just doesn't have the cabin crew to operate more 737 flights. During the pandemic KLC with its cheaper FAs and smaller and fuel-efficient aircraft did really well, they saved the day for KLM. Mainline cabin crew were offered early retirement, attractive severance packages and even secondment to KLC on full KL pay. Now mainline doesn't have enough FAs, and even KLC is struggling.

Johan

irishguy28 May 25, 2022 3:49 pm

At least 36,000 slots to be scrapped at AMS between 1JUN22 and 28AUG22
 
So, the slot co-ordinator at Schiphol is capping the number of slots for the period from 1 June to 28 August. The current 126,000 will be dropped to a maximum of 90,000 slots. The airlines have been assured that they will not lose any slots that they choose not to use over the summer period, i.e. they will retain all of their current slots again after the summer even if they drop slots during the summer months, so the hope is that airlines will happily and gladly cancel a significant number of their planned summer flights.

The article doesn't address the issue of what happens if the airlines don't manage to give up the necessary 36,000 slots. The article also appears a bit contradictory - the airlines wanted a full, busy season to make up for the lost business of the last 2 years, but also quotes a Schiphol spokesperson as saying that the airlines have "reacted positively" to the development.

Further measures are due to be announced tomorrow.

https://nos.nl/artikel/2430257-nieuw...ol-lucht-geven

johan rebel May 25, 2022 5:20 pm


Originally Posted by irishguy28 (Post 34280321)
so the hope is that airlines will happily and gladly cancel a significant number of their planned summer flights.

Will Schiphol happily and gladly indemnify the airlines?

Johan

irishguy28 May 25, 2022 5:44 pm


Originally Posted by johan rebel (Post 34280512)
Will Schiphol happily and gladly indemnify the airlines?

Johan

On the contrary; Schiphol plans to increase the fees it charges the airlines by 37% over the next 3 years.

johan rebel May 25, 2022 5:59 pm

KLM already took Schiphol to court over that more than a month ago.

How much to charge for services provided is another issue entirely than suddenly no longer offering a service, thus hurting the business of ones (captive) clients.

BobTL May 25, 2022 10:21 pm


Originally Posted by johan rebel (Post 34280079)
That was certainly the case yesterday and today. 18L/36R closed for maintenance, southwesterly winds, so for most of the day only 27 was available for landings, and 24 and 27 for departures. Enough to severely limit capacity. One wonders how LHR seems to do reasonably well most of the time with only two runways.

As for the aircraft substitution issue, KLM just doesn't have the cabin crew to operate more 737 flights. During the pandemic KLC with its cheaper FAs and smaller and fuel-efficient aircraft did really well, they saved the day for KLM. Mainline cabin crew were offered early retirement, attractive severance packages and even secondment to KLC on full KL pay. Now mainline doesn't have enough FAs, and even KLC is struggling.

Johan

Exactly my point.

I’m not in a position to value if KL has more B738/9 crews available or not, the point was just that bigger aircraft could be a part of the solution.

BobTL May 25, 2022 10:28 pm


Originally Posted by Netherlines (Post 34280012)
I beg to differ,KL's first objective is to make money,flights are being cancelled on a daily basis for weeks now and the situation is not improving.Even if you cancel 2 Embraer services and fly 1 B-737 instead KL loses an incredible amount of money.It's never going to happen.

Of course they want to make money but you are taking my comment out of context.
Apart from that, KL will look at the total picture. Not only fuel consumption is a KPI they look at, there are many others.
If you want to succeed as an airline on the long haul (no pun intended), customer satisfaction is high on the list.

mlin32 May 25, 2022 11:54 pm

Lol for customer satisfaction (especially that of paying J customers), please take a look at the KLM catering thread :D

I do wonder what Schiphol was thinking, raising airport fees while this meltdown is happening.

ryandc99 May 26, 2022 12:55 am

Report from my trip to AMS this morning. I arrived around 7:05 am. The lines for terminal 1 were outside the building and wrapped quite a while.

Inside terminal 2, the regular line for both check in and security was quite long but priority wasn't horrible. I was able to get thru the check in, security and passport control and into lounge 52 in about 1 hour total curb to lounge.

johan rebel May 26, 2022 2:54 am

Drastically reducing the number of slots is a rough-and-ready approach to dealing with (solving?) the problem, and asking for trouble with the airlines at the same time.

Is it even possible to do this in an equitable way, and what's equitable anyway in this instance?

The main problem at Schiphol is apparently the security bottleneck, and then specifically the departures checkpoints. It would therefore make most sense to go after the airlines/flights with the largest number of pax originating at AMS, i.e. just about every airline except KLM. I'm sure only the latter would approve of such an approach.

If, on the other hand, they want to reduce pax numbers at the transfer security checkpoints (and thus release staff to man the departure ones), it would make sense to pick on KLM flights with lots of transfer pax from non-secure destinations.

Then there's the issue that all slots are not equal because the number of departing pax fluctuates depending on the time of day, the day of the week, school vacations, and so forth.

Many other factors also need to be taken into consideration. Schiphol is creating a real hornets' nest here.

Johan


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