SJC Morning aircraft shuffle
Oct 15, 2001, 10:45 am
#1
Original Poster
Join Date: Jun 2001
Location: SFO, UA 1K, Hyatt Plat
Posts: 124
SJC Morning aircraft shuffle
Seems that SJC isn 't dealing well with staff reductions. With the number of flights going out in the mornings they are struggling to deal with it all. Checkin and security is a major pain, 90 minutes yesterday, and that's in the "short" first Class/Premier line... however we've been told to expect long delays everywhere, so no problem here.
The bigger problem was the plane shuffle they go through at SJC in the mornings. They keep a lot of planes overnight at SJC for use in the morning, but they don't have a lot of gates. This means aircraft get parked around the airport at different places, and before they can fly they need to be brought back and loaded.
Yesterday (Sunday) I had an 8:10 to Denver, and there was an 8:20 to IAD. Neither plane was at the gate, and it was 8:00 before they brought over the 757 for the DEN flight, 8:15 for the IAD flight.
When the 757 arrived I saw someting you don't get to see every day... with no jetways at SJC terminal C they rely on stair trucks. I guess the guy who drove the plane over from wherever it was parked is the same guy who drives the stair truck, becuase they couldn't bring it to the aircraft. So the ground person waited in the open front door of the aircraft (757's normally load from the door closer to the wing) and a baggae loader was moved up to the door at quite a steep angle and the aircraft driver stepped out onto the conveyor belt, locked the door behind himself and rode the conveyor belt to the ground... he them moved the stair truck up the the other door.
Sorry, took a detour there... so once the aircraft were at the gates then the cleaning crews came and did their thing, the flight crews did their things and eventually the cabin crew were let in.
The bottom line is that both the 8:10 DEN and the 8:20 IAD left an hour late. There was no real statemenet made as to the reason (and in fatc the terminal monitors showed nothing other than "on time" although my UAL paging told me of delays), but overhead many time were a very small number of very harassed gate agents saying staff reductions were to blame.
I understand staff reductions in business and appreciate their need at United at the moment, as much as they hurt everyone. But if their is not enough room at the gates to keep the aircraft overnight please leave enough staff to get the aircraft there in time for their scheduled departures. There are a number of flights out of SJC in the 6:00 - 6:45 time frame which need the gates first... but surely this leaves enough time to move the post 8:00am flights over in time?
The bigger problem was the plane shuffle they go through at SJC in the mornings. They keep a lot of planes overnight at SJC for use in the morning, but they don't have a lot of gates. This means aircraft get parked around the airport at different places, and before they can fly they need to be brought back and loaded.
Yesterday (Sunday) I had an 8:10 to Denver, and there was an 8:20 to IAD. Neither plane was at the gate, and it was 8:00 before they brought over the 757 for the DEN flight, 8:15 for the IAD flight.
When the 757 arrived I saw someting you don't get to see every day... with no jetways at SJC terminal C they rely on stair trucks. I guess the guy who drove the plane over from wherever it was parked is the same guy who drives the stair truck, becuase they couldn't bring it to the aircraft. So the ground person waited in the open front door of the aircraft (757's normally load from the door closer to the wing) and a baggae loader was moved up to the door at quite a steep angle and the aircraft driver stepped out onto the conveyor belt, locked the door behind himself and rode the conveyor belt to the ground... he them moved the stair truck up the the other door.
Sorry, took a detour there... so once the aircraft were at the gates then the cleaning crews came and did their thing, the flight crews did their things and eventually the cabin crew were let in.
The bottom line is that both the 8:10 DEN and the 8:20 IAD left an hour late. There was no real statemenet made as to the reason (and in fatc the terminal monitors showed nothing other than "on time" although my UAL paging told me of delays), but overhead many time were a very small number of very harassed gate agents saying staff reductions were to blame.
I understand staff reductions in business and appreciate their need at United at the moment, as much as they hurt everyone. But if their is not enough room at the gates to keep the aircraft overnight please leave enough staff to get the aircraft there in time for their scheduled departures. There are a number of flights out of SJC in the 6:00 - 6:45 time frame which need the gates first... but surely this leaves enough time to move the post 8:00am flights over in time?
Oct 15, 2001, 11:21 am
#2
Join Date: Sep 2001
Location: 10007.
Posts: 649
On a related note, how long did you wait at the security checkpoint ? SJC has always been bad -- back in May at 6am I waited 30 minutes to clear security and nearly missed my flight to ORD. At that time they only had 1 checkpoint open despite the amount of flights leaving (UA to LAX, DEN, and ORD; NW to MSP; CO to EWR and IAH; TW to STL, HP to PHX; and AC to YYZ).
Looking forward to the new terminal at SJC (which will be completed in 20 years???)
Looking forward to the new terminal at SJC (which will be completed in 20 years???)
Oct 15, 2001, 6:49 pm
#3
Original Poster
Join Date: Jun 2001
Location: SFO, UA 1K, Hyatt Plat
Posts: 124
<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by canard:
On a related note, how long did you wait at the security checkpoint ? SJC has always been bad -- back in May at 6am I waited 30 minutes to clear security and nearly missed my flight to ORD. At that time they only had 1 checkpoint open despite the amount of flights leaving (UA to LAX, DEN, and ORD; NW to MSP; CO to EWR and IAH; TW to STL, HP to PHX; and AC to YYZ).
Looking forward to the new terminal at SJC (which will be completed in 20 years???)</font>
On a related note, how long did you wait at the security checkpoint ? SJC has always been bad -- back in May at 6am I waited 30 minutes to clear security and nearly missed my flight to ORD. At that time they only had 1 checkpoint open despite the amount of flights leaving (UA to LAX, DEN, and ORD; NW to MSP; CO to EWR and IAH; TW to STL, HP to PHX; and AC to YYZ).
Looking forward to the new terminal at SJC (which will be completed in 20 years???)
</font>
I thought the National Guard unit at the checkpoint with the M16s (or whatever the modern machine gun is they use these days) was over the top... I've seen quite a few Guard teams at security checkpoints, but these were the only ones I've seen with the machine guns out in plain view.
While I am glad they are there I'm not sure what value they are adding to the process... they stand back and watch.. they can't see the X-Ray screens and don't participate in the searches etc... they are just... well... there.
Surely their presence will prevent an arrogant passenger from arguing with the security folks... but is there any other value?