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Europe............................... IFATCA European Region Virtual 2020 Meeting
IFATCA EUROPEAN REGION VIRTUAL 2020 MEETING
zby Philippe Domogala, SENIOR CORRESPONDENT, IFATCA
As all the planned regional meetings were cancelled due to the COVID-19 crisis, IFATCA’s (Acting) EVP for the European Region Frédéric Deleau convened the second European informal virtual meeting via Zoom on 21 Oct. 2020. The meeting was attended by some 35 participants representing most of IFATCA’s European Region member associations.
Images by IFATCA
After a brief welcome, Deleau introduced the EUROCONTROL Network Manager (NM) director Iacopo Prissinotti, who was invited to make a presentation showing how the COVID-19 crisis drastically affected the traffic and revenue for ANSPs since March 2020. Prissinotti predicted a slow return to normality. He said the return will be volatile and complex. After some encouraging increases during the summer months, aviation traffic is up to about 55% of 2019 traffic. Actual figures show traffic stagnating at around 40% of 2019 traffic. What is worrying is that load factors only are 45% of what they were in 2019. A significant improvement is not expected before next spring and will depend on a lot of factors. One of the most important factors that will impact the recovery will be additional travel restrictions that various countries may impose.
In addition to the COVID crisis, Prissinotti discussed the recent opening of the Israel airspace to overflights. This change is expected to initially move around 100 aircraft in both detections above new areas. These traffic flow shifts will have both workload and revenue consequences for various European member associations. Deleau then began the portion of the meeting where member associations exchanged internal information.
IFATCA’s liaison to the European Union Paul Neering described how the European Commission has responded to the crisis. Neering briefly explained the consequences of the boycott by professional staff organisations to the various working groups with which the Federation previously participated.
On the SESAR front, there is a new contract between IFATCA and SESAR, but for specific tasks only.
EASA has been busy addressing rulemaking issues such as remote towers, UAVs, and ATCO licencing.
IFATCA is represented on those working groups. With EUROCAE, we also are represented on issues relating to TCAS X and Virtual centres among other things.
The rest of the time was dedicated to current developments of the member associations, including how they coped with and consequences from the COVID-19 crisis. A general trend that was shared by participants was that a change of duty rosters was the norm in most countries, as ANSPs tried to mitigate the effects of controllers eventual contamination. As a result, some planned projects, like the new centre planned in Belarus, were delayed until further notice.
Many ANSPs are in financial difficulties and need financial support either from their states or from bank loans. In some countries the loans were subject to conditions, like in Switzerland, to “reduce the perks” of air traffic controllers, while at the same time, extending ATCOs retirement age. As a result, many controllers have experienced pay cuts. While some countries were able to allow controllers to keep 100% of their wages, according to the member associations sharing information, controllers in many countries saw their pay cut between 5% and as much as 60%. In most places, the On-the-job-training (OJT) was stopped, and some trainees – even those very close to qualification – have been terminated.
One effect of the current crisis is that while the daily traffic is very low, the peaks are still there, and traffic is unevenly distributed, not over 18 hours as before, but now around four hours. Another non-negligible issue with such low traffic is how to keep controllers competent and validated and how training can be achieved with such low traffic. Innovative solutions are being discussed, like in Germany where they are looking at possibly checking people out on virtual high traffic generated on a simulator.
Finally, Deleau asked for support on a new project that aims to complement and update the “Single European Sky Mission possible IFATCA document” which currently misses a few pillars to address the new developments of the SES2+ package. He asked for a group of volunteers to create a task force to review and further develop that document giving attention to proposals for new ways of financing essential services and recommendations for a more efficient institutional organisation to deliver ATC over cross-border conditions. y
