22 January 2019
Gloucestershire Airport (EGBJ) will become a PPR airport from 1 March. All non-home based visiting aircraft will be required to telephone to book in with the ops team.
James Head, Operations Director at the airport, told FLYER, “In the overwhelming majority of cases pilots contact us though operations to book in as a practice of good airmanship.
“EGBJ has for many years not been a PPR only aerodrome. At the same time, our movement numbers remain amongst the highest in the UK.
“By making PPR mandatory, it is anticipated that the few pilots that elect not to book in at present, will benefit from a detailed briefing on our current operational status. It also enables us to initiate overdue action if required. Approach and departure procedures are unchanged.
“On whether or not it is an aerodrome’s role to accept aircraft, I would say that we at Gloucestershire airport are passionate about [the] customer’s experience.
“We work hard to ensure that our customers, both based and visiting enjoy and benefit from their time with us.
“Our role however is to ensure that safety values and practices are at the heart of our operation.”
17 comments
Personally I think it is common courtesy to call , it helps in flight planning and if they are busy and it’s brief does it matter. For me I can an approach but prepared to amend if requires
In mitigation, this airport has the most comprehensive and friendly briefing document I have ever seen.
I always phone ahead. Sometimes surprising what you find out. Not least its one less thing to do approaching your destination to already have an idea of the weather, runway etc.
Couldn’t it be done by E-Mail like other airfields?
What a shame. A backwards step.
The cascade of control continues in the name of safety. I dont have to telephone ahead to make a car journey, boat journey of motorcycle journey, yet it could be argued that they too, carry risks which could be mitigated by phoning ahead “in case overdue search and rescue procedures are required”.
I also instinctively baulk when I hear the combination of management-speak and psychobbale “we at Gloucestershire Airport are passionate about the customers experience” – obliging the “customer” to do what was, they say, being done voluntarily by the majority is then, puzzling.
Unpacking this, I hear – “We are too busy to deal with all these arrivals which pop up at random, and for admin purposes we would rather have a smooth flow which will enable us to plan our staffing levels accordingly”
Why not just say “ we can’t cope and need some help as we cant afford more staff – we’re sure you won’t mind doing part of our job for us…..”
That is a backward step. I guess we are going from an airport managed and run by a pilot and enthusiast to one run by bureaucrats with boxes to tick and lists to make.
He clearly doesn’t know what good airmanship is, if he thinks PPR is good airmanship. Does that make every pilot in the US and much of the rest of the world have poor airmanship because they don’t phone ahead for PPR. They have never even heard of this British beauracratic concept!
And if we are going to learn something useful from said detailed briefing, why wasn’t the useful information in the Notams where it should be if it’s that important.
PPR should also absolutely not caused overdue action initiation. This is not what it’s for at all, if you want that you should file a flightplan.
We are mostly flying for fun, we change our plans on route, we decide to go later or earlier, or even somewhere completely different. It’s not supposed to be a commercial scheduled operation.
I don’t have to have PPR to drive on the M25, or park in Tescos car park why here.
Next thing I can see is “nany state” dayglo jackets mandatory for everyone because some timid manager thinks it might please the CAA or health and safety despite no requirement, but introduces the rule “just incase” it’s “best practice” to cover my ass.
There is not much to add to Nigel’s excellent comment. This is a small step of a small bureaucrat towards Big Brother’s state, but if we pilots (sorry I prefer this term to “customer”) do not object, it will not take long before big bureaucrats will impose flight plan for every flight and Mode “s” for everybody.
All this in the name of “Heath and Safety” of course!
Never realised it wasn’t PPR! I go at least once a month and ring every time, anyway.
Interesting to read the comments above. All appreciated!! We will certainly look at adding other options to assist the PPR process such as SMS text and email.