Hundreds of flight delays hit Heathrow
Hundreds of flights were delayed at Heathrow two days after a new system went live to ‘cut delays caused by strong winds’.
The delays affected 287 flights taking off from Heathrow on Sunday and 288 flights arriving at the London airport, according the flight data website Flight Aware.
The new system, Time Based Separation (TBS), went live on Friday and was described as a ‘world first’.
In a press release by NATS, it said: "A new way of separating arriving aircraft at Heathrow Airport by time instead of distance in order to cut delays caused by strong winds has gone live as part of a phased introduction this year.
"Traditionally, air traffic controllers separate flights by set distances dependent on the aircraft type and the size of the spiralling air turbulence – or wake vortex – they create as they fly.
"Time Based Separation (TBS) takes live wind data from the aircraft to dynamically calculate the optimal safe spacing between each aircraft in order to maintain the landing rate. Its introduction is expected to halve current headwind delays at the airport and significantly reduce the need for airlines to cancel flights."
A spokesman for Heathrow Airport said: "There were delays at Heathrow yesterday due to very high winds.
"We had no cancellations (out of the approximately 1300 scheduled flights) so although we are running at 98% capacity the airport coped well with the weather disruption.
"Of course we are sorry for those passengers who were delayed yesterday."
A spokesman for NATS said: "The tool is obviously new so it will take some time for us to be getting the absolute most out of it.
"We are currently in a period of Limited Operational Service to refine our processes and ensure everything is working as expected. We then plan to go fully live on 1 May, although further refinements will probably be made over the course of the year."
Diane
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