Ryanair operations in bad weather

[Lx008]

Trams out for the night, announced around 1300hrs. Buses slowly rolling out back into service since 1800hrs, basically every operator (train & plane too!) wiped out here in the Lothians.

mods note - split from this thread

Other than the mighty Ryanair who for some questionable reason has decided that all flight to Edinburgh should make at least 2 (non-successful) landing attempts before diverting to better weather.

 

[DunsBus]

Other than the mighty Ryanair who for some questionable reason has decided that all flight to Edinburgh should make at least 2 (non-successful) landing attempts before diverting to better weather.

Ah, Ryanair. You can always tell one of its planes apart as it's the one with an outside toilet.

I'm very surprised that it even attempted to land at Edinburgh given the forecast. Red weather warnings aren't issued for fun!

 

[ejstubbs]

Other than the mighty Ryanair who for some questionable reason has decided that all flight to Edinburgh should make at least 2 (non-successful) landing attempts before diverting to better weather.

Ryanair did actually manage to land a flight from Budapest at EDI yesterday at 08:31 - at the second attempt. Someone videoed the landing of the flight from Budapest and it looks a tad sketchy to me. Note in that Flightrader24 screenshot all the cancelled flights that had been due in before and after, and the Ryanair flight from Stanstead due to land an hour later that gave up and returned whence it came - at a time when, according to the Met Office, the winds had actually diminished somewhat, before really getting going two or three hours later.

I find the comment on the X-formely-known-as-Twitter post linked above that the pilots were "earning their wages" somewhat questionable. The problem at the time was not so much the mean wind speed, which wasn't exceptional, but the fact that it was gusting up to twice the mean speed. Having your airspeed going up and down like a yoyo can't have been fun, and I do wonder whether the correct professional decision would have been to divert. Ryanair pressuring their crews to do otherwise sounds pretty dodgy to me. The people actually flying the aircraft are the ones with the training and the real-time information needed for making such decisions, and are the ones responsible for doing so. An airline exerting subtle psychological (and procedural) pressure on the flight deck crew to question their own judgement would, I suspect, not go down well were anything to go badly wrong (similar practices have been called out in the investigation reports into to accidents in the past).

 

[JG89]

Ryanair did actually manage to land a flight from Budapest at EDI yesterday at 08:31 - at the second attempt. Someone videoed the landing of the flight from Budapest and it looks a tad sketchy to me. Note in that Flightrader24 screenshot all the cancelled flights that had been due in before and after, and the Ryanair flight from Stanstead due to land an hour later that gave up and returned whence it came - at a time when, according to the Met Office, the winds had actually diminished somewhat, before really getting going two or three hours later.

I find the comment on the X-formely-known-as-Twitter post linked above that the pilots were "earning their wages" somewhat questionable. The problem at the time was not so much the mean wind speed, which wasn't exceptional, but the fact that it was gusting up to twice the mean speed. Having your airspeed going up and down like a yoyo can't have been fun, and I do wonder whether the correct professional decision would have been to divert. Ryanair pressuring their crews to do otherwise sounds pretty dodgy to me. The people actually flying the aircraft are the ones with the training and the real-time information needed for making such decisions, and are the ones responsible for doing so. An airline exerting subtle psychological (and procedural) pressure on the flight deck crew to question their own judgement would, I suspect, not go down well were anything to go badly wrong (similar practices have been called out in the investigation reports into to accidents in the past).

Do you have any actual evidence for these accusations you've made against Ryanair?

 

[Shaw S Hunter]

Do you have any actual evidence for these accusations you've made against Ryanair?

I'll throw in the following anecdote as purely circumstantial evidence. During the years I was a regular spotter at MAN I saw only two airlines cause go-arounds due to runway incursions.

One was PIA whose pilots seemed to have difficulty following Tower instructions immediately after landing and thus were sometimes incredibly slow vacating the runway. So if ATC had the next lander close behind the incoming pilot occasionally had to go around. This could happen almost anywhere in practice especially where amateur pilots use major airports.

The other was Ryanair. Every now and then a departing pilot would start to move from the holding point to line up for take off in anticipation of receiving the appropriate instruction completely oblivious to the fact that the next lander had been given landing clearance quite a long way out. A serious no-no and the sort of thing that can lead to Tenerife type accidents. The only "excuse" could be a few Ryanair pilots succumbing to management pressure to maintain their schedules.

Now that's not to say it's in any way endemic. But IME these were the only "guilty" parties that I witnessed at MAN. I stress again this is completely anecdotal and circumstantial.

 

[JG89]

I'll throw in the following anecdote as purely circumstantial evidence. During the years I was a regular spotter at MAN I saw only two airlines cause go-arounds due to runway incursions.

One was PIA whose pilots seemed to have difficulty following Tower instructions immediately after landing and thus were sometimes incredibly slow vacating the runway. So if ATC had the next lander close behind the incoming pilot occasionally had to go around. This could happen almost anywhere in practice especially where amateur pilots use major airports.

The other was Ryanair. Every now and then a departing pilot would start to move from the holding point to line up for take off in anticipation of receiving the appropriate instruction completely oblivious to the fact that the next lander had been given landing clearance quite a long way out. A serious no-no and the sort of thing that can lead to Tenerife type accidents. The only "excuse" could be a few Ryanair pilots succumbing to management pressure to maintain their schedules.

Now that's not to say it's in any way endemic. But IME these were the only "guilty" parties that I witnessed at MAN. I stress again this is completely anecdotal and circumstantial.

So no, you have 0 evidence to support any of the serious claims claims you've made against Ryanair.

I recommend you stop yourself making any further accusations of unsafe practices amongst Ryanair pilots without evidence.

 

[Shaw S Hunter]

So no, you have 0 evidence to support any of the serious claims claims you've made against Ryanair.

I recommend you stop yourself making any further accusations of unsafe practices amongst Ryanair pilots without evidence.

It would help if you read my post properly. I am not the OP, did not make the accusations which clearly bother you and was merely pointing out that "stuff" does in fact happen. I also included a disclaimer, twice. If you work for Ryanair perhaps you should say so.

 

[GRALISTAIR]

Knock West Ireland - NOC - is an all weather airport and Ryanair use it a lot. However, NOC to LPL which my wife and I take regularly having family in County Galway, can be dodgy due to the wind gusts across Liverpool bay. I have never really had a problem though.