Too cold for YYZ workers

[pelmet]

Quite correct. We were clearly told it was -40 C temperature in the post(which is going to chill us). I keep hearing people claiming that they experienced these ridiculously low temps which are not true.

My actual coldest was -48C. It had been -50 earlier before we arrived but it warmed up and I was quite disappointed but I think it is in the fifties if F is used.

By the way, can anyone tell me when the actual ground stop from GTAA started and finished?

[Shadowfax]

What utter nonsense on this page.

The air temp was -23. Machines do not know "wind chill". Modern airliners are certified to operate in the stratosphere which last time I checked is normally -56C. To state that equipment was "frozen" is an insult to any Canadian that ever had to boost a car - minus 23 is hardly cold - hardly worth mentioning.

This concept of "O we move so much more metal than Edmonton" what garbage! To the individual worker, does it matter whether there are 2 airplanes to service or 1 million? 1 man 1 job - just do it! Comparing the EG rampies to the numbers in YYZ - really - look in the mirror. You embarrass yourselves with every post.

This is really simple - YYZ employs people who are not prepared for an even moderately cold Canadian Winter - call in the ARMY! To any crews who think they did the best they could - one phrase - lowered expectations! This is Canada - it's cold - wear a frigin ski mask - preferably while not going to a 7-11

[Rockie]

I'm guessing you weren't working at YYZ when this was going on and therefore have no first hand knowledge of what transpired.

[Married a Canadian]

This concept of "O we move so much more metal than Edmonton" what garbage! To the individual worker, does it matter whether there are 2 airplanes to service or 1 million? 1 man 1 job - just do it! Comparing the EG rampies to the numbers in YYZ - really - look in the mirror. You embarrass yourselves with every post

It matters to the individual worker because when there is a snowball effect due to the increased "metal" that is coming in....you can't keep up with the demand AND the weather conditions.
I am sorry but the numbers matter in this case because the airport had to take a lot more aircraft than it could handle in the weather conditions at the time (which btw had more to them than the "balmy" minus 23 that the rest of Canada is sneering at being uncanadian). A simple aviation equation of too many planes + not enough stands + weather conditions that were the worst seen in YYZ for a long time = ground stop and complications. Now as far as I can see in that equation...the too many planes part is one that would be less common in EG than it is at YYZ....I am sure that EG or WG would have the same problems if that were ever part of the equation.

I have been consistent in that I am not the GTAAs biggest fan..and I sure hope they learn a LOT from the events last week. But it is getting rather tiring listening to comments like the above as everyone seems to think that YYZ should operate the same as other airports round Canada in bad weather and that YYZ is somehow weak because minus 23 is not as cold as the rest of the country.
If you want to compare anything...even the cold...you have to compare EVERYTHING...and not just cherry pick what you think is the most canadian response in winter.

BTW I don`t mind embarrassing myself with every post because I work at YYZ so at least I know first hand what transpired.

[teacher]

It wasn't just the cold. Blowing snow causing low vis, flash freeze causing an inch of ice on every paved surface and taking in 30 diversions from Ottawa, Montreal and toronto a City a Centre are what rally caused the problem.

Not enough gates. Rough weather, deciding delays and slow working conditions were the real problems. The cold was just one part. The ground stop was warranted to try and clear some of the back log and clean up the airport of ice.

Again, it's easy to criticize from the comfort of an office on parliament hill or the warmth of the terminal.

[Inverted2]

And a lot of rampies called in sick. Paying minimum wage for the new guys doesn't really motivate anyone to come into work and freeze for 10 or 12 bucks an hour.

[sportingrifle]

Well Polar Vortex 2.0 may be headed to YYZ again - lets see what they learned from last time.

[iflyforpie]

And a lot of rampies called in sick. Paying minimum wage for the new guys doesn't really motivate anyone to come into work and freeze for 10 or 12 bucks an hour.

If the big carriers who were inconvenienced held a carrot out for a cruise pilot position after x number of years as a YYZ rampie.... they would never have to worry about staff shortages or people calling in sick--no matter what the weather was.

[Inverted2]

And a lot of rampies called in sick. Paying minimum wage for the new guys doesn't really motivate anyone to come into work and freeze for 10 or 12 bucks an hour.

If the big carriers who were inconvenienced held a carrot out for a cruise pilot position after x number of years as a YYZ rampie.... they would never have to worry about staff shortages or people calling in sick--no matter what the weather was.

Don't give them any ideas. It'll be YYZ Ice Pilots

[Bede]

Rockie, teacher, et al.

So please answer this question:

What was the greatest contributing factor to this SNAFU:
a) icy taxiways
b) equipment that would not start because it was too cold (-23C)
c) the 34 SwissPort employees that booked off sick that day and the GTAA having only 2 fuellers available for the entire airport

[hazatude]

I have clinched and closed with the naked North, I have learned to defy and defend;
Shoulder to shoulder we have fought it out -- yet the Wild must win in the end.

-Robert Service

[Married a Canadian]

In answer to this question

What was the greatest contributing factor to this SNAFU:
a) icy taxiways
b) equipment that would not start because it was too cold (-23C)
c) the 34 SwissPort employees that booked off sick that day and the GTAA having only 2 fuellers available for the entire airport

You can't just narrow it down to one factor. The SNAFU started as I have mentioned when YYZ took in diversions from other airports (mainly YOW, YUL and YTZ) and as the gates weren't being vacated there was no where to put them...so real estate began to become in short supply. With deboarding, staffing and fuelling being limited AND weather conditions that were brutal for Toronto (I don't care what the rest of Canada thinks) everything escalated.

The taxiways? This is the one area that the GTAA did as well as they could. The runways were useable at all times. The taxiways were scrubbed and sanded constantly. When the groundstop was lifted they were ready to go. The groundstop did not affect bizjets or cargo and they landed and taxied without incident.
As for the equipment freezing and the sick calls? That is something for the GTAA to look at and figure out.

IMO the worst part of the response by the GTAA was the communication to all involved parties. My understanding is that there was little to none from the levels of management that you would expect it from. My work colleagues on the midnight shift said the Air Canada stock frequency was bordering on comical at times in terms of how little information was being given to the pilots.

We have another cold spell coming this week (without the snow and ice though). Hopefully it will be "ops normal".

[Bede]

Married a Canadian,

I was there, the taxiways were brutal. But why was no one moving off the gates allowing other airplanes to get in? Because ramp crews didn't show up and GTAA told their employees to stay inside.

GTAA took a situation which should have caused minor delays (<1hr) and, through their ineptitude, turned it into a situation causing massive delays which resulted in a one week effort by airlines to clean up.

[teacher]

Rockie, teacher, et al.

So please answer this question:

What was the greatest contributing factor to this SNAFU:
a) icy taxiways
b) equipment that would not start because it was too cold (-23C)
c) the 34 SwissPort employees that booked off sick that day and the GTAA having only 2 fuellers available for the entire airport

A) icy taxiways: I know of 2 planes that went into snow banks not from taxiing fast but being either blown by the wind or being jets, we're unable to have zero thrust and slow motioned brakes on into the snow. Taxiing was VERY slow and we were weather cocking when hit by a gust. Sand and uria were being blown off before it did any good. Push backs in some case were impossible as the tugs were spinning out and not moving.

B) Equipment: both flights i managed to do needed new GPUs as they were running but wouldn't provide any power. Maintenance said electrical components inside were probably frozen due to a combination of moisture than extreme cold.

C) Ground crew: both flights I did that we're not cancelled had to wait a long time for ground crew to load and marshal us in and out. I have no opinion about book offs as I didn't know about it until I read it here. Jazz doesn't use swissport either. I did watch many of them doing their best but it was getting dangerous with the ice and wind especially Monday night. When iti the 2 to 4 times longer to service the plane and get it off the gate other aircraft have to wait. YYZ is a busy airport and gates just don't sit empty.

D) BAGS!!! Bags were arriving into the airport from diverted flights, checked bags for flights that were either delayed or cancelled, checked bags from flights that were loaded than cancelled and brought back into the terminal ALL together overwhelmed the baggage system in YYZ.

E) YYZ fuelling is usually done by driving a truck with a pump beside the aircraft and plugging into an underground system of fuel pipes that deliver the fuel rather than tanker trucks. When it snowed, rained than flash froze it froze the access covers shut under 1 to 2 inches of ice. YYZ obviously doesn't keep an entire fleet of tankers on standby just in case and the extreme waiting time for fuel also made leaving the gates a very drawn out affair. Some flights were loaded and ready waiting for fuel when the wait got so long that they were than cancelled.

What was the biggest SNAFU? All of it combined together.

[Married a Canadian]

Bede

I understand the taxiways were brutal at the time the snow and freezing rain went through....not denying that...and I have read how much fun taxiing and the like was that night. That was still not the root cause of the problems discussed on this thread though..and I have maintained throughout that not many airports worldwide would do a better job of snowclearing and ice removal as YYZ with comparable size and traffic numbers. It was impossible to treat all surfaces on the Sunday evening....too much pavement...no airport would have been able to keep all areas clear given the weather conditions.

GTAA took a situation which should have caused minor delays (<1hr)

C'mon..be honest...delays are never going to be less than an hour in peak arrival traffic (which is what Sunday evening was) in the middle of a snow clearing operation with further bad weather forecast AND all the diversions that came in. To suggest otherwise is unrealistic..weather is weather no matter how badly the GTAA fumbled the other issues. Ground stops and reduced rates are common in bad weather at the best of times.....this was not the best of times.

The ground stop should not be the issue as it seems to be a case of "damned if you do..damned if you don't". The delays should not be an issue either because they are going to happen......we'll come back to this in summer with thunderstorms and the like.

The issue is why the snarl up escalated to beyond the norm (the two refuellers being a prime point, the sick calls for rampies, gate crews staying inside etc). This has taken the attention away from what the GTAA normally does well (winter ops)...and has given them unwelcome attention and a lot to digest and learn from.

which resulted in a one week effort by airlines to clean up.

The airlines have a lot to learn from this aswell. Their communication in the terminals to passengers was pretty poor to say the least. Plus, even with the commercial pressure aspect of flying, they still schedule all their arrivals and departures in BAD weather in the hope that outside agencies (ATC and the GTAA) will by some miracle be able to keep the arrival/departure rate high.....knowing full well that won't be the case. Hello snarl up and ground stop city.

[sportingrifle]

Teacher, Married, Rockie et all.....


I was there and have my own opinions of why this turned in to such a disaster....no one thing but my personal opinion is that personal issues and management decisions played a bigger role than technical and wx issues. Nonetheless, am I to take from your collective posts that in the conditions experienced, nothing else could have been done to make the operation work?

Because if that is the case, in addition to a minimum RVR and ceiling, YYZ should have a Minimum Operational Temperature (MOT). If the temp is forcast to reach the MOT, then all flights should be diverted and the airport closed as it is incapable of operating at temperatures below MOT.

I am deliberately being silly here to point out that as long as we keep blaming the fiasco on an act of God and telling each other how much tin we move on good days, , not much will improve. For an airport with the highest landing/pax fees in Air Canada's worldwide system, this is just plain inexcusable. Spend less money on the public art in a crew bypass hallway that nobody but some unappreciative pilots ever see and spend it on whatever it takes to make the airport operate in a Canadian winter. Hmmm, maybe I am not being so silly......

Sportingrifle

[Rockie]

I was there and have my own opinions of why this turned in to such a disaster....no one thing but my personal opinion is that personal issues and management decisions played a bigger role than technical and wx issues. Nonetheless, am I to take from your collective posts that in the conditions experienced, nothing else could have been done to make the operation work?

I've heard here that all but two of Consolidated fuel drivers booked off that one night. If it's true, then that all by itself would bring YYZ to its knees even on the best weather day of the year.

It takes about 100 things coming together perfectly to get an airplane pushed off the gate on time at an airport like Toronto. If one of them fails or is delayed there is an inevitable pressure down the line that effects everything around it in some way. YYZ is also the major connecting hub in this country and a major one for North America, so problems in other centres also have a negative effect on this airport. The rolling crap weather in this part of the continent that week and a half effected all 100 of those very necessary things and the snowballing effect was huge.

Mistakes were made I'm sure and they will be identified and every effort made to prevent them from happening again. But I am confident there is not another airport in the world with the size and scope of operation YYZ has that could have done better. Blaming it strictly on the cold is grossly uninformed. Comparing YYZ to Bumrush, Saskatchewan is equally so.

[GUMPS]

Oh please do tell me these 100 things that need to come together just to get off the gate on time..

[Rockie]

Oh please do tell me these 100 things that need to come together just to get off the gate on time..

Cargo
Catering
Fuel
Ground handling
Maintenance
Gate Allotment
ATC
Flight planning
Security
Passenger handling
Customs
Homeland Security
Etc
Etc
Etc

You have no idea...

I remember seeing a poster of everything that has to occur beginning 48 hours before a flight departure leading up to departure time. I tried finding it online but couldn't. You think that swarm of vehicles around the airplane just happens? Bags load themselves? Toilets empty themselves? Fuel magically appears?

[GUMPS]

Sometimes I think you forget what a majority of the posters on here do for a living...Anyways, enjoy the -20 again today.

[Married a Canadian]

spend it on whatever it takes to make the airport operate in a Canadian winter.

That quote alone raises the most interesting question. At what level should the users (ie airlines) and the passengers EXPECT an airport like YYZ to operate at in not only a canadian winter but also in the weather conditions that caused the snarl up and the topic of this thread.
My main disagreement in this whole topic isn't that the ball was dropped on many levels and to quote

personal opinion is that personal issues and management decisions played a bigger role than technical and wx issues

I 100% agree with that, but there are various posters and people out there that seem to think that YYZ should have kept working the same even in atrocious weather AND with numerous personal and management issues. YYZ can operate in winter conditions....and does year on year. No point in reporting that though on a normal day though as that isn't newsworthy, "airport moves aircraft in bad weather" dosen't really grab the attention.
I have been watching the news this morning with the impending snowmaggedon being forecast for the East coast again in the US. They have premptively cancelled hundreds of flights at the various airports (PHL, BOS, DCA, PIT, JFK, EWR, IAD, LGA) to ensure there isn't a backlog.
Why don't the airlines in consultation with the GTAA do that in Toronto? Why run a full operation when you KNOW what is coming and the effect it is going to have on your operation(on the very basic level in any snowclearing operation, capacity is reduced as there will only be one arrival and departure runway). I appreciate the commercial pressure on the airlines but that pressure becomes even more with an almighty cluster**** on the ground and in the air. Overloading the system in ANY transport scenario (car, train and aircraft) is never going to result in smooth operations. Once you add in the other elements mentioned in this thread you are at a point that something is going to give....in this case...a ground stop.

nothing else could have been done to make the operation work?

My answer to that is the commercially difficult one of cancelling flights in advance. Agreeing to an arrival and departure rate that will allow a continous flow within the restrictions that the weather was allowing. I worked arrival on the Sunday evening...and the sweat patches under my arms weren't coming from a "steady" flow of traffic into YYZ. If the gates were full and planes could not push back then why were planes still coming in to land? Where were they going to go?

If the temp is forcast to reach the MOT, then all flights should be diverted and the airport closed as it is incapable of operating at temperatures below MOT.

You aren't far off the mark.....although as Rockie, Teacher and myself will continue to reiterate...it wasn't the cold that caused the stoppage. However it does back up my point of an airport cannot operate at peak capacity in bad weather...and it certainly can't operate at peak capacity in the weather experienced on the days in question. I had a rather frank exchange with a pilot who got annoyed that in the summer with thunderstorms all round the area that sometimes they get steered into some rather "bumpy" flying conditions. My response was that all the other aircraft that wanted to land at that exact same time were saying the same thing and that there wasn't enough sky to keep them all clear of all the CBs...and yet the minute ground stops and airborne holds were put in place to try and give us more room...we would get phonecalls from all levels of management pushing pushing to get things moving again. You can't have it both ways.
So there have to be tough decisions made about WHO gets delayed and for how long OR who gets cancelled. The US is doing it today as we speak. Would YYZ and the GTAA have the gumption to do the same to the extent that the operation can run at an acceptable level for ALL parties involved (not just the airlines).

You also have to ask how to make the operation work with the amount of sick calls that have been reported (of which I was also unaware as I am not on that side of the field). If you need a minimum amount of bodies to keep the operation running and they all call in sick....what do you put in place to stop happening in the future? Perhaps more people on standby (if there weren't already?). Sicknotes required for any calls on a known weather day?

Sometimes I think you forget what a majority of the posters on here do for a living

When Rockie, Teacher and myself are reporting what happened both from an ATC and cockpit standpoint AND also in Rockie's case, giving some examples of the SNAFUs and why they occured (the GPU and fuelling issue was well explained I thought) it can get a bit wearying to keep getting told...Yes BUT, yes BUT, Yes BUT.
I don't think any of the 3 of us have said "Yay GTAA..the best...yay...textbook operation all the way through YAY!"......I really REALLY hope they learn a LOT from everything that occurred and preventative measures are put in place for the future
Having said that though..having "industry professionals" say things like that delays shouldn't be less than an hour and that YYZ should be the same as other Canadian airports, or that the weather experienced is "normal" for Canada......what am I supposed to say?

I point out the amount of "tin" being moved on a good day (1200 plus usually) to make the point that if you try doing that on a "bad" day....problems will occur.

Anyway....fingers crossed for the next 3 days. Given that there is no snow and ice forecast...I don't foresee a problem.

[teacher]

Sometimes I think you forget what a majority of the posters on here do for a living...Anyways, enjoy the -20 again today.

No offence GUMPS but by the posts made by some you have to excuse me for assuming many are either not working in the aviation industry or just simply do not have a clue. Understandable if one were to work at smaller airports doing charter work.

YYZ runs like a conveyor belt that doesn't stop. 24s of beer come out the brewery and must being removed every few seconds and loaded onto a pallet. But to get to the belt from the pallet you have to navigate an obstacle course. If one of the obstacles takes longer than planned the 24s start adding up. Eventually if too many obstacles take too long to navigate and the 24s start piling up they fall. Anything out of sequence like a late arrival, malfunctioning GPU or fuel delay throws the whole sequence off. The volume of arrivals and departures just can't handle these kind of schedule destructions.

Something as simple as a tail swap due to a mechanical problem for example is an easy 1-1 1/2 hour delay. New flight plans have to be filed, fuel, catering, grooming, ground crew, tow crew, slot times and baggage need to be arranged. Now, do this 10 to 20 times over like during the last storm and things get unmanageable really fast.

Passengers especially don't realize how many hands are involved to get an aircraft on it's way. They think of it like a car, throw your bags in and go.

As was pointed out, the GTAA and airlines do make preventative cancelations but maybe it's just not enough. An issue of too little too late. Next thing though you'll be hearing criticism of too many canceled flights!! "How can a Canadian Airline cancel flights in the winter" they'll say. We just can't win.

[Rockie]

Sometimes I think you forget what a majority of the posters on here do for a living...

Edit: You asked the question and I answered it. How is that forgetting what people here do for a living? If you already knew the answer why ask?

[flatface]

No aviation content inferred or implied. I am just saying "you never know what you get in box of chocolates" or how they got into that box or did not get into that box.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WmAwcMNxGqM

[Married a Canadian]

Very cold weather in Toronto the last two days and wouldn't you know it....the operation at YYZ has run fine. Only cancellations have been the flights to the US that have been hammered by snow.
Now why won't the media report that Pearson was operating fine in the cold weather?