Are pilots screwing up the basics so much that ATC needs to spoon-feed us now?

[HighFlyingA380]

The last week or two I've been hearing a couple new trends that confuse/concern me. They both involve very basic procedures, but now it seems like ATC is spoon-feeding these, which I thought was the purpose of publishing so as to reduce frequency congestion:

1- Getting a clearance out of KORD, it is always the O'Hare 8 and RVs to your transition. The climb procedures end as "maintain 5,000 or assigned altitude." Up to now, the clearance was given and read-back simply as "climb via the SID" and that obviously indicated that we'd stop at 5.000. Now, they still say climb via the SID, but then add "top altitude 5,000", and if you don't explicitly say that, you get a terse "I need you to verify top altitude assignment." WTH? Were professional pilots not reading the SID and just climbing away? This new protocol seems absolutely redundant and a wast of breath on an already clogged frequency...

Disclaimer: KORD is the only place I routinely depart on a published procedure, so I have no other location to compare it to. Are ya'll seeing this elsewhere?


2- Previously as you're vectored to an approach, it's been something such as: "Cleared RNAV 30, maintain 3,000 until established." Again just recently, I've been hearing the addition of: "Cleared RNAV 30, maintain 3,000 until established on a published portion of the approach."

So are pilots not understanding what being "established" actually entails and just descending whenever they want?

 

[ISaidRightTurns]

For the first one I can say that controllers are getting burned more and more frequently with guys blowing through their altitude (foreign carriers especially - I think top/bottom altitude is an ICAO difference). The .65 says they may exclude the top altitude assignment when published on the SID, but if issued, it must be read back.

Regarding the second, I could see where it would be added if I'm vectoring for an IF at an intercept that is similar to the IF > IAF line. As far as I know it's not standard phraseology. 7110.65 5-9-4 has some good examples but the phrase they use in describing them are "...until established on a segment of a published route or instrument approach procedure" but specifies an at or above clearance at the IF. I could see the clearance you gave as being better than the book in this particular case, sometimes in the real world they just go with what works.

 

[Jmcmanna]

ORD had more than 60 reported cases of aircraft climbing to the wrong altitude on the ORD8 SID (and probably more than didn't cause a conflict and weren't reported). Most of them were caught by the controller, but a few times aircraft either leveled off at 4000 (and conflicted with traffic at satellite airports like MDW), or climbed to 10,000 (conflicting to arrivals descending to 7000, really bad if you were climbing at a 'corner', like a 320 or 220 heading). One even came off climbing to FL390. Many of them resulted in a loss of separation.

Since ORD ATCT has begun using the "top altitude 5000" (or whatever they do to verify the top altitude), I don't think there have been any occurrences of aircraft climbing to the wrong altitude, although they have not been doing it long.

It seems redundant, but we have to compensate for the bottom 1% of pilots (which at ORD is still a couple dozen flights per day) to keep everyone else moving safely.

Now the biggest issue again (which has been that way forever) is that pilots come off on the wrong departure frequency dozens of times per day. At least the airspace is designed to accommodate NORDO aircraft at 5000 for at least 20 miles in every direction, so coming up with a solution is not a high priority.

 

[Jmcmanna]

With regards to question 2....I don't think there has been an official change of phraseology, but pilots do make mistakes with that regard, too. An MD80 flying into ORD ignored 6 altitude crossing restrictions on the 27L localizer and descended to 2500 feet 40 miles east of ORD. other pilots who are at the MVA want to go 'just a little lower' to try to see if they can get below a cloud deck and descend to an unsafe altitude without saying anything. I had a 737 pilot flying into MDW (whose airlines operates hundreds of flights per day there) ask for 3000 to get below a cloud layer as they were approaching the departure side of the airport, even though for the last 10 minutes, departing aircraft have been calling on the same frequency climbing to 3000.

I once had an operational deviation because a UAL flight with 3 numbers in its call sign take a descent instruction for an EGF with 4 numbers in its call sign and descend into SBN approach airspace while on the WATSN arrival into ORD.

 

[mikea]

With regards to question 2....I don't think there has been an official change of phraseology, but pilots do make mistakes with that regard, too. An MD80 flying into ORD ignored 6 altitude crossing restrictions on the 27L localizer and descended to 2500 feet 40 miles east of ORD.

So I'm confidently flying VFR at 2700 (sic) under the Bravo and can't count on the airliner being above me? Wake turbulence! MAMA!!!

 

[Palmpilot]

So I'm confidently flying VFR at 2700 (sic)...

What's wrong with flying VFR at 2700?

 

[N801BH]

The last week or two I've been hearing a couple new trends that confuse/concern me. They both involve very basic procedures, but now it seems like ATC is spoon-feeding these, which I thought was the purpose of publishing so as to reduce frequency congestion:

1- Getting a clearance out of KORD, it is always the O'Hare 8 and RVs to your transition. The climb procedures end as "maintain 5,000 or assigned altitude." Up to now, the clearance was given and read-back simply as "climb via the SID" and that obviously indicated that we'd stop at 5.000. Now, they still say climb via the SID, but then add "top altitude 5,000", and if you don't explicitly say that, you get a terse "I need you to verify top altitude assignment." WTH? Were professional pilots not reading the SID and just climbing away? This new protocol seems absolutely redundant and a wast of breath on an already clogged frequency...

Disclaimer: KORD is the only place I routinely depart on a published procedure, so I have no other location to compare it to. Are ya'll seeing this elsewhere?


2- Previously as you're vectored to an approach, it's been something such as: "Cleared RNAV 30, maintain 3,000 until established." Again just recently, I've been hearing the addition of: "Cleared RNAV 30, maintain 3,000 until established on a published portion of the approach."

So are pilots not understanding what being "established" actually entails and just descending whenever they want?

We have this phrase repeated on every clearance /readback on departures here in KJAC........

"Climb via the SID, except maintain 16 thousand..... I think the SID spells out 16 thousand so why the additional instruction....

Talking about wasting bandwidth....

 

[Unit74]

Sounds like much ado about nothing to me guys. Why are you so worried about the extra about 1 second it takes? Do you take it personal as if the controller assumes you have not read the DP or did you actually think there may be a specific reason why they are requiring the notification and read back?

Instead of whining about it on the interweb, may I suggest a call to the tower supervisor or FSDO? Me thinks a trend of "pilots" have been busting the restriction, hence, the read back.

 

[bobmrg]

The last week or two I've been hearing a couple new trends that confuse/concern me. They both involve very basic procedures, but now it seems like ATC is spoon-feeding these, which I thought was the purpose of publishing so as to reduce frequency congestion:

1- Getting a clearance out of KORD, it is always the O'Hare 8 and RVs to your transition. The climb procedures end as "maintain 5,000 or assigned altitude." Up to now, the clearance was given and read-back simply as "climb via the SID" and that obviously indicated that we'd stop at 5.000. Now, they still say climb via the SID, but then add "top altitude 5,000", and if you don't explicitly say that, you get a terse "I need you to verify top altitude assignment." WTH? Were professional pilots not reading the SID and just climbing away? This new protocol seems absolutely redundant and a wast of breath on an already clogged frequency...

Disclaimer: KORD is the only place I routinely depart on a published procedure, so I have no other location to compare it to. Are ya'll seeing this elsewhere?


2- Previously as you're vectored to an approach, it's been something such as: "Cleared RNAV 30, maintain 3,000 until established." Again just recently, I've been hearing the addition of: "Cleared RNAV 30, maintain 3,000 until established on a published portion of the approach."

So are pilots not understanding what being "established" actually entails and just descending whenever they want?

This is not new. This tiny URL will take you to a PDF explaining it all.

http://tinyurl.com/lalsw8z

Bob Gardner

 

[HighFlyingA380]

This is not new. This tiny URL will take you to a PDF explaining it all.

http://tinyurl.com/lalsw8z

Bob Gardner

Yeah, already have that. I know the "climb via" stuff isn't new. What I'm asking is about their repatition of the charted "top altitude" portion, which that document clearly indicates (questions 4 & 5) is not necessary to explicitly say unless the cleared altitude is different than charted. I've always only gotten 5,000, which is charted.

Another redundant thing they do is after I read-back the "climb via the SID" clearance, they always "confirm you are able to meet the altitude restrictions?" Duh. If I was unable to meet it, I wouldn't have accepted the clearance...

 

[HighFlyingA380]

Sounds like much ado about nothing to me guys. Why are you so worried about the extra about 1 second it takes? Do you take it personal as if the controller assumes you have not read the DP or did you actually think there may be a specific reason why they are requiring the notification and read back?

Instead of whining about it on the interweb, may I suggest a call to the tower supervisor or FSDO? Me thinks a trend of "pilots" have been busting the restriction, hence, the read back.

Are the interwebz used for anything other than bitching about stuff??? Learn something new everyday... :wink2:

And yeah, I kinda do take it personal. I don't like people just assuming I'm not doing my job, especially when people's lives are at stake.

And it does take significantly longer than 1 second, and at a place such as KORD where it can easily take 10-15 minutes to get a clearance and get in line for taxi, yeah, it is a problem. PAX get mad, we burn more fuel, we get off schedule, and people, including myself, get grumpy...

 

[Palmpilot]

Are the interwebz used for anything other than bitching about stuff??? Learn something new everyday... :wink2:

And yeah, I kinda do take it personal. I don't like people just assuming I'm not doing my job, especially when people's lives are at stake.

And it does take significantly longer than 1 second, and at a place such as KORD where it can easily take 10-15 minutes to get a clearance and get in line for taxi, yeah, it is a problem. PAX get mad, we burn more fuel, we get off schedule, and people, including myself, get grumpy...

Considering the reduction in altitude deviations reported in post #3, it does sound like the extra verbiage is necessary and accomplishing its intended purpose, though.