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Dangerous air traffic control procedures over Paris airports
23 September, 2009

Michael Cosgrove

“Jerk. You are a bunch of good-for-nothings.” That is an extract from an exchange between an Air France pilot and air traffic controllers at Paris Roissy-Charles-de-Gaulle airport. Controllers’ abusive working practices are said to be behind it.

Illegal part-time working and deliberate understaffing in control towers are just two of the abusive practices routinely used by air traffic controllers in French airports, notably the two big Paris hubs, Orly and Charles-de-Gaulle, according to French daily Le Figaro. The paper has investigated rumours concerning the abuses and found that they often compromise aircraft safety during take-off, approach and landing phases.

The French transport minister angrily demanded full details of the allegations this morning, adding that he wanted them “within 24 hours.”

The job of aircraft controllers is to operate the systems that ensure safe air traffic movements in their sector. Their work is of the most crucial importance in avoiding mid-air collisions and accidents on runways. Without them, safe maneouvering by the large numbers of planes to be found in modern-day airspace, and most notably around big airports, would be impossible. The job can be stressful and the responsibility is enormous.

The inherently stressful nature of the job means that controllers do not work many hours a day, and French controllers are generally contracted to work only 24 hours a week at their workstations. In reality however, they have illegally organised themselves and their work routines in a way that means that many controllers in busier airports often work only 12 hours a week, although they are still paid for 24 hours. It is this situation that has led to some very serious in-flight and runway near-misses and other incidents.

“Clairance,” in French Air Traffic Control (ATC) terms is the word used to designate “clearance” or an authorisation to take off or land. It is also the name given to the illegal work systems, and has become synonymous in French ATC circles as being authorisation to take the day off.

ATC centres in France organise controllers into teams for each shift. A team at Roissy, for example, typically consists of 15 controllers, which is the number chosen to best ensure airplane safety. They are supposed to remain at their posts during their shift, but in reality several controllers on each shift are not even at the airport and have taken a paid day off with the connivence of the other controllers, who take another day off in their turn.

Rumours concerning ATC in France, officially denied by airports and controllers’ unions, have been circulating for a while. But, little by little, and under the cover of anonymity, people are beginning to talk.

“We have often noticed reductions in the number of plane movements allowed," said a management-level Air France employee. "Many of them are inexplicable because there is no technical or meteorological reason for that to happen. We then noticed that ATC staffing levels are lower than they should be. But we have to be very discreet about this issue because we fear reprisals such as strikes.”

Strikes are never far away in the world of French ATC because the trade unions have a very powerful presence in ATC in France. A one-day strike by them means millions of euros lost to Air France and other airlines, as well as disruption affecting millions of passengers.

Another key player in French aviation is the ‘Direction Générale de l’Aviation Civile’ (DGAC.) The DGAC does not deny the existence of the abuses, but minimised their effects in a vague statement, saying, “The number of control positions opened at a given moment cannot be inferior to the number which is necessary for aircraft safety.” The statement is vague because, although it mentions the number of control posts, or workstations, open, it does not say whether or not they are all manned.

Some suspect the abuse is tied to an increasing number of female controllers in what used to be an almost uniquely masculine world. Low staff levels often occur during school holidays, and are said to involve a significant number of female controllers.

Controllers normally cover just one zone of airport activity and its associated radar and radio work. These zones include landings, take-offs, runways, taxiing, and parking amongst others.

The Clairance system, however, means that a controller covering for absent colleagues often regroups several radio frequencies at once. For example, a controller may run both approach communications and taxiing instructions. This situation has sometimes led to what has been described a “cacophony” on the airwaves, which can lead to increased stress due to higher concentration levels and thus a reduction in aircraft safety.

The unions deny the rumours, saying that staffing levels are almost always what they should be.

Air France pilots claim that argument to be dishonest. Said one: “The controllers have the right to ask Eurocontrol [the European agency which coordinates ATC activity in European skies] in advance to reduce airport capacity, and thus the number of controllers. Many of those demands are made for fallacious reasons. So, although they reduce activity, there is technically no official delay to planes due to a lack of controllers.”

Fearing a strike, pilots are unwilling to push the issue further.

Several examples of serious incidents due to understaffing have come to light.

One pilot tells the horrifying story of a near-miss incident above Paris, in which a plane whose anti-collision equipment failed was not correctly looked after by controllers. “It was a Keyan Airlines. Our anti-collision gear warned us of an imminent collision and we dived at 4000 feet a minute to miss it. At that descent rate we quickly found ourselves only one minute from hitting the ground. I heard the other plane go right over my head.”

But his troubles were not yet over. Once on the ground, a controller authorised him to cross a runway [in order to proceed to his disembarking point.] The pilot says, “I suddenly saw a plane taking off on the runway and braked hard to stop my plane dead in its tracks. In just a few minutes I had to handle two major accident risk situations.”

After the incident, which went unnoticed by the passengers, an internal enquiry found that there were only eight out of the scheduled 15 controllers on duty at the time. “We alerted senior management to the situation,” said the pilot, “... but they said, ‘Don’t rock the boat with the controllers. If there’s a strike it’ll be a catastrophe.'” Other pilots have since tried to find details of the incident on a dedicated website, but it has been taken down.

Illegal understaffing by controllers has resulted in execrable relations between themselves and pilots. Those relations are endangering flight safety.

Below is the translation of an excerpt from a conversation in French between the pilot of Air France flight AF735 and controllers at Roissy Charles-de-Gaulle during the plane's landing approach.

Tower – “AF735, descend to level 360 and reduce to Mach point 75.”
Pilot – “Why are you penalising us so much by letting planes behind us go first?”
Tower – “There are only two runways at Roissy.”
Pilot – “Only two runways and two controllers you mean. You guys never do any work. We were late taking off, we have caught up the time lost, this is my last flight and I am going to retire in a very bad mood.”
Tower – “I couldn’t care less about that.”
Pilot – “Jerk. You are a bunch of good-for-nothings. You have no idea how to work.”

The conversation continues for almost two more minutes, with insults being traded and controllers laughing and joking amongst themselves. At one point a controller says, “He isn’t answering now is he!” whereupon his colleagues begin snickering. Pilots on other planes then intervene to condemn the conversation.

Clearly, that a plane on a landing approach engages in that kind of distracting conversation is an extremely serious breach of cockpit and controller discipline.

The incident took place because long-haul flights are normally allowed to overfly local traffic and land earlier, but this necessitates controller coordination. But controllers also have the option of putting all planes in single file in certain circumstances via a software system called Maestro. This requires less intervention by controllers. That is what happened in the above example and so the pilot lost the time he had caught up during the long flight. The higher-than-usual flight speed cost Air France almost 4 tonnes of fuel.

French Transport Minister Dominique Bussereau has demanded that the relevant aviation authorities “Give me, within 24 hours, the necessary elements of analysis and information concerning the reported incidents.” The DGAC said it would comply immediately with the demand.
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