OUTPUT by EGATS

2Dec. 2004

The Eurocontrol Guild’s publication of Air Traffic Control

In this issue you read about ...... the 2005 Annual General Meeting,... the Eurocontrol CISM Workshop,... the last Regional Meeting of IFATCA in Bucharest,... the ‘Quick-Wins’ our Space Management Doc,... the EGATS Photo Competition,... and many other interesting matters.

Publishing StatementEGATS OUTPUT ©2004 EGATSVolume 9/Issue 2December 2004

Editor - editor@egats.org:Patrik Peters - President of EGATS - president@egats.orgpdtp peters desktop publishing

Contributions by:Members of the Executive Board of EGATS, Philippe Domogala, Max Bezzina & others.

Printing:The EUROCONTROL printing office -Thank You!

EGATS OUTPUT is published three times per year. It is solely for our members. No part of the information contained in this issue is of anybusiness to the outside world, unless otherwise dedicated by the Executive Board of EGATS. Anybody who forwards this informationoutside the EGATS membership without the express, written approval of the EGATS Executive Board will be proposed for expulsion at thenext AGM for acting against the interests of the EUROCONTROL GUILD OF AIR TRAFFIC SERVICES. The articles, letters, opinions etc.contained in OUTPUT are those of the writers who are solely responsible for their content. They do not necessarily reflect the opinion ofthe EUROCONTROL Guild.

The EGATS name and logo are our trademarks and are not to be used without permission.

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Skiing events in 2005:

The Golden Flight Level 2005 inChamonix/France15. - 22.01.2005

info: www.GFL2005.com

NATCA Skifest 2005 in Breckenridge/ColoradoUSA

05. - 12.02.2005info: www.natcaskifest.com

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Chances!

Dear members,

It’s getting colder outside. And I don’t onlymean the fact that we are approachingwinter.We are facing a cold front and stormy times.The national service providers from the 4states of the Maastricht airspace areconducting informal talks to have theMaastricht UAC released from theEurocontrol agency. For many years alreadythey claim wanting to split the serviceprovision from the regulatory body. This isa pushed forward argument as themultilateral agreement between the 4states and Eurocontrol clearly states thatthe regulation rests with these 4 states.The truth behind though is that ourprofession is, more and more, seen as abusiness, which makes profit. And it is theseprofits they are interested in. Furthermore,in their eyes, the MASUAC has to becomecheaper ,- to increase the profit evenfurther! The DFS under the leadership ofMr. Kaden have managed to persuade theGerman Ministry of Transport to transferMASUAC into a service provision unitmanaged by …. “global players” like theDFS or LVNL (both members of CANSO).Talks are going on behind the back ofEUROCONTROL between the DFS, ATC –The Netherlands (LVNL) and Belgocontrolas well as the Luxembourgian authorities.Should these talks continue to be successfuland the DFS keep on with their marchagainst a Eurocontrol MASUAC, then it willnot only become colder for us, but will befreezing instead. In this power-play, smallerservice providers like Belgocontrol will also,either be eaten or at least have to co-operate with the “global players”.It is easily imaginable that our workingcontracts won’t remain the way they arecurrently. There may be some advantagesfor us, but for sure these contracts will be“streamlined”. And having the currentreduction of salaries, due to the change incost of living-factor, in view – you mightbe able to imagine where we end up.The so far valid notion of: “If you thinkthat safety is expensive – try an accident!”is to be seen in a different light. Safety isbeing assessed as a risk that can becalculated. It thus appears cheaper to allowa certain risk rather than to invest inimproving safety. Does human life becomepayable when investment is returned?Do we want to go down that track?The DFS is currently promoting SMOP –Single Man Operation in some of their majorunits. How does that fit in just 2 1/2 yearsafter the Ueberlingen-catastrophe?The recommendations of the accident

investigation board state that sufficientmanning incl. contingency staffing shall beprovided for at all times. It was criticizedthat there was only one controller working2 positions and no further help available. Isthe renunciation from the 4-eye principlenot giving way to cheaper but safety criticalworking methods (talking about busy middleEuropean centers)? I am sure that the DFShas made plenty of safety surveys to provetheir case – but how would the public reactto this? Can we afford to ignore the board’sand also IFATCA’s recommendations? Arewe not giving way for an evolution that wemight regret one day?But let us go back to Maastricht: In all thesediscussions about cost reduction it ispurposely forgotten that we as theEUROCONTROL Maastricht UAC are playinga leading role in research and development,we are one of the most productive ATCcenters in Europe (Performance ReviewCommission-Report 2004) and we still area masterpiece of cross border ATS provisionin a multi-national environment. And herelies our biggest strength.In the framework of the Single-EuropeanSky Initiative of the European Commission(see also OUTPUT 2/2003), the creation ofFAB’s – Functional Airspace Blocks (*) hasbeen decided.The European Commission is, in January2005, carrying out a study to find out inhow far the Maastricht UAC could be seenas a FAB or, with in other words, what wouldbe necessary to convert the MASUAC into aFAB?This is a chance for the Maastricht UAC.Even the 4 states have realized this andenvisage the UAC as a “de facto FAB avantla letter”. Which makes us a very well likedcash-cow, wanted outside of the Eurocontrolagency. Should that happen, we might looseour R&D status, states might fight for theirindividual benefits and thus destroy one ofthe most European centers existing.

This is why we, as staff of the UAC, asoperational staff and as members ofthe Eurocontrol Guild of Air TrafficServices should voice our concerns andstand united for a Maastricht UACinside the Eurocontrol agency!

I wish all our members & their families withinEurocontrol, be it in Brussels, Bretigny,Luxembourg or Maastricht, a peacefulChristmas time and a healthy and good2005!

Patrik PetersEGATS President

(*) Framework regulation: A Functional Airspace Block is “anairspace block based on operational requirements, reflecting theneed to ensure more integrated management of the airspaceregardless of existing boundaries”.

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IFATCAInternational Conference

Melbourne/Australia17th - 22nd April 2005

The 2005 International IFATCA conference is going to take place in thewonderful city of Melbourne “down-under” in Australia.

To avoid the busy season of the Melbourne Gran-Prix, the confer-ence had to be moved to April - making it a bit more chilly as this

is the begin of the autumn season. But that doesn’t matter toomuch - we will be there to work! All necessary information on the

conference and about IFATCA in general can be found on thesewebsites:

www.ifatca.orgwww.ifatca2005.com

You wish to join us once for this IFATCA conference?Then please inform the EGATS EB by E-mail to ifatca@egats.org

(deadline 15.01.2005) and you can participate in our2005 IFATCA International Conference draw.

We expect you to attend all daily meetings, take actively part in the conference,represent EGATS in an orderly manner and observe the rules of conduct.

Attending an IFATCA conference can be a very professional fulfilling event.It makes one feel more part of the bigger world of air traffic control and puts our

issues, strengths and weaknesses on to a broader perspective.

Expenses (registration, transportation & hotel) will be carried by EGATS.

The following rules apply:! Be an EGATS & not an EB member! Be an active controller at MASUAC,! Have never attended an IFATCAmeeting on behalf of EGATS,! Agree to & attend the wholemeeting.

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The meeting was attended by Patrik Peters,Raff and myself. We had the pleasure toalso see Max Bezzina attending on behalfof Eurocontrol Luxemburg.There were 200 delegates present and 45Members associations represented. The dayprior the Regional Meeting a CISM seminartook place, more on this by Patrik.The Eurocontrol DG, Victor Aguado waspresent the first day and gave a presenta-tion on the past year and the tendenciesfor the future.We learned that we did in fact quite wellthis Summer, with a raise of traffic, a re-duction in the number of incidents / acci-dents, a halving of the delays and costs re-maining at the same level since last year.

Personal note: With this image and thoseresults, one has to wonder as to why weneed so badly to continue to cut costs andupset staff in Maastricht. Competition withone another seems to be the only reason.

I had a brief discussion on Maastricht withthe DG during a coffee break and I under-stand his hands are tied by the 4 States. Itis my impression that the 4 States are tell-ing different stories to the Press (and to us)than they are to the DG regarding theirplans for the future of the Centre.The main subject of discussion at the meet-ing was the Functional Airspace Blocks(FAB) from the Single European Sky (SES)plan of the EU. Many are fearing that thecreation of such blocks (in fact pieces ofairspace not liked to States, a bit like ourCoastal sector) could lead to closure of ATCfacilities and competition amongst serviceproviders, with the cheapest gaining thecontract. This could lead to the re-negociation of contracts bringing everybodydownwards. The fears expressed are reduc-tion in salaries, in staff numbers and in so-cial benefits.What we see happening in the core of Eu-rope today would tend to give credits tothe pessimists:In Germany, for cost reductions reasons,they want to close control towers at nightand have the service done from anotherTower situated hundreds of Km away (ra-tionale given : In fog the TWR controllersdo not see anything either, they could beanywhere, so no difference to put them 100Km away).

Also in Germany they want to introduce Single man op-erations in ACC en route sectors. This despite the recom-mendation of the report of the Ueberlingen accident.(Rationale: the report is valid for Switserland, not Ger-many). The relations between management and control-ler association-Union, the newly formed GDF (replacingthe old VDF) are extremely difficult and described as “onice “.In Norway, the service provider decided to close downits main ACC in Oslo and move the services to Stavanger.This without any consultation with its controllers Asso-ciation. The ones who objected were apparently told theywould be dismissed. An Operations Manager in Olso whosupported the controllers has apparently already beenfired.In Belarus, the leader of the Controllers union was sim-ply dismissed and anyone active with the Union –Asso-ciation received a 6 months contract renewable if staffremains quiet.The controllers associations of the countries that makeup CEATS (the Central European UAC managed byEurocontrol) are apparently extremely unhappy with theway Eurocontrol does things there. An extremely hardreport was made by Italy, the association tasked withreviewing the project, which did upset the EurocontrolAgency delegation.

Work on monitoring what the EU isdoing with SES is continuing andPatrik was nominated as Head ofone of the major projects (Air-space), replacing the IFATCA chair-man Technical and Operationalcommittee (Akos Van der Plaat)who was getting overloaded.

On the technical side, we got apresentation from Alex Wandels

from Eurocontrol on data link. Nothing new for us.Nadine Pilon from Eurocontrol Bretigny did a presenta-tion on the image ATC has in the Press. Bad of course,only receiving coverage in case of incidents and acci-dents. We have a lot of work to do and we are not suffi-ciently good at it.The meeting issued a Press release that can be viewedon www.ifatca.org website. The social events in theevening were very well organised and allowed many con-tacts with our neighbours. It was only saddened by thefact that a 40 years old controller from Serbia, suffereda stroke during the farewell dinner and died 2 days after,leaving a sick wife and a small child behind. We are deeplyshocked by this and have meanwhile collected funds forfinancial support to this poor family.

Philippe DomogalaIFATCA Liaison Officer

IFATCA EUROPEAN RegionalMeeting BUCHAREST22 -24 October 2004

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Hello dear EGATS colleagues,I have attended the IFATCA EuropeanRegional Conference in Bucharest, Romaniaas a Eurocontrol Observer for TrainingMatters.

There I had the pleasure of meeting theEGATS delegation and Patrik asked me towrite down an article on my short visit toBucharest ACC.

Since Patrik gave me the opportunity ofcommunicating with my colleagues up-north, I thought of also taking the occasionto share with you some of the personalimpressions I got from the part of theregional meeting to which I attended.For me the key word during this meetingwas change and the key emotion was thefear of the future.The Single European Sky was debatedheavily during the meeting and for me avery few important points emerged:

1.) Change is all over the EuropeanATM environment.

MUAC, specifically the Ops Division, hasbeen going through a phase of changewhich has raised questions and createdtension and a feeling of uneasiness. I feelthis is but the beginning.

Change is all over the place, not just atMUAC.Like the right of free movement of humansand goods through the EU, the liberalisation

of many services (e.g. financial, airlines,telecommunication, etc), and the monetaryunification, all of which brought revolutionsin their respective domains, the SingleEuropean Sky will bring dramatic changesto our business and to the way we dobusiness.

I feel that the changes that MUAC inparticular and Eurocontrol in general havegone through so far are but the beginningof more fundamental changes still to come.Even though I feel things will change, andthat some ideas are already on some tablesand undergoing discussions, the way ourworking environment will look like in thenear future is still, to the greater extend,unknown to me.

The fear of the unknown is a justifiedemotion, but, if after analysing the situation

and the forces (many and powerful – EC,ANSPs, Airlines, Industry…) who arepushing for the change, you arrive like meto the conclusion that change is inevitable,then, maybe, it is the right time to startthinking of how to influence this change toget the most benefits out of it.

Resisting the change altogether – and hereI need to underline this is just my opinionJ, will only delay it, if at all, for a little whilemore, and will in the mean time create alot of tension and a bad feeling throughoutour day-to-day work.

A visit to Bucharest ACCand a couple of thoughts…

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So what could we do?

2.) Mandate our Professional Bodyand our Trade Union to act firmly butconstructively to maximise thebenefits from the change.

Through this period of high activity, thenumber of meetings our representativesattend to and their work load havemultiplied by a dramatic degree. Theresources have remained the same.

At this point we, together with ourrepresentatives should think about what thekey competencies for each body are (EGATSand also through IFATCA: perhapsprofessional and technical, TUEM and alsothrough ATCEUC and the other consultationgroups: perhaps social issues) and mandatethem to focus their work on their keycompetencies. We should mandate themto act firmly but constructively to highlightissues related to the subjects for which theyhave been set-up and in which they aregood in order to maximise the benefits wecan get from each respective domain.

I feel that this is the only way to come outof this feeling good and satisfied.

On the other hand, by having ourrepresentative bodies trying to dilute theirfocus on too many issues, sometimes notdirectly related to their core competencies,and by categorically resisting change, I amafraid we will come out of this feeling tiredand dissatisfied.

We will be asked to change and if we actwisely, we too can get profit from all ofthis.The rest of the conclusions are for you tomake…

…aah yes, back to my visit at BucharestACC:As a reporter, I have to start with anapology, because the photographer wasindisposed and I had to improvise with thecamera handling. I only managed twopictures of the building, as pictures of theOps Room were STRICKTLY forbidden!(Pictures on the previous page are takenfrom the official RATCA website - TheEditor)

Apologies aside, Bucharest ACC is workingon a very new system designed by AleniaMarconi and inaugurated in November 2003.The consoles look very much like ours,including the highly agronomical-friendlysupport screens!

During the visit we were told that theRomanian FIR is divided in 3 ACCs, the onewe were visiting in Bucharest, and two more,one in Arad and one in Constanca.

The ACCs in these 2 locations will be broughtto Bucharest in 2007 (changes have startedhere too!) and on these sites only theapproach and tower units will be left,together with some contingency in casesomething happens to Bucharest.

The current Bucharest ACC is divided into12 sectors, and each sector is (wo)manned,like us, with an Executive and a Coordinator.

They still use paper strips, and the reasonwe were given for why they still do this isbecause electronic messages would take toomuch of their screen size. (I will remainfactual here and refrain from commenting!)

After 15 minutes on the balcony, we wereaccompanied to the coffee room were wespent the remaining 30 minutes!!

This ends my report,

One other thing I always remember when Iattend IFATCA meetings and/or visit othercentres, is that we basically all think we aredifferent, special, unique, have big problems,etc. but then we realise, with the exceptionof some extreme conditions, that we arebasically similar, work in similarenvironments and experience similar thrills,frustrations and problems.

These conferences are an eye opener.If you can, you should attend.

From your colleague approaching Luxie.

Max

Max.bezzina@eurocontrol.intAny comments to this article, but alsosimple ‘postion reports’ are welcome!

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CISM WorkshopBucharest

On Friday 22nd October, in conjunc-tion with the EUR meeting, IFATCA incooperation with the DFS andEUROCONTROL, held a workshop onCritical Incident StressManagement(CISM) in Bucharest. Theobjective of this workshop was topresent and share the experiences ofvarious service providers regardingCISM. Various presentations showedfrom different angles the view on anintegrated human factors element ofmodern management. The presenta-tion were aimed at ATCO staff andmanagers with the intention to passon information to those having neverheard about the program, being in theprocess of introducing such a systemand those wanting to share their ex-periences on CISM.

Alexander Skoniezki, Head of HumanFactors Management (Eurocontrol)gave an overview on the present level ofimplementation of CISM in the ECAC area.He reminded the audience that the intro-duction of CISM is a harmonisation objec-tive in the European Convergence and Im-plementation Plan to be implemented in theECAC area by the end of 2007. CISM hasproven its necessity already - especially inthe light of the recent catastrophes ofÜberlingen and Milano.Ian Patterson, DAS/HUM CISM expert(Eurocontrol), presented the historicalbackground of the program, starting withidentified reactions in “battle conditions”during the American Civil Wars of 1865,followed by the two World Wars and Viet-nam. Studies on psycho-traumatology fi-nally led to debriefing methods first usedfor fire brigades in the USA in 1983, enter-ing the aviation world after the DC10 crashof Sioux City (1989) and the EL-AL B747crash in Amsterdam (1992).Critical Incident Stress are normal re-actions to an abnormal event.We today differentiate between two differ-ent ways of CISM. The one-one counsel-ling method with a peer counsellor and thegroup therapy led by a medical health ad-visor and a peer.In Europe we separate accident investiga-tion strictly from CISM. Data exchange be-tween these two parties is not done, whichmight at times lead to legal implications.

Kevin McGrath, Dublin Airport StationManager and a peer since 1999, gave anupdate on the IAA CISM system. Followingan airprox in 1997 where two controllerswere suffering from post traumatic stressand where no formal system was existingthat could have helped those staff mem-bers, the necessity to establish such a sys-tem was seen. Kevin highlighted the im-portance to consult staff representativessuch as unions and associations in the drawup of such programs. After contact hadbeen established with the EATCHIP programof Eurocontrol, a call for tender was re-leased and following selection a companytasked with the training (5 days off-site (3plus 2 days)) selected. Out of 49 nomina-tions, 18 peer counsellors were selected.Costs for time-off and travelling expensesetc. is reimbursed to the peers. More in-formation can be found on their website:www.iaa.ieCurrently the program is being reviewedand extended. 12 additional peers were se-lected.Isabel Cambraia, a NAV Portugal psy-chologist, talked about the role of peersas seen in Portugal. She stressed the vol-untary and confidentiality aspect as wellas the fact that the peers should come fromthe immediate working environment (col-leagues). NAV Portugal provides a 5 daytraining course followed by yearly refreshertraining. She also mentioned the limitationsof a peers and highlighted the link betweenpeers and a mental health professional.The by far most interesting presentationwas a cooperation between colleagues fromDFS and SKYGUIDE. Jörg Leonhardt(DFS), Ralf Schultze (DFS), RalfMersmann (DFS), Carol Minder(SKYGUIDE) and Sabine Zimmermann(SKYGUIDE) gave a highly interestingoverview about their experience gained inthe CISM work following the Überlingencatastrophe. Jörg, a trained Human Fac-tors Specialist and CISM Trainer, explainedthe different crisis intervention methods.He clarified that CISM is not only a modelbut an integrated system.

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After the Überlingen accident, 120 ATCOs wentthrough 6 debriefing sessions.

4 different methods are being used:• One-to-one (Safer Model)

• Small group crisis intervention(Defusing)

• Large group crisis intervention(Debriefing)

• Follow-up/Referral

Having a look at the picture on the right, onecan see that the ATCOs went through the emo-tional level ending their programme on thecognitive level. A debriefing is to be seen ascrisis intervention but not to be misunderstoodas therapy. Peers conducting this interventionare following the above structure, therapistsdo not.The phases:Introduction: The team will introduce them-selves, describing the rules of conduct (no dis-turbances, no hidden signs) and the processeswith the aim of reducing fears and thus createtrust. Absence of criticism is one of the basicsof crisis intervention. Sabine, as one of theATCOs having participated in the debriefing ses-sions, felt at ease after this first step. She re-alized being amongst colleagues.Fact: Purpose of this phase is to bring all par-ticipants on the same level of knowledge (in-formation gathering) and to voice how the in-dividual is “connected” to the accident. “Whendid the accident come into your life?” or “Whendid you hear and how did you hear about theaccident?” These easy questions are setting thebase, they are non-emotional - simply facts,told us Carol, another one of the Swiss de-briefing participants.Thought: “What was your first thought?” or “Which thought can’t you let go?” Ralf explained:When thoughts are voiced, they loose theiremotional power. This will not let you go intothe spiral of uncontrolled emotions. The levelof involvement in an accident has to be equal -a homogenate group is essential to limit theimpact on the other group members. Sabinestates that they were looking for answers toquestions like “What if that would happen tome?” and “How is that possible?” or “Can Icontinue to work?” Due to the close feelingamongst the group members individual feel-ings of weakness are fading away.Reaction: Here the bottom of the emotionallevel is being reached.

The question to be asked is: “What wasthe worst part for you?” Imagining thewhole accident as a kind of movie: “Whatpart would you like to cut out?” This ques-tion leads to the identification of the moststressful point. The search for this pointhelps coping with other parts of the ac-cident (side-effects). Carol said that thishighly emotional time was best expressedin the questions raised by the partici-pants: “Why him/me/us?”Symptoms: Did you notice any changesin your behaviour & your thinking, or didyou change physically? In this phase theparticipants slowly enter the cognitivelevel again by asking themselves whatthe effects for them individually were.Like this the person can regain control.Sabine explained that colleagues had lostconfidence in their work. They did notknow how to go on. Sleeping disorders,no appetite, not wanting to watch thenews on TV were typical symptoms.Through group discussions the partici-pants found it easier to accept their ownproblems.Teaching: In this phase there were noquestions asked; the peers gave a sum-mary of the symptoms and previouslyasked questions. This shall normalizeand take away the uniqueness of thesereactions - provide coping mechanism onhow to deal with stress. The peers gaveideas on how to manage the next day/s,outlining that alcohol is counterproduc-tive as it reduces the ability to work,makes people unfit and puts the stressback into the brain. The participants ex-perienced this phase as very helpful be-cause they could learn from their col-leagues experience.

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Re-entry: In this final phase the questionfor a possible positive aspect for the futurewas asked. The idea behind this is to focuson the way ahead and not looking back.This way ahead has to be mastered in smallconcrete steps where every individual findsa perspective for the future - day by day.With time passing by, the stress will de-crease. After this last phase it is importantto have peers available to accompany theparticipants. They will reconsider theirwork, their attitude towards their profes-sion and their working methods.The debriefings were ended with a non-alcoholic drink giving the chance to discussquestion which remained open and provid-ing a hotline for future queries.The team around Jörg finished this veryinteresting and moving presentation bystressing the need for a uniform CISMmodel and an international network in or-der to interlink and be able to support oneanother. Standards will have to be set onpeer and management level.

This presentation showed the possibilitiesa functioning CISM system can provide. Asa participant of this workshop and in par-ticular of this presentation, I myself wentthrough the different phases of the abovedescribed model. I could feel how I wassuffering emotionally as we went “down-hill”, how I was asking myself the exactsame questions. I was trying to find an-swers to those questions and ended on thecognitive level again. A very interestingexperience.

Christiane Damal, Human Factors Spe-cialist for SKYGUIDE, briefed us aboutthe research that is been done to assessthe benefits of CISM. Only very few studiesare so far available on this subject and thatmakes it very difficult to evaluate the effi-ciency of CISM. The ICSF (InternationalCritical Stress Foundation) was used to re-ceive data for this evaluation. One differ-entiates between benefits for the personand for the organisation.Personal benefits:• psychological effects• team spirit (group feeling)• physical benefits (reduction in

drug/alcohol consumption)• reduction of stress reactions

Others:• family support• decline of marital discord• reduction of medical costs

Company benefits:• awareness of possible

consequences• reflection about error management• facilitation of post incident process

of skill reacquisition• improves internal image

group moralFinancial return on investment:• less sick leave• shorter duration of sick leave• less premature retirements• less personnel turnover

As a conclusion Christiane showed an ex-ample from the Commonwealth Bank ofAustralia, showing that the branch with CISMwas showing more positive results than theone without CISM.Johan Kjaer-Hansen from Eurocontrolgave a presentation of a feasibility study oneconomic evaluation of human factors pro-grammes. This study concentrated on theeconomical benefits of CISM - using datafrom ca. 60 DFS-ATCOs. The promising re-sult showed a good return on investmentfor the CISM program.Roger Bartlett gave a very lively presen-tation about the CISM introduction in-house.He paid respect to the driving force ofEGATS in the set-up of our program, men-tioning Inge Vander Eyken as the mainactor in this.After these presentations, an interesting dis-cussion about various aspects of the CISMprogrammes took place - resulting in thefollowing conclusions:

CISM should be:√√√√√ integrated in a crisis

management system√√√√√ following clear harmonised

procedures & structures√√√√√ conducted by well trained &

certified peers√√√√√ a standard of care in ATM

There is a need for one model and net-work, management support and com-mitment!

Patrik Peters

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About a year ago EGATS launched a pro-gram cal led Space Management atMaastricht UAC. The goal of the programwas the improvement of the way space ingeneral is managed in our centre.

Often, the needs and wishes of the staff andespecially operational staff were not con-sidered with the importance it deserved. Thiswas not only a question of comfort and wellbeing but mostly a question of giving thestaff a good environmental working and restspace in order to perform their assignedduties in good conditions.

Therefore, EGATS produced a documentcalled “Quick Wins” which described the firstand urgent needs that were spotted in or-der to improve the space management inthe short term.

It is now time to inform you about the de-velopments and first results of our program.Some results are already visible, other as-pects are still under development but thingsare moving and we are confident that moreresult will be achieved shortly.

The new TV and DVD set of the Rest Roomwas our first achievement. After more thanten years of loyalty and good service, theold EGATS’s TV set could finally retire andenjoy a well deserved ETS. We now canenjoy a wide screen TV and a DVD playerwhich hopefully will serve us for many com-ing years.

Regarding the dormitories in the basement,a lot of improvements have been achievedalready. First of all, the quality and the flowof the air in the room have been lookedat. The flow of air that was circulating inthe room was pointing directly towards thezone where the head of the person sleep-ing in the room was positioned. The speedof the flow was extremely high resultingin uncomfortable and unhealthy sleepingconditions which were resulting in dry eyesand throat the next morning.

This has been solved. The ventilation hasnow been optimised to have a good bal-ance between fresh air and good sleepingconditions.

The soundproofing of the dormitories is amore complex subject. The soundproof-ing of the walls is apparently good but thesound is spreading via the ceilings. To solvethat problem a lot of money should be in-vested, the whole area should be rebuiltwhich would leave us with very few dor-mitories for an extended period. Since theproject is to relocate the dormitories in awindow environment, the dormitories willremain as they are for the moment.

The noise coming from the pipes of theheading system has been looked at andappropriate maintenance has solved theproblem.

As you all know, the quality of the mat-tresses is a main point of concern. Hope-fully, at the publication of this article somemattresses will be installed in the dormi-tories for testing. A form will be at yourdisposal for evaluation and to collect yourcomments. After selection, all mattresseswill be replaced and installed at the begin-ning of 2005.We are now investigating the possibility ofproviding staff with bed sheets and blan-kets. Unfortunately, this nice service wouldbe more expensive than expected (morethan 60000 euros per year for renting andcleaning). So this will all depend on theavailable budget of the Facility Manage-ment Section. We will keep you informedabout future developments on the subject.

We wish you in advance sweet dreams onthose new mattresses.

Update on the Space Management Project

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The rooms used as dormitories within ourcentre will be equipped with a lock. Actu-ally, some of them are equipped already.

The next improvement for those rooms willbe the installation of a system to hide theroom from the lighting of the corridors andfrom the outside and the refurbishment ofthe couches which are used as beds.

The replacement of the equipment of thefitness room is delayed to next year forbudgetary reasons. A list off new cardio-vascular machines has been done. We arenow waiting for the funds. As you will seefurther, there is a plan to relocate as wellthe fitness room at another locationAnother problem in our centre is the kioskPC’s disseminated all over the corridors.

It’s annoying for staffs that are looking foran available PC and very disturbing for of-fice staff in the neighbourhood of thosePC’s. Therefore, we are planning to groupabout 20 PC’s on the third floor of the ac-tual OPS Room building next to the DFS’restroom.

This will have several advantages:

- Staff will have an easier access tothe PC’s.

- A minimum of office staff will bedisturbed by the kiosk PC’s.

- No more time lost to find an avail-able PC.

- It will make the maintenance ofthe PC’s easier.

Hereunder you can see a first drawing ofthe project.

Regarding the billiard room, we had re-quested a change of the cloth of the twotables and a general refurbishing of theroom. It is quite surprising to see how peo-ple care about things which are not theirs.

The first request was attendedimmediatelybut the second one did not receive the sameenthusiasm which is understandable if youlook at the picture below.

No, this is not a photo of the surface of themoon but only a part of the billiard room’swall.

We are not here to give lessons to the us-ers but if we try to improve our facilities,we expect in return a minimum of respectfor the work done by our colleagues.Those colleagues will of course not be verymotivated to help us if we treat their worklike this.

We therefore count on your cooperation tohelp us in this project.

Here are a few more results of the “QuickWins”:

- The installation of an extrac-tion device in the two smokingrooms.

- Adequate lighting on the wayleading to the parking areabehind the old GAF building.

- Better adaptation of our cen-tre to disabled staffs: access,parking…

13

Once the new building extension will be in placeand after the relocation of some sections, wewill have sufficient space at our disposal forthe creation of a large area where could begrouped the rest and recreation area and thedormitories.

Each dormitory will have its own window…

Yes, you read correctly, a window!!!!!!!!

This area would be located at the first floor ofthe actual OPS Room building at the actuallocation of the classrooms.

This drawing is a first draft of our project. Itwill most probably evolve together with newrequirements or requests from staff and fromcertain sections.

The Future…..End 2006 - Early 2007

If you are motivated, havesome spare time, want towork in a dynamic team &achieve something for our

profession.... then youshould join

the Executive Board ofEGATS.

For the elections 2005 weare looking for you!

For more info, contact usin person or via

board@egats.org the EB!!!

For those reasons, we will not provideyou with too many details that could atthe end not be reality.

Feel free at anytime to come with yourideas, they are always welcome.

Now, we wish to thank some people whoare our partners in this project: Arn,Johan, Peter and Heinz-Jose. We thankthem for the great job they are doing,for their commitment, their interest andtheir listening…Thank you all.

That’s all for now folks…See you soonwith further news.

EGATS PHOTO COMPETITION ... ... and the winner is?

Our first photo competition only attractedthirteen entrants but I consider it to havebeen a great success, if only for thestandard of the photos submitted. The 36photos were of a very high standard indeedand interpreted the subject, water, in avariety of ways, although reflectionsprevailed.I had some vague ideas about how, and bywhom, the entries should be judged butwhen one of the entrants suggested thatperhaps children would take a totallydifferent view of the photos to adults Idecided to follow it up. I approached oneof the teachers of my daughter’s class inthe international department of theJoppenhof primary school in Maastricht.Her enthusiasm convinced me that thiscould indeed produce an interesting result,and thus the stage was set for the judgingto be executed by a group of 20 eight andnine year olds from the United States,Russia, Japan, Italy, Spain, Czech Republic,Poland and others.The judges’ selection of Jakub Vinicky’swaterfall photo was undisputable and madeJakub the winner of our first competition.The photo was taken in Eupen, Belgium inAugust of this year using a Canon EOS 300camera loaded with Fuji Sensia 400 film.He used a 28-105mm lens. Jakub’ssubmissions provided the only film entries.I must admit to being a little surprised, in amost positive way, that the kids selectedsuch an abstract picture to take the secondprize.Anja Lingk’s ‘Ice Hole’ photo was taken in/on (I didn’t ask….!!) the Franz Josephglacier on New Zealand’s South Island inMarch of this year using a Casio EX-Z4digital compact camera. Anja is alreadyplanning her strategy for next year’scompetition, even though she doesn’t knowthe subject!Two photos were selected for the thirdplace, both entered by the same person –Ilia Bojilov’s wife Dessi. At this stage theteachers entered the action to select whichphoto would collect the third prize. Theychose Dessi’s shot of water flowing overpebbles in a stream close to Elsloo castle.Taken in May the photographer used aMinolta digital camera.Congratulations to all three prize-winnerswho have received gift vouchersredeemable for photographic items.

It is just a pity that we could only select three photos as many ofthe other entries were worthy of prizes. However, I hope this willencourage the other entrants to submit entries for next year’scompetition.

Paul Hooper

14

15

Bird strike ... and more

Say again....Questions via the radio should not always beanswered exactly.Tower: Aircraft in holding pattern, say fuelstate?Aircraft: FuelstateTower: Say again?Aircraft: Again....After this the tower controller switches off hisradio and climbs down the stairs to drink coffeethe rest of the afternoon.

And the Big Hand Is On the...Tower: “Delta 351, you have traffic at 10 o’clock,6 miles!”Delta 351: “Give us another hint! We have digitalwatches!”

Turbulence on taxiway!For months after California’s Northridgeearthquake of 1994, aftershocks rocked the SanFernando Valley and Van Nuys Airport. Onemorning about three weeks after the initialquake there was a particularly sharp aftershock.Moments later on Van Nuys’ ground controlfrequency: “Uh, four-three-kilo would like tofile a pilot report for moderate turbulence onthe east taxiway...”

ATIS Hotel“ATIS” stands for “Automated TerminalInformation Service,” which is a recordedmessage broadcast at most busy airportsaround the country. ATIS gives pilots the currentwind, air traffic, and runway information andeach time the information changes, thebroadcast is revised, with each revision beingassigned the next letter in the phoneticalphabet. This designation is included in thebroadcast, which is identified as, “InformationAlpha...” Bravo, Charlie, etc.

At ATIS-equipped airports, pilots are requiredto listen to the recording prior to contacting

Approach Control or the tower and mustrepeat the “Information so-and-so”identifier when they make their initialradio call. Sometimes, the results can behilarious...The scenario: it was night over Las Vegasand “Information Hotel” was current onthe ATIS. Mooney 33W wasn’t too sharp,but he didn’t let that stop him from talkingto Approach Control.Approach: “33W, confirm you have‘Hotel.’ 33W: “Uhhhmm, we’re flying intoMcCarren International. Uhhhmm, wedon’t have a hotel room yet.”After that, Approach was laughing toohard to respond. The next several callswent something like this call to United583 (which didn’t make it any easier tostop laughing)...Approach: “United 583, descend to FlightLevel 220.”United 583: “United 583, down to FlightLevel 220. We don’t have a hotel room,either.”

Now That We’ve Got That Straight...Tower: “November 2115L, are you aCessna?”2115L: “No, sir...I am a male Hispanic.”

Some People Just Never ListenATC to Flight 123: “Slow to 300 knotsplease.” After several moments, it wasapparent the crew had not complied withthe first speed reduction and wasovertaking the inbound plane ahead ofthem.ATC to Flight 123: “Slow to 280 knots.”This was soon followed by a request for250 knots from ATC when the crew stillhad not slowed the airplane.Finally, the now-frustrated controllerordered, “Gentlemen, the number is 250.Either slow to it or turn to it!”

16

AGM 2005-Invitation

You are invited to theAnnual General Meeting 2005

of EGATSthe EUROCONTROL GUILD of

AIR TRAFFIC SERVICES

It will be held in theMASUAC Canteen

on the15th March 2005 @ 19:30 hrs.

The agenda will be published in due time.For questions, please E-mail to: execsec@egats.org

CU there!

MerrMerrMerrMerrMerry Christmasy Christmasy Christmasy Christmasy Christmas& a Happy& a Happy& a Happy& a Happy& a Happy,,,,,

HeHeHeHeHealthy and Safealthy and Safealthy and Safealthy and Safealthy and SafeNew YNew YNew YNew YNew Yeeeeeararararar

for you and yourfor you and yourfor you and yourfor you and yourfor you and yourloved onesloved onesloved onesloved onesloved ones.....

TTTTThe Execuhe Execuhe Execuhe Execuhe ExecutivetivetivetivetiveBBBBBoooooararararard of EGAd of EGAd of EGAd of EGAd of EGATTTTTSSSSS

FEES for2005!

Your mem-bership feesare due inJanuary

2005 again.Please make

sure youhave your

bank trans-fers or

“machtiging”forms ar-ranged.

For moreinformation,

- pleaseconsult our

website(FAQs) oremail to

treasurer@egats.org.

For mem-bershipissues -contact:member-

ship@egats.org