Aircraft turnaround is a frenetic whirl of activity that must be accomplished at lightning speed to keep an aircraft aligned with designated schedules. Each minute of delay costs an airline US$75. But it’s not just a minute that’s at stake. There’s a cumulative effect across the entire air transport system. For context, in 2019, delays cost airlines $8.3 billion in the US market alone.
Equally time-critical to turnaround is block times, encompassing push-back, taxiing, take-off, climb, cruise, descent, landing, and taxiing back to the gate at the destination airport. Once block times are assigned, missing timings have a knock-on effect with financial and reputational penalties for an airline. And that doesn’t just mean delays. Being too early can be equally problematic and costly. For example, due to bad weather blowing in, a pilot might prepare to take off quicker and speed through the route to avoid bad weather – arriving early at the destination. This…
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