Wind speed.

[Bases5]

What is the the avg wind have to be for air ports to close. 

[RickT]

Google is your friend.  I quickly googled you question and got a lot of results many of which were an interesting and informative read.

[sumiandkage]

In many cases,  an airport with multiple runways that allow for take offs and landings in different directions will often shift  to limiting takeoffs and landings in specific directions in order to safely manage a moderate wind event. 

 

Crosswinds and tailwinds are often a lot more dangerous than, say, taking off into a brisk headwind.  Had my first aborted landing/touch and go round at Salt Lake City last year due to crosswinds that were just the wrong speed and angle when the pilot was making the first landing attempt, 

Edited August 28, 2019 by sumiandkage

[scottbee]

17 hours ago, Bases5 said:

What is the the avg wind have to be for air ports to close. 

 

It depends.  on the direction of the wind, and the layout of the airport

 

It's based more on the crosswind component; with most commercial aircraft able to handle 25-30kts of 90 degree crosswind.

 

If you're at an airport where the runways run in only one direction, a 30-35kt wind COULD put them out of service, if the wind was at right angles to the runways; but that's a worse case scenario.

 

 

[Zach1213]

2 minutes ago, scottbee said:

 

It depends.  on the direction of the wind, and the layout of the airport

 

It's based more on the crosswind component; with most commercial aircraft able to handle 25-30kts of 90 degree crosswind.

 

If you're at an airport where the runways run in only one direction, a 30-35kt wind COULD put them out of service, if the wind was at right angles to the runways; but that's a worse case scenario.

 

 

 

It's interesting to see different airport designs and how they specifically take advantage (or plan for) winds typical to their area. Places like San Diego and Los Angeles only have essentially due east/west runways because their winds are either coming off of the ocean or, much more rarely, in to the ocean. Then there's Denver, which has winds coming in all different directions at all different times and runways to reflect that.

[scottbee]

16 minutes ago, Zach1213 said:

 

It's interesting to see different airport designs and how they specifically take advantage (or plan for) winds typical to their area. Places like San Diego and Los Angeles only have essentially due east/west runways because their winds are either coming off of the ocean or, much more rarely, in to the ocean. Then there's Denver, which has winds coming in all different directions at all different times and runways to reflect that.

 

Old WWII era airports tend to have a triangular layout so you're never more than 30degrees of crosswind component.  A good example of this might be YYJ (Victoria BC) where there are three runways at roughly 60 degrees apart. If you look at old maps of LHR, you'll see it was originally like this too. 

Slightly newer airports might have runways at right angles (DEN, SFO, YYZ, JFK) reducing the crosswind component to 45 degrees;

 

and some airports where the wind really tends to blow in one direction only may have runways all running in the same direction (today's LHR, LAX) 

 

[FlyerTalker]

1 hour ago, scottbee said:

 

and some airports where the wind really tends to blow in one direction only may have runways all running in the same direction (today's LHR, LAX)

 

Add in SEA, ATL, SLC, DTW and many more.

[Fairgarth]

4 hours ago, scottbee said:

 

A good example of this might be YYJ (Victoria BC) where there are three runways at roughly 60 degrees apart. If you look at old maps of LHR, you'll see it was originally like this too.

 

 

Indeed, and now we have this huge, ongoing battle about building a third runway at Heathrow.  Heathrow HAD three runways, for goodness sake.  I've taken off on the third one many years ago on a BEA Trident.

[Zach1213]

8 minutes ago, Fairgarth said:

 

Indeed, and now we have this huge, ongoing battle about building a third runway at Heathrow.  Heathrow HAD three runways, for goodness sake.  I've taken off on the third one many years ago on a BEA Trident.

 

Sure, but LHR traffic numbers are a hell of a lot different now than back in the day. In 2018, for example, LHR had over 120,000 more aircraft movements than 30 years before. That's a 120,000 increase in aircraft movements, not 120,000 movements in total. The third runway will only increase that, and associated noise, traffic, etc. Even with a third runway back in the day, there wasn't anything near the number of aircraft movements they have now, and that number would only increase as more slots are allocated with a third runway.

[scottbee]

22 minutes ago, Fairgarth said:

 

Indeed, and now we have this huge, ongoing battle about building a third runway at Heathrow.  Heathrow HAD three runways, for goodness sake.  I've taken off on the third one many years ago on a BEA Trident.

 

 

The '3rd' runway (05/23) closed bringing it down to 2 runways in 2005 (yes, that recently). On the (1950s) map below, the remaining runways (09L/27R, 09R, 27L) are the two long east west ones, and 05/23 is the SW/NE runway to the east side of the airport

 

But back in the in the early 50s, Heathrow had six runways, two in each direction, looking something like a star of david.

 

 

 

 

[scottbee]

2 hours ago, FlyerTalker said:

 

Add in SEA, ATL, SLC, DTW and many more.

 

I should have mentioned ATL , 5 parallel runways (only), along with SEA (3 parallel)
SLC is close, although the 3rd runway is slightly skewed from the others 

However, DTW doesn't fall into the 'all in the same direction', it has two crosswind runways (09/27 L&R)

 

All (or almost all) in the same direction is very common these days.  (DFW, YVR, YYC)

 

and of course single runway wonders like LGW and SAN - (and yes I'm aware while LGW technically has two they can only use one at a time).   

Finding a modern jet airport in the old triangle layout is harder to find, with YYJ being the only one I could think of (where all three still exist as runways).  But add BOS to the list of three significant runways roughly 60 degrees apart

 

 

[Fairgarth]

1 hour ago, Zach1213 said:

 

Sure, but LHR traffic numbers are a hell of a lot different now than back in the day. In 2018, for example, LHR had over 120,000 more aircraft movements than 30 years before. That's a 120,000 increase in aircraft movements, not 120,000 movements in total. The third runway will only increase that, and associated noise, traffic, etc. Even with a third runway back in the day, there wasn't anything near the number of aircraft movements they have now, and that number would only increase as more slots are allocated with a third runway.

 

Quite true.  The airport needs a huge increase in movements which seems to annoy some people but has already happened at Paris, Amsterdam and Frankfurt who are busy stealing Heathrow's lunch.  KLM, for example, serves 16 British airports, a lot more than British Airways ironically.  Do you think these people are going to Amsterdam?  Heathrow employs 77,000 people most of whom must live within commuting distance of the airport so who is complaining about noise?  People who bought their houses before 1946?

[PaulMCO]

If it hurricane related, most airlines will cancel their incoming flights in a day before in order to prevent their planes being stuck and possibly damaged.   Expect the cancellation to begin at Orlando, PBI, FLL, MEL and maybe even MIA late Saturday into Sunday.  Right now the predictions are all over the map, with a wide model variation.

[scottbee]

On 8/28/2019 at 2:46 PM, Fairgarth said:

 

Quite true.  The airport needs a huge increase in movements which seems to annoy some people but has already happened at Paris, Amsterdam and Frankfurt who are busy stealing Heathrow's lunch.  KLM, for example, serves 16 British airports, a lot more than British Airways ironically.  Do you think these people are going to Amsterdam?  Heathrow employs 77,000 people most of whom must live within commuting distance of the airport so who is complaining about noise?  People who bought their houses before 1946?

 

Another interesting fact is how much quieter modern aircraft are than ones of yesteryear.   A 40 yr old jetliner is probably 20db louder than a modern one, it's really quite astonishing.  Really noticed it the other day at the airport when a 737-200 (circa 1980) took off following a brand new 787.

 

[FlyerTalker]

On 8/29/2019 at 10:34 AM, PaulMCO said:

If it hurricane related, most airlines will cancel their incoming flights in a day before in order to prevent their planes being stuck and possibly damaged.   Expect the cancellation to begin at Orlando, PBI, FLL, MEL and maybe even MIA late Saturday into Sunday.  Right now the predictions are all over the map, with a wide model variation.

 

MCO has announced a suspension of operations starting at 2am on Monday Sept 2nd.  None others yet - rumors that AA will move many planes out of MIA to prevent damages.

[PaulMCO]

17 hours ago, scottbee said:

 

Another interesting fact is how much quieter modern aircraft are than ones of yesteryear.   A 40 yr old jetliner is probably 20db louder than a modern one, it's really quite astonishing.  Really noticed it the other day at the airport when a 737-200 (circa 1980) took off following a brand new 787.

 

They have to be by law.  Aircraft of the 70'/80/s era had to have hush kits installed.

[hallux]

On 8/30/2019 at 5:31 PM, scottbee said:

Really noticed it the other day at the airport when a 737-200 (circa 1980) took off following a brand new 787

The difference between a 777 and a 787 is considerable even.  I was in LA in April, was watching the approach end of the South runways from my hotel room, the 777 was easily heard, the 787 not so much.

[FlyerTalker]

2 hours ago, hallux said:

The difference between a 777 and a 787 is considerable even.  I was in LA in April, was watching the approach end of the South runways from my hotel room, the 777 was easily heard, the 787 not so much.

 

Apples and oranges.

 

Each engine on the 787 generates between 59,000 and 81,000 pounds of thrust, depending on the model.

 

Each engine on the 777 generates between 81,000 and 115,000 pounds of thrust, again depending on the model.

 

Strongest 787 engine only puts out what the minimum 777 engine does.

[Fairgarth]

On 8/28/2019 at 2:04 PM, scottbee said:

 

and of course single runway wonders like LGW and SAN - (and yes I'm aware while LGW technically has two they can only use one at a time).

 

 

 

Reminds me of an incident at Gatwick many years ago that was almost a disaster.  Gatwick has one runway.  The taxiway parallel to that can be used on rare occasions as a runway.  The taxiway parallel to that is a genuine taxiway only.  So yes, there are three parallel strips.  The runway was closed at night for repairs and an aircraft was landing.  The two pilots knew that the runway was closed so they should land on the taxiway to the right.  Which they did, except that they were now too far to the right on the genuine taxiway which is where they landed.  Murphy's Law, alive and well.

[scottbee]

2 hours ago, Fairgarth said:

 

Reminds me of an incident at Gatwick many years ago that was almost a disaster.  Gatwick has one runway.  The taxiway parallel to that can be used on rare occasions as a runway.  The taxiway parallel to that is a genuine taxiway only.  So yes, there are three parallel strips.  The runway was closed at night for repairs and an aircraft was landing.  The two pilots knew that the runway was closed so they should land on the taxiway to the right.  Which they did, except that they were now too far to the right on the genuine taxiway which is where they landed.  Murphy's Law, alive and well.

 

it's not uncommon at all. 

KBFI (Boeing Field, Seattle).  There are parallel runways; the more northern runway is quite short (3500') and looks like not much from the air, the more southern parallel runway , is long (10000'), and has a parallel taxiway the entire length on it's southen side.  If you're not paying attention, what should be 14R looks a lot like 14L with the parallel taxiway looking like 14R.  

 

KFSO (San Francisco). Jul 2017 there was quite a scary situation there when 28L was closed for some reason (paving??).  An Air Canada flight was told (at night) cleared to land 28R, and lined up (and almost landed and crashed into) 4 aircraft taxing on taxiway C.  There's a whole wikipedia article on the incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_Canada_Flight_759     The pilot saw two lit 'runway like' stripes, and lined up to land toward the right hand one. (taxiway C).  He thought he was seeing runways 28L/28R, but instead saw 28R / Taxiway Charlie

 

Edited September 3, 2019 by scottbee

[zdcatc12]

On 8/28/2019 at 5:04 PM, scottbee said:

 

All (or almost all) in the same direction is very common these days.  (DFW, YVR, YYC)

 

 

 

 

Two of DFWs runways are diagonals, 13/31 L and R

[scottbee]

2 hours ago, zdcatc12 said:

Two of DFWs runways are diagonals, 13/31 L and R

 

DFW falls into the 'almost all' categories, with 5 of 7 runways running parallel., hence why I said that

[fbgd]

On 8/28/2019 at 5:46 PM, Fairgarth said:

 KLM, for example, serves 16 British airports, a lot more than British Airways ironically.  

 

I don't think it's that odd or ironic. BA have international flights to more airports in the US than AA have international flights out of the US for example.

 

The UK has a very good transport infrastructure so people travel fairly significant distances by car/train/public transport to catch flights from LHR. 

 

Heathrow is slot restricted and BA won't waste slots operating to every hole in the hedge. It's easy for KLM to operate flights to AMS from Humberside and Teesside and other tiny airports.

[Fairgarth]

16 hours ago, fbgd said:

Heathrow is slot restricted and BA won't waste slots operating to every hole in the hedge.

 

Exactly.  And Schiphol isn't, I assume.  So if the Brits have decided as a matter of public policy that the Dutch can have the jobs, economic growth and tax revenue, that's their business.  So be it.

[zdcatc12]

22 hours ago, scottbee said:

 

DFW falls into the 'almost all' categories, with 5 of 7 runways running parallel., hence why I said that

I saw the "almost" after I replied, you be correct, sorry.