Antonio wrote:
-Extension of formerly restricted opening hours at somer AENA airports
I have been reading this for a few years now, but still never understood how this has been put into practice.
Could you name a couple of airfield examples where the opening hours are x to y, and where I can land my Cirrus outside these hours in compliance with the rules?
boscomantico wrote:
have been reading this for a few years now, but still never understood how this has been put into practice.Could you name a couple of airfield examples where the opening hours are x to y, and where I can land my Cirrus outside these hours in compliance with the rules?
Unfortunately I don’t have a detailed register and do not know if it is available. I can indeed give a couple of examples.
Back in 2012 most AENA airports with low traffic had its opening times restricted as a (very questionable) measure to save costs. Those that used to be SR to SS lost 1-6 daily opening hours, but also some of those operating at night. Most of those had their restrictions either lifted or mitigated over the last three years , and most are subject to extended opening hours (at least +1) with PPR and extra fees. Relevant email address for the ppr is usually on the AIP and usually one week ppr or more is required but you may be lucky with two or three days.
A couple of examples:
LERJ went from SR/SS or therabouts to restrictions all week long and especially on weekends (open winter sat 6-10 sun 17-2030, I think they call it “customer-focus” only the focus is on ensuring GA customer stays away) but they now allow restricted use (non commercial) sat 11-17 and sun 0930-1700 with a 1hr lunch-break
A similar thing occurred at LEBA and LEBG
LESB went from SR/SS to winter 0815-1545, but allow 1wk PPR extensions to SS subject to approval. This is more useful in Spring and later in Summer.
PS: In the “operating hours” section in Spain’s AIP, ‘restricted use’ means they only allow non-commercial operations
OK, I will look at the respective AIP entries and see if I can make any sense out of it. (*)
FWIW, I was of course looking for options to land outside of official (full-staff) opening hours, not for keeping the the airport open longer (which costs the aircraft operator a lot of money).
(*)I do have the doubt that it might not be usful for visitors in case of fenced Airports (i.e. all of the Spanish ones), since one might not be able to get in/out without any “staff” (a bit like in France, where most airports are technically 24h, but praticially speaking, those which are fenced are a problem, unless you know the location of some secret doors, doorcodes, etc.)
So, taking Logrono as an example:
Looks like there might be a lot of pitfalls…
boscomantico wrote:
FWIW, I was of course looking for options to land outside of official (full-staff) opening hours, not for keeping the the airport open longer (which costs the aircraft operator a lot of money).
Weirdly enough, extending op hours by PPR does not cost the airport user (as opposed to the operator) a terrible amount depending on the airport. LESB is like EUR60
one might not be able to get in/out
This will not happen at AENA airports during published op hours, but if you land at closing time then take 20 mins to leave aircraft or try to enter more than 30 mins in advance of opening time then you may have problems
the restircted use hours do bridge the gaps on weekends, but don’t bridge the huge gaps on weekdays
It is still way better than it was!
handling is mandatory at Spanish airports…?!?
“Only” those which state so in section 20 “local procedures”, unfortunately an increasing number. This is done for two reasons:
a) At large airports on safety and other practical grounds
b) At smaller airports to incentivate handling agents, although this will never be openly admitted (safety is quoted instead)
whether one can get customs/immigration to work during restricted use hours
Customs/immigration work to their own timetable and if unavailable at certain times within the airport’s op hours then it will be published like in the LERJ case above. This is another recent big improvement to get a small airport like that to offer customs in Spain where GAR does not exist.Otherwise the ‘intl airport’ category is rather nonexistent at Spain’s small airports hence restricting them to Schengen flights (even if they have customs agents on site like at LESB)
can you pay landing fees during restricted use hours? I see AIS/ARO is open, but Ops?
OPS at these smaller/restricted airports will be same team as those supporting AIS/ARO, which will be published as above for LERJ
Mod plse feel free to indicate if this is too much of a thread diversion
