New aviation chief reports reduction in NAIA congestion

Manila, Philippines -  Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) director general William Hotchkiss has reported that congestion at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) runway has been eased through a coordinated arrival slotting system (CASS) put in place last week.

The retired Air Force general said the CASS will reduce flights placed on holding pattern by the Air Traffic Control (ATC) until safe landing spaces are available.

“This would also result to significant savings for the airlines because airplanes such as an Airbus A320 burns fuel worth about P7,000 per minute on a holding pattern,” he said.

Transportation and Communications Secretary Manuel Roxas II said the CASS system prevents domestic aircraft flying to NAIA from taking off from their airport of origin if they do not have an available slot at the NAIA runway.

International airlines have also hired a third party Australian entity to coordinate the flight takeoff and landing slotting at the runway, he added.

Roxas said the DOTC was already reviewing a proposal to limit the number of events (takeoffs and landings) at the NAIA runway to a maximum of 40 during peak hours from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Based on data of actual flights in a certain week during the summer 2012 passenger season, a total of 2,620 events were registered at the NAIA runway, he added. 

The proposal showed that after removing all the flights of local carriers to destinations with night-landing capabilities, the total events were reduced to 2,294.

In per hour slices, events only went to as high as 41 and reflected a 12 percent reduction of all the flights.

The arrangement had been previously agreed upon by local airline companies which have flights to destinations with night landing capabilities like Kalibo, Cebu, Davao, Iloilo, Cagayan de Oro, Bacolod, Tacloban, Puerto Princesa and Zamboanga,

NAIA’s runway can only accommodate 36 events per hour on average, or one minute and 40 seconds to maintain safety standards.

The DOTC has implemented a number of measures to ease the problem of runway congestion at NAIA during peak passenger season.

Hotchkiss is prioritizing the implementation of measures that will improve organizational development and modernization of equipment, all aimed to make the country’s civil aviation systems more efficient and compliant with international standards.

However, he declined to set a timetable for leading the CAAP towards regaining Category I status with the United States Federal Aviation Authority.

The country was downgraded by the US FAA to Category II status in late 2007, which prevented Philippine carriers with flights to the US from opening more routes and adding frequencies.