cactusflyer

I ran into a bit of an odd situation yesterday that I was hoping someone could shed some light on.

During the evening rush in SEA, there was a Delta A330 that was trying to get an opposite direction departure (heading north, when the airport had south flow going), and the crew clearly wasn't happy that tower was going to make them wait at the end of the runway for a half-hour until a sufficient gap opened up to get them out.

All I can figure is that the request had something to do with the airplane taking a polar route towards Asia (and maybe the fact that the winds aloft were out of the south), but I can't imagine that an extra 30 minutes of idling on the ground would have been more efficient than going a short distance the wrong direction until they got turned on course.

Given that Delta does quite a bit of Asia flying out of Seattle, I'm assuming this kind of thing isn't very common (no one I talked to had ever seen it before), and I'm at a loss for why someone would try to get an opposite direction departure out of a busy airport that doesn't have terrain constraints on any of the runways.

Timbo

Yes, their takeoff data was probably runway limited and they needed the downslope to be legal for takeoff.

I've had that same thing happen many times out of ATL on 27R/9L years ago in the MD11. It seems stupid but it's the only "Legal" way to do it.

Remember, all takeoff data is predicate on loss of an engine at V1, and it takes runway slope into account.

As long as both engines are running, you could go either upslope or downslope, but it wouldn't be "Legal" to go upslope, and if you lost an engine at V1, you might not get off the ground by the end of the runway going uphill.

rmratc

@cactusflyer The FAA has made opposite directions operations very restrictive anymore for us. Depending on SEA's operation/SOP they probably have to stop arrivals. Where I am, we cannot have any arrivals within 10 miles of the airport if we are going to perform an opposite direction operation. So for SEA to make them wait for 30 min while they could either build or wait for a gap in the arrival traffic is not uncommon now.

N9373M

True dat. Recently, I've been denied the VOR-A into CAE (circle to 5 or 29) while they're departing 11. Before, they'd let us go to the missed approach point (SW of the departure corridor for 11)

They also dropped the ASR

rickair7777

I used to do wrong-way arrivals all the time at little airports, but can rarely do it anymore.

A couple airlines played chicken in DC IIRC, and now ATC is a lot more restrictive.

jagbn

I once had a Northwest A320 captain ask for and get a Rwy 19 departure in DCA specifically to get myself and another jumpseater on the airplane. Couldn't do it taking off north due to the restrictive departure.

A couple months later at DCA a Mesaba RJ left 15 revenue pax behind (and me) because the crew didn't ask for a opposite direction departure.

That was probably 8 years ago; maybe they don't do that any more at DCA.

ToastAir

It has become ridiculous what has to be done to allow opposite direction operations. Among other things, there is a defined cutoff point something like 10 miles, but it varies by location, the ATIS must be changed (not sure why). For awhile they were changing it almost monthly. There is suppose to be a workgroup coming up with something better.

EasternATC

FWIW, opposite direction departures at DCA are alive and well. ATC there is very accommodating.

Hawker Driver

An ATC conflict, contributed by opposite direction procedures & an ATC error, occured several years ago. The result of that F... up was elimination of all opposite direction arrival/departure procedures & the removal of local tower controller authority to allow such operations.

From the post above tho..., it looks like that is changing again.

HIFLYR

I would never request it at SEA or any other major airport when it's busy. It's pretty normal for us to ask if the wind will allow a opposite direction TKOF if our ramp is at that end and the airport is not busy.