When an airport has a heart attack: Hong Kong hub struggles to find cure to flight backlogs

Aircraft behave like blood that enters and then leaves the heart. To air traffic controllers, Chek Lap Kok airport resembles a vital organ. Usually, an aircraft arrives or departs every 54 seconds, but when outgoing jets are delayed, too few planes leave, causing an imbalance. This puts pressure on the controllers directing traffic around the facility. This is what happened during particularly foul weather on three days last month, making it one of the most serious cases of disruption since the airport opened in 1998. Chek Lap Kok, in effect, suffered a heart attack. Several factors - heavy rain and lightning and mainland airspace restrictions - saw arriving planes stacked up at the airport for up to three hours until parking stands became free, leaving travellers stranded at a time when they expected to make a quick exit. "Aircraft delay aircraft. Very simply, if these aircraft can't depart, they plug parking bays," said a senior airport operations manager, who could not be named because he was not authorised to speak to the media. The facility's operator, the Airport Authority, said this was a "rare" event, even though the same thing happened three times in one week. Airport figures show that over the weekend of May 23 - the wettest day of the year so far with an average 169.4mm of rain - 54 flights were cancelled and 1,308 were delayed. Sixty-five per cent of all scheduled flights were affected. Lam Chiu-ying, convenor of an aviation concern group, pointed out that if the original masterplan for 2020 had remained on track, a midfield concourse now under construction would have yielded 49 aerobridges in a "X" design, instead of 19 in a less-costly "I" shape. READ MORE: 'Airport chaos could have been avoided if HK adopted X-shaped proposal' "There has been some miscalculation on the provision of new [parking] bays," said former director general of civil aviation Albert Lam Kwong-yu, who oversaw the ambitious 2020 masterplan. Even though Hong Kong is as busy as London Heathrow, it has only 59 aerobridges connected to the terminal building and 27 remote stands, from which passengers have to be bussed to the main terminal. By comparison, Asian rival Singapore Changi has 96 aerobridges and 37 remote stands, while Seoul Incheon 74 and 40, yet both serve 10 million fewer passengers than Hong Kong and between 136 and 228 fewer aircraft a day. Hong Kong languishes with Bangkok's international airport as being close to capacity. The Airport Authority has defended its approach to planning, insisting that the airport's operations will be boosted once the new midfield concourse with its 19 departure gates comes on stream by the end of the year. "Insofar as the maximum practical capacity of the [present two-runway system] is concerned, the 78 [aerobridges] can meet the general planning guidelines of the International Air Transport Association," a spokesman said. The IATA guidelines cited by the authority say each aerobridge should be used to handle six turnaround flights daily. Hong Kong's existing 59 aerobridges, multiplied by six and then by 365 days, should therefore accommodate at least 129,210 flights a year. But the airport is actually handling 163,500 passenger flights - 27 per cent more than the IATA guidelines state - under the guise of extreme "efficiency". The airport needs 75 terminal-connected departure gates to handle present demand, based on the authority's figures. A HK$1 billion concourse which was opened in 2010 is the only piecemeal upgrade. It provides just 10 stands for single-aisle jets. However, an aviation analyst at CAPA Centre for Aviation, Will Horton, noted: "Many Asian airports misjudged single-aisle aircraft and low-cost airline growth. Movements grew faster than passenger volume. "That was a problem for parking stands. The north satellite terminal at Hong Kong for narrow bodies hampered future construction as it prevented the airport from starting the midfield concourse earlier. Chek Lap Kok won a short-term battle but lost long term." The airport has also focused its investments on retail and advertising projects. Revenue from commercial activities rose from HK$2.04 billion in 2004 to HK$7.98 billion last year, according to its annual reports. Airport charges increased from HK$2.7 billion to HK$3.82 billion in the same period. Singapore Changi's latest annual report shows that the facility earned HK$5.6 billion from retail and advertising and HK$4.1 billion from aviation fees last year. Chek Lap Kok's HK$2.8 billion terminal 2 was a major contributor to the rise in commercial income. The facility, which contains retail outlets and restaurants as well as check-in counters, is due to be closed for expansion in 2019 to support the proposed third runway project. While the major weather-related disruption happened on May 23, airport bosses had had a sneak preview of what was to come on May 20. The airport was in disarray on that day as the weather took its toll. Between 6pm and 4am, planes were stacked on the taxiway waiting to park. At 11.30pm some 39 planes and thousands of passengers were left waiting up to two hours until a parking stand became free. Everything began to unravel after 3pm on May 23, triggering delays lasting nearly 17 hours. The worst of the weather kicked in just before 4pm with a red rainstorm warning. Some 20 lighting strikes hit the ground within the 1km boundary of the airport island, the authority said. As the bottleneck of arriving planes intensified through the evening, thousands of passengers expecting a swift getaway from the airport were left listening to apologetic pilots announcing repeated delays in getting to a parking slot. Ground and apron staff were forced to take shelter indoors under rules to stop weatherrelated injuries. On top of the rain, all 46 flights scheduled for Beijing and Shanghai were delayed indefinitely by mainland airspace restrictions, racking up 6,900 minutes of delay between them. The affected planes simply had to wait at their gates. Until these planes departed, incoming planes had to be allocated alternative parking. The airport said 100 additional workers including airline employees, authority staff, ground and ramp service staff and government personnel were deployed. Acting authority general manager Stephen Yiu Siu-chung stressed: "We trust the public understands that the airport community spared no effort to minimise inconvenience to passengers." The airport handles 67 arrivals and departures per hour. During bad weather the rate drops to 27 take-offs and landings. According to the city's air traffic controllers, when the mainland imposes air restrictions, the rate may fall to 27 arrivals and just 20 departures an hour. Airport bosses say the severe delays show the HK$140 billion third runway must be built to allow faster operational recovery, but it is not expected to be completed until 2023 at the earliest. The airport last year operated at 93 per cent of capacity, serving a record number of flights and passengers, leaving little slack for it to return to normal after delays such as those seen in May. With the authority committed to building a third runway, the airport's ability to manage similar stormy weather will linger and frequent mainland airspace restrictions won't go away, even as the airport ramps up to handle 102 flights per hour once the new runway is operational.

When an airport has a heart attack: Hong Kong hub struggles to find cure to flight backlogs

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Disruption at Chek Lap Kok in May highlights the need to find better ways to clear gridlocks

Disruption at Chek Lap Kok in May highlights the need to find better ways to clear gridlocks