Don’t leave passengers up in the air over traffic control system problems
Yet another glitch at one of the world’s busiest airports doesn’t inspire confidence. Our new leader can help by being completely transparent about the issues
I am thinking of not flying in or out of Hong Kong at the moment.
The latest glitch with our troublesome HK$1.5 billion-plus, state-of-the-art air traffic control system sounds downright scary.
According to the Civil Aviation Department, controllers lost information on the positioning and altitude of a large number of flights for 15 minutes. This doesn’t mean they had no idea where the flights were. The backup system worked – thank God! – so they could still maintain audio and satellite contact with aircraft.
Officials said planes over Hong Kong airspace and in and out of the airport were not affected. I suppose they were right, since no plane crashed.
Still, I am not putting my trust in a system, however advanced, that could lose track of so many flights for 15 minutes.
The incident happened less than a week after the system was given a clean bill of health by the department following a series of glitches and flight disruptions. Despite the positive assessment by an expert panel, problems identified included the inaccurate display of aircraft positions, disappearing flight plans on screens and a server disruption at the control tower. That doesn’t sound reassuring.