Air-traffic control in `mayhem'

THE BRITISH air traffic control system, due to be privatised in 2000, has been thrown into "mayhem" a record 18 times since February as controllers struggle to cope with an ever-increasing number of flights.

They complained that on one occasion this year, air space "degenerated into chaos and was extremely dangerous". The incident occurred when more than 50 planes entered an area for which the safe maximum was considered to be only 42.

A controller said in a letter to the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), obtained by The Independent, that on 28 April, "we had over 50 aircraft entering a sector that was already full. There was no safe place to put the new aircraft."

Only 12 such cases of overload - lodged when controllers believe the number of aircraft they are handling means they could lose the ability to separate them safely - were recorded last year. At the current rate of increase there are likely to be a record 40 instances in 1998.

With air traffic set to grow by 6 per cent a year, things are unlikely to improve. "The worse sector is Clacton at the moment," said Bob Neville, who works at the busy West Drayton centre and is also a representative for the air traffic controllers' union, IPMS. "This has all the northern European traffic. Things are also pretty bad over the Irish Sea and the Dover sector."

The union points out it was only 18 months ago that two jets carrying hundreds of passengers were minutes away from a collision after a controller had been too busy coping with a particularly crowded piece of airspace. The official inquiry that followed estimated there was "37 per cent" excess traffic but said that was "exceptional".

"It doesn't appear to be exceptional less than two years later on," said Joe Magee, aviation officer for the IPMS.

However, a spokesman for the CAA said "overload limits have built-in safety margins". "British airspace is four times safer than the world average," said the spokesman.

The rise in passenger numbers is being fuelled by smaller airports. Stansted in Essex is growing at 25 per cent a year and London City airport has been allowed to double the number of take-offs and landings.

Things are likely to get worse. A high-tech centre at Swanwick designed to cope with a 40 per cent increase in traffic was supposed to open last year but has been troubled by software problems.

Bill Semple, chief executive of National Air Traffic Services, has told MPs the centre should be open by 2000 but industry sources say that is very optimistic.

Ministers believe a "public-private partnership" would allow firms to pay for the much-needed investment in NATS but controllers are concerned that the private sector would put profit before safety. Some senior Labour figures have also cast doubt on the sell-off. Gwyneth Dunwoody, the Labour MP for Crewe and Nantwich who chairs the Commons Transport Select Committee, told reporters she had many "concerns over safety if the plan went ahead".