A member of the deicing 'crew' will inspect the aircraft by leaving the truck and running their bare hand down the leading edge of the wing. The aircraft crew cannot open the door after they have left the gate (and popped the brake). Once they shut the door and leave the gate they have 'departed' it does not matter how long it takes to deice.

(Written on 08-03-2021)(Permalink)

They need the border to reopen. Ogdensburg is the closest American city to a foreign capitol, Ottawa.

(Written on 07-03-2021)(Permalink)

I am sure that Frontier invested in training in Nashville (captive vendors do not have training budgets). The problem with this sort of job is rapid turnover. Job applicants who need a job will accept one not at the airport before the airport completes the background check. They apply in March are offered employment in September by which time they are already working elsewhere. It is possible to have a sort of bunching of skills where one person on the shift with a whole three years of time on the job will be the only person trained to deice, to airstart, to pushback, etc., because everyone else on the shift has been there less than six months and has not completed training.

(Written on 06-03-2021)(Permalink)

Pitot tubes are heated but they are small. Dash 8's have rubber boots for mechanical deicing of the leading edge of the wing. Also ice is not ice, that is ice at 30 degrees is going to be easy to melt. Ice at 0 degrees is going to be almost impossible. Large antennas can be 'detuned' when ice forms on them and no amount of power will melt the ice even when power comes from a local generator that does not have to be flown around.

(Written on 06-03-2021)(Permalink)

Let me add further that deicing is never done at the gate because deicing has to be done where there is a drain that does not connect to the watershed. Deicing fluid is propylene glycol mixed with water and heated. Anti-icing fluid is propylene glycol with green dye. If the issue is snow but not ice it is permissible to use brooms or a rope thrown over the wing and pulled its length. In the southern US it is permissible to use hot water to deice. I would note that the deicers---one to spray and one to drive the truck---would have been pulled away from their normal job whatever that is.

(Written on 06-03-2021)(Permalink)

I worked at a SWOA, a Special Winter Operations Airport. I cannot find a list of these on google but I doubt that Nashville is one so I doubt the baggage handlers there do much deicing. There is considerable rigmarole to doing the actual deicing. The deicer has to put a harness on over his or her uniform that connects to the bucket that is attached to the cherry picker. The gloves for baggage handling are often not gloves that work to keep your hands warm. The deicing fluid has to be warm which means that the truck has to be started well before takeoff to get the type one up to 180 degrees. This is an issue for the first flight of the day. The heaters on the truck are diesel and of course have to work. Which may have been an issue in this case since I do not see any orange on the wing. And all of this for about eleven dollars an hour.

(Written on 06-03-2021)(Permalink)

They probably do not do a lot of deicing in Nashville. Going by the photograph they did not deice at all. Deicing fluid is bright orange and comes out of the nozzle at 180 degrees. Anti icing fluid is green and is not heated. So they put unheated propylene glycol on top of ice. I doubt there would be a contractor in Nashville that only does deicing. It is almost certainly done by the ground handling company, probably by baggage handlers doing double or triple duty. Turnover in these jobs is very high and it is probable that the deicer/baggage handler would not have deiced more than a few times before this.

(Written on 05-03-2021)(Permalink)

Yes, I saw that. Is it clear who Integrated Acquisition is?

(Written on 15-02-2021)(Permalink)

I worked in NYC for many years for a computer company. One of our customers, Integrated Resources, bought an old department store, S.Klein at Union Square and 14th Street, and was going to make it their headquarters but they went bankrupt before they moved in. Integrated Resources owned Learjet at that time. The stories I see say that Bombardier acquired Lear in 1990 but it is not clear from whom. Integrated Resources was mainly into junk bonds and real estate.

(Written on 15-02-2021)(Permalink)

It is a small world. Ratan Tata used to wash planes at the Ithaca Airport: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxnHEM0hQrk at the 21 minute mark.

(Written on 07-02-2021)(Permalink)