Ostend Airport RUNWAY PERFORMANCE REPORT 2020 member of FABEC / www.skeyes.be EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Air Traffic Management (ATM) Performance is Looking at the distribution of traffic per runway, it driven by four Key Performance Areas (KPAs): safety, can be seen that 2020 follows the trends of 2017 and capacity, environment and cost-efficiency. This 2019, with runway 26 being preferentially used. 2018 report focuses on skeyes’ operations at Ostend- was a year with more north-easterly winds recorded Bruges International Airport (International Civil at all Belgian airports, implying a more frequent use Aviation Organization (ICAO) code EBOS). Its aim is of runway 08. In 2020, winds blew predominantly to provide our main stakeholders with traffic figures from the South-West, with an exception for the for 2020 and relevant data on the performance of our months of April and May where more easterly winds operations at Ostend Airport, namely on three of the were registered and the use of runway 26 dropped to four KPA’s: safety, capacity and environment. around 40% (being on average at 71% for the whole year). Traffic Safety The year 2020 will be remembered for the breakout of the coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic, which Three topics are presented in this report: greatly impacted aviation. Low records of traffic were missed approaches, runway incidents, such registered in Ostend-Bruges International Airport, as runway incursions, and improvements and with an average drop of 25% in comparison with 2019. recommendations. Regarding the first matter, Furthermore, in April 2020, during the COVID-19 first Ostend Airport registered 11 missed approaches wave, a reduction in flights of 76% was seen in the overall in 2020, ten on runway 26 and one on runway airport. 08. Weather conditions and unstable approaches are the main reasons, accounting for 82% of the missed Traffic flying by Visual Flight Rules (VFR) accounts approaches at Ostend Airport. for approximately two-thirds (66%) of the traffic in Ostend, and although restricted during the first There was one runway incursion in 2020, categorised months of the pandemic, this flight rule category as severity ‘C’ (significant incident). There were four saw a positive trend in the summer months (July more runway incidents – a runway excursion, two through September), with up to +21% of the previous taxiway excursions and a taxiway incursion – none of year’s traffic in July. Throughout the hours of the day, which happened with the involvement of skeyes. VFR movements had similar averages than previous years during the morning (06:00-09:00 local time), As in all Belgian airports where skeyes provides air and the same trend, with less movements, during traffic services, a Local Runway Safety Team (LRST) the rest of the day. Traffic flying by Instrument Flight is in place in Ostend, involving pilots, air traffic Rules (IFR) decreased more severely, both in average controllers, the airport and safety managers. During and in absolute numbers, and a peak is hardly visible LRST meetings, safety issues are discussed and during the day. investigations are shared among all parties so that all may benefit from the lessons learnt. II Capacity and Punctuality Environment At Ostend Airport, the declared IFR & medium In 2020, the Preferential Runway System (PRS) in weight VFR capacity was exceeded on eight days place at night at Ostend Airport was complied with during the year. However, at the peak hour of by 67% of the departures and arrivals. Even in the those days, mostly VFR flights - around 80% - were months of April and May, where the wind patterns recorded. On average in 2020, the traffic at peak changed to mostly North-East, the PRS was followed hour was 20.8 movements below the declared IFR & by respectively 66% and 61% of the movements. medium weight VFR capacity. While there are no annual targets with regard to Air Traffic Flow Management (ATFM) arrival delay for Ostend Airport, skeyes registers the arrival ATFM delays, as part of a continuous monitoring of the Air Navigation Service Provider’s (ANSP) performance. In 2020, as in 2019, no ATFM arrival delay has been recorded in Ostend Airport. From a passenger or airport perspective however, delays are observed more frequently than this. In fact, every departure or arrival can be affected by ATFM regulations placed in other parts of the Belgian airspace, by other countries in whose airspaces the aircraft flies through, or by the airport of arrival, possibly also in another country. In 2020, flights landing in Ostend Airport experienced a total of 1,791 minutes of ATFM delay, of which 13% were due to skeyes en-route regulations. Flights taking-off from Ostend totalled 1,498 minutes of ATFM delay: 10% attributable to skeyes, and the remaining 90% due to regulations placed by other ANSPs. Overall, there was a decrease in ATFM delay at Ostend Airport of 86% compared to 2019 figures. III THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC The year 2020 is a year that was gravely scarred On the 11th of March 2020, the WHO made the by the COVID-19 (Corona Virus Disease of 2019) assessment that COVID-19 was to be characterised pandemic. In this section, a short summary is as a pandemic. provided to give the reader a timeline. This will be referred back to further in the report in support of The Belgian government moved into the federal th certain statements. The year 2020 can be split into a phase of crisis management as from the 13 period before the COVID-19 crisis and the COVID-19 of March and ordered the closure of schools, crisis. This is visualised in Figure 0-1. restaurants, cafés and bars, as well as the cancellations of public gatherings for sporting, The pandemic originated in Wuhan, China in cultural or festive purposes. [3] December 2019. The World Health Organisation (WHO) published a disease outbreak news on the At this point the measures taken by countries against COVID-19 and the precautionary actions 5th of January 2020 to report a cluster of cases of of passengers caused flights to be suspended and pneumonia with unknown cause in Wuhan, Hubei airlines to operate ghost flights. The ghost flights Province. This was later identified as the coronavirus are kept in the air for the so-called ‘use it or lose it disease COVID-19 caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus. rules’ that stipulate that carriers have to use 80% of The first case outside China was reported on the 13th their allocated slots or they return to a common pot of January in Thailand. [1] for the next calendar year for the lucrative slots. In On the 24th of January 2020, France reported its a reaction to this, the European union suspended first confirmed COVID-19 case, the first in Europe. temporarily the rules that encouraged airlines to The first case in Belgium was reported on the 04th keep empty ghost flights in the air. of February 2020. As of the 22nd of February, Italy Additional measures, based on the spread of became the country with the most cases in Europe COVID-19 in Belgium, were in place as of the 18th and the third most cases worldwide, and on the 23rd of February, it introduced strict measures. [2] of March with stricter social distancing measures, non-essential travel prohibited, non-essential Figure 0‑1: COVID‑19 timeline Start of the year Start of 01 January 2020 COVID-19 crisis 18 March 2020 04 February 2020 First COVID-19 case in Belgium IV shops closed, gatherings banned, and penalties for In August-September 2020, the number of new anyone who failed to comply with the restrictions. corona virus infections per day began to rise again [4] This event is used here as the start of the crisis of in Belgium. This was later to be identified as the the COVID-19 pandemic. second wave. The start of the second wave is set on the 31st of August, based on on the difference in the On the 20th of March at 15:00 local time, Belgium 7-day average of new cases and the hospitalizations. closed its borders to all non-essential travel, further That week was the first week after the first wave impacting air traffic. [5] where both indicators were positive, and stayed Just like most airlines in the world, Brussels Airlines positive for two months (the rising part of the suspended its commercial flights, initially from the second wave). In the recovery phase both the 21st of March 2020 until the 19th of April, but finally trend in new cases and hospitalizations were less delayed the start of the operations until the 15th of pronounced. [8] June 2020. [6] [7] On the 30th of October, Belgium had the highest Beginning of May, Belgium started to gradually infection rate in Europe, leading to a national nd ease the lockdown measures with the reopening lockdown introduced from the 2 of November of non-essential shops (under certain conditions) and lasting until beyond 2020 with restrictions and on the 11th of May and reopening the cafes and measures on travelling that were tightened on the th th restaurants as of the 8th of June. Private business 18 and 30 of December 2020. [9] [10] flights were allowed back in the aerodromes as of the 30th of April . Starting on the 15th of June 2020, commercial traffic picked up again. At this point, the number of cases were at the lowest since the beginning of the pandemic, indicating the end of the first wave and start of the recovery phase. Start of COVID-19 End of the year second wave 31 December 2020 31 August 2020 22 June 2020 O2 November 2020 Start of recovery phase Start of COVID-19 lockdown V SAMENVATTING De prestaties van het luchtverkeersbeheer Bekijken we de verkeersspreiding per baan, dan kun- (ATM, Air Traffic Management) worden bepaald nen we vaststellen dat 2020 de trends van 2017 en 2019 door vier kernprestatiegebieden (KPA’s, Key volgt, met een preferentieel gebruik van baan 26.