An hour VATSIM spotting at MAN EGCC

[James Underwood]

Had an hour this evening so decided to do something different and have an hours spotting from the Visitors Centre! Taken between 1800 and 1900 Local on the 2nd July:

BAW167 EGCC - EGLL

 

CFG301 EGCC - LOWW

 

DTR180 EGCC - EIDW

 

EZY37AQ LPPT - EGCC

 

LVWOC - BIKF - EGCC

 

RYR52RN LEBL - EGCC

 

James.

[marcus holmes]

That is something different,,, very nice.

[Charan Kumar]

Spotting on VATSIM...very cool. indeed some of these airports really get busy

[Chriss Klosowski]

Great set of pictures! 

[Tobias Dammers]

Lovely! If this became a regular service, that would be super awesome 🤩

[Kirk Christie]

Might want to check A9 of the code of conduct, you are not actively participating on the network.

 

I have in the past had Supervisors contact me post flight advising that I had been sat idle on the ground too long and needed to disconnect, so I am unsure how some one can get away with spotting on the network.

 

Edited July 8, 2020 at 01:01 AM by Kirk Christie

[Andreas Fuchs]

If you are still busy with your post-flight duties, but responsive, this should be no issue at all. Also, if you plan 1 hour ground time between flights, this is acceptable, too. Just be responsive.

When I was a Supervisor I regularly caught pilots who had been sitting idle on the ground for 10, 15, or 24 hours and they were unresponsive, naturally. Yeah, sure, they forgot to a) disconnect from VATSIM, b) forgot to shutdown their flight simulator and c) forgot to switch off their computers before they went to bed/left home. It's these people who ruin it for the rest.

[James Underwood]

Thank you guys!

I had no problem 'spotting' at Gatwick recently either, I don't hold up gates, at Manchester I put myself in a J-2 Piper and spawned myself at a maintenance shed, at Gatwick I spawned at a GA ramp, but looked close to a taxiway so I went to the other side of Runway 26L (offline I must add!) and found an empty concrete area well out the way, and was fine there.

I usually put OBSERVING in the comments and connect as a J-2, and not had a problem, I would disconnect if a controller found it an issue or if I happened to be in the way for some reason, but I do try to park in obscure places well out the way. I can understand a controller being annoyed if I was at a gate for hours.

Last spotting trip for me was last year at Dusseldorf so not being able to get out during lockdown this virtual spotting is a nice relaxing fix! Better when it's real people as well and not watching AI planes, plus I tune the radio to ground or tower as a 'scanner' and use the VATSIM map as 'FR24'

 

[Kirk Christie]

Its not really about whether you were in the way or holding up gates.

If you were observing to learn ATC procedures thats ok under A9, but you have labelled this post as a sporting exercise, so you were essentially inactive on the network, you were neither flying or ATCing, and that's what A9 is all about, you were not actively participating in the network.

 

A9 - Except as provided for in Section B3(b) of this Code of Conduct, members shall not leave their connections unattended. Members not actively participating in the network (ie connected as an observer) shall not log on for excessive periods of time.

[Robert Shearman Jr]

Whose definition of "excessive" are we going by? 

[Nick Marinov]

3 hours ago, Robert Shearman Jr said:

Whose definition of "excessive" are we going by? 

CoR §6.01.B.5. “Prohibited conduct” is defined as any conduct which is deemed by the individuals listed in Article VI., §6.04 of this Code of Regulations as being abusive to other members of VATSIM.net and/or detrimental in any way to VATSIM.net.
CoR §6.04.B Sole Discretion: It is within the sole discretion of the individual authorized by this rule to determine whether the conduct of a member warrants removal or temporary suspension of said member.

As Andreas said, cases where the pilot has forgotten to disconnect for one reason or another are seen most often when it comes to that rule. Also action in such cases is coordinated within the department  with SOPs and what people are trained to do when they become a SUP.

[Andreas Fuchs]

9 hours ago, Kirk Christie said:

If you were observing to learn ATC procedures thats ok under A9

I am sure that he is going to have the reply to a SUP should he get ramp-checked some day 😈

Don't forget that those rules were made to catch hardcore online-time loggers, not the occasional observer before, after or between flights.

[Sean Harrison]

Booting people at 31min, or responsive anywhere is not in the spirit imho.  61km/hr in a 60 zone.  It upsets people.

Rules are there to stop calamity and chaos, they are a tool to enable us to deal with issues that affect the network imho.

Rules are for the guidance of wise men, and the strict compliance of fools.  Imho.

the network is provided for the enjoyment of all.

[Andreas Fuchs]

9 hours ago, Sean Harrison said:

Booting people at 31min, or responsive anywhere is not in the spirit imho.  61km/hr in a 60 zone.  It upsets people.

- at least last year the SUP-instructions were to NOT actively look for those "longhaul sleepers" anymore, but dedicate time to urgent cases
- as long as you are at or near your computer and can respond to requests and calls, you are in compliance with network rules, you can do what you like as long as your actions do not affect the enjoyment of others negatively
- in a 60 zone I want to drive the maximum possible speed, that's efficient. In my place 3 km/h will be deducted automatically and another 2 or 3 km/h will also be tolerated, because the low fines would not justify the admin work to issue them. As a consequence I can safely drive 65 in a 60 zone without upsetting anyone and I won't get an expensive photo taken

As you say, those rules are here to handle those who really create issues, but sometimes collateral damage may be caused by over eager SUPs. We are just humans and there is no professional training for such a responsible job.

[Kirk Christie]

In my case, we had not forgotten to disconnect, in fact, we had not less that 5 minuets ago pulled into the gate, not to mention this was in our worldflight sim, so we were departing again on the next leg of the flight, when a supervisor messaged asking us to disconnect as we had arrived at our destination, despite the fact we had submitted a new flight plan.

[Andreas Fuchs]

6 hours ago, Kirk Christie said:

In my case, we had not forgotten to disconnect, in fact, we had not less that 5 minuets ago pulled into the gate, not to mention this was in our worldflight sim, so we were departing again on the next leg of the flight, when a supervisor messaged asking us to disconnect as we had arrived at our destination, despite the fact we had submitted a new flight plan.

That's bad and should not have happened, if my information from above (SUPs not to focus on attendance checks) is still accurate by July 2020. I strongly suggest you send this as feedback to the VP SUPs, he will certainly take it forward to the SUPs so they can learn from this situation.

[Joshua McBride]

A9 - Except as provided for in Section B3(b) of this Code of Conduct, members shall not leave their connections unattended. Members not actively participating in the network (ie connected as an observer) shall not log on for excessive periods of time.

He didn't leave it unattended so no violation there. Second excessive period of time is not well defined and, therefore, very subjective so no one here can really determine if he or anyone else is violating by doing this. It would be up to the supervisor at the time to make the subjective determination.

[Kirk Christie]

Virtual air traffic network, not virtual airport spotters network, you are either online to fly, control, or observe to learn.

[Liesel Downes]

Restricting "spotting" in this case would also render all connections to record time-lapses/livestreams of events against the CoC, which I think we all can agree is not beneficial for the network. We're not in the days of dial-up and bad ADSL where idle connections hogging up bandwidth was actually an issue, so I don't see why we should continue to stop people from using the network in this way. Of course keep kicking actually AFK people to avoid planes taking up gates or whatever, but I think this is entirely harmless. 

1 hour ago, Kirk Christie said:

Virtual air traffic network, not virtual airport spotters network, you are either online to fly, control, or observe to learn.

Sure, but again, we (at least to my knowledge) have the bandwidth to support 1 or 2 people doing a live stream recording or "spotting" on the network now, so why bother? 

[Kirk Christie]

10 minutes ago, Liesel Downes said:

Restricting "spotting" in this case would also render all connections to record time-lapses/livestreams of events against the CoC

The vast majority of these are recorded by people who are also providing ATC services.

[Liesel Downes]

7 minutes ago, Kirk Christie said:

The vast majority of these are recorded by people who are also providing ATC services.

Good point, although I still believe people recording while not doing ATC would still be fine with 2020 bandwidth 

[Kirk Christie]

And radio range should be increased to match the transceiver range instead of still being fixed at 400nm for CTR, but it hasn't so we need to obey what is in place in its present state till such time as things are changed.

[Andreas Fuchs]

As Liesel wrote, it's not a big problem as long as spotters do not occupy gates and are responsive. Some of our pilot clients allow people to connect as "Observers", making them invisible indeed. Even better for spotting. As long as a member does not spot aircraft continuously and during all connections, it should be fine. It's all about the balance.