The grounding of flights for about three hours Thursday at Durango-La Plata County Airport stems from a problem of long standing.
“I told the airport administration there at least as early as March 2012 that they needed a person trained to take weather observations when the automated system is not available,” National Weather Service electronics system analyst Chris Kornkven said by telephone Friday from Grand Junction.
A lack of communication Wednesday appeared to be what brought the situation to a head. National Weather Service technicians called early Wednesday afternoon, but airport Director Kip Turner was traveling and didn’t learn of the next-day maintenance until late Wednesday. He reiterated Friday what he said Thursday – that because the technicians didn’t confirm their arrival, airport officials assumed there would be no maintenance performed.
Turner, who was hired as airport director in March, said more advance notice of maintenance is needed. He would like 48-hour lead time, he said.
Kornkven said that’s impossible. The vast territory three technicians cover, travel time and emergency assignments preclude such advance notice, he said.
The Federal Aviation Administration requires weather observations be made for planes to take off and land, and Durango-La Plata has no trained observer readily available.
So when two National Weather Service technicians arrived Thursday to upgrade and recalibrate automated instrumentation, shutting down the system for the maintenance brought operations to a halt from about 9 a.m. to noon.
Other airports don’t need a lot of time to prepare for maintenance of automated systems, Kornkven said. A trained observer can record temperature, cloud height, visibility, wind speed and direction, barometric pressure and precipitation if maintenance coincides with flight schedules, he said.
Turner said he’s contacted the FAA about the process for training a weather monitor.
As a result of the miscommunication and the flight delays, Kornkven said, the work to be done Thursday – installation of new software followed by recalibration – was not carried out.
Instead, the old software was repaired to allow operations to resume, Kornkven said. Recalibration assures the accuracy of instrument readings, he said.
Technicians will have to visit again to do the work, Kornkven said.
The mix-up Thursday caused the delay of two flights and the cancellation of two flights.
Several passengers rented cars to drive to Albuquerque and Lubbock, Texas.
daler@durangoherald.com
