A First Air ATR 42-500 lining up to take off at Igloolik Airport in Igloolik, Nunavut, Canada.

Above the 60th parallel in the United States and Canada, which is known as the far north, aviation is vital to the survival of small communities. Due to the lack of adequate roads, highways, rail, and bodies of water to connect these communities to larger towns and cities, aircraft deliver virtually all of the needed resources.

Cold temperatures, extended periods of darkness, and other unique challenges create difficult operating conditions for pilots who fly throughout the region. In addition, the need to accommodate a widebody aircraft or an international overflight that must divert to the area because of an emergency poses a higher-than-normal risk.

In order to identify and address safety and operational shortcomings in the far north, ALPA established the President’s Committee for Remote Operations (PCRO) in 2012 as part of the Association’s continuing efforts to promote one level of safety for all pilots. The PCRO recently issued a new white paper that addresses how to strengthen aviation safety during emergency diversion situations. “Improving Commercial Aviation Safety in the Far North” identifies key ways in which air traffic control (ATC) and airport facilities can be improved.

“Currently, requirements for diversion airports in the far north haven’t kept pace with the increase in commercial air traffic over this region or the aircraft that may need to use the airspace,” said Capt. Peter Black (First Air), the PCRO chair. “Couple this with gaps in available resources once the aircraft is on the ground, and great potential for a major safety issue exists. By bringing these issues to the attention of regulators in the United States and Canada, we hope to advance planning and funding to safely handle the far north’s unique challenges.”

According to NAV CANADA, the number of flights over the 60th parallel has doubled from approximately 4,500 per month in 2007 to 9,500 per month in 2016. As a result, Canadian domestic airspace has become the second-busiest in the world after the United States. It also increases the potential for an unexpected diversion by widebody aircraft into very small airports that lack adequate resources to safely and properly care for passenger and crews on board, especially in the event of an emergency.

On Jan. 14, 2017, Capt. Greg Rooney (Delta) and F/Os Paul Wilkinson (Delta) and Jay Arnett (Delta), who are now both captains, found themselves in such a situation when they were grounded at a frigid and remote airfield in Cold Bay, Alaska, with limited support facilities near only a small village. Amidst the cold and wind, the flight crew coordinated the movement of some passengers to the airport terminal and a nearby recreational center, while the rest remained on the airplane. The three pilots then split duties between the locations and foraged for food to help keep the passengers in good spirits for the next six hours until a replacement aircraft arrived. Their remarkable efforts were recognized this year at ALPA’s Air Safety Forum with the Superior Airmanship Award, one of the Association’s top honors. Their need for resourcefulness, however, underscores the lack of adequate resources provided to flight crews and airports for handling diversions in this area of the world.

Prior to 2012 and ALPA’s increased focus on operations in the far north, ATC infrastructure was insufficient to handle even local traffic. However, because of ALPA’s efforts to spotlight ATC modernization needs, conditions have improved. But with the continued increase in overflight traffic, far north skies have become considerably busier. As a result, ATC infrastructure—communication, navigation, and surveillance—and ATC automation and procedures are in need of additional improvements to handle the increased traffic overflying the region. The lack of necessary resources to support flight crews during an emergency situation creates a potential safety risk that ALPA suggests should be remedied in several ways.

To ensure direct and effective communications during potential emergency situations, the Association recommends implementing continuous ATC very high frequency (VHF) radio coverage for Alaska and northern Canada so that controllers have the ability to coordinate more efficiently with flight and ground crews. Currently, communications during periods of solar activity can be degraded or unavailable, and other forms of satellite communications can be less than optimal at northern latitudes. These issues could be remedied by extending continuous VHF coverage from cruise altitude to the surface in the vicinity of diversion airports.

Expanding pilots’ ability to use instrument landing system (ILS) approaches would also enhance safety in the region. While available at most potential diversion airports in Alaska, only seven of the 38 airports in the far north of Canada are so equipped. By increasing navigation tools such as ILS, required navigation performance, and/or LNAV/VNAV approaches that are appropriate for air carrier diversion, pilots experiencing an emergency would have the ability to perform a vertically guided approach regardless of weather conditions.

In addition to improving pilot communications, many enhancements could be made to ensure that airport infrastructure and operations are fully equipped to handle a diversion by an aircraft that must land before reaching the intended destination. Currently in Alaska, 15 airports have paved runways that serve as suitable alternate airports, but they aren’t equipped with all the services and resources available to be truly effective alternate airports. In Canada, only three airports that serve as designated alternates have paved runways, but several more airports could serve as alternates if they were updated with much-needed improvements.

Unlike aircraft diversions that occur in temperate climates, during winter in Alaska and northern Canada, the combination of potentially inadequate resources and exposure to exceedingly low temperatures and resulting windchills could be extremely dangerous in the event of an aircraft accident or incident. Additionally, crews that typically don’t fly into these cold-temperature restricted airports during winter must remember to apply a cold-weather correction to their barometric altimeter. Cold temperatures associated with low barometric pressure can cause false altimeter readings by as much as 400 feet.

In February 2017, a flight with 216 passengers and 17 crewmembers experienced an automatic shutdown of the left engine due to a detected anomaly. The crew diverted to an enroute polar alternate airport because of concerns that the right engine would also shut down. With temperatures at -24F/-31C, passengers and crew were kept on the aircraft for 14 hours due to inadequate accommodations at the airport and in town. While a relief flight ultimately picked up the passengers, the aircraft’s remaining systems were fully functional, which kept this event from becoming dangerous. However, even the smallest mechanical issue with any number of aircraft environmental systems could have made this outcome significantly worse.

Last year, ALPA conducted a poll of airport managers in the far north to determine the resources available to passengers and crews at airports that serve as alternates. Among the findings, a majority of the facilities did not have a tug on the property capable of moving the largest aircraft allowed to use the airport as an alternate. In addition, most of the respondents did not have the survival gear likely needed for passengers and crews in the event of a widebody emergency.

The requirements for enroute alternate airports in the far north have not kept pace with the increase in traffic and the size of aircraft that may need to use these airports. As a result, a major safety issue could occur if an airliner had an accident or incident that necessitated diverting to a far north alternate airport and removing passengers and crewmembers from the aircraft, particularly in harsh winter conditions.