Crowded Airspace For US Fighter Pilots

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U.S. pilots flying missions over Iraq come to the region expecting a host of challenges, including swirling sandstorms and urban battlefields filled with a mix of enemies and civilians.

But Naval aviators flying off the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman aforesaid single in kind of the newest difficulties has been the least expected: navigating increasingly crowded airspace in a region that has experienced the world’s fastest airline growth in recent years.

The mix of U.S. combat aircraft and civilian planes from booming Gulf airlines illustrates the growing divide in the Middle East between countries like Iraq and Lebanon, which are mired in political and sectarian conflict, and oil-rich nations such similar to the United Arab Emirates and Qatar enjoying a windfall revenue and surging investment.

Cmdr. Bill Sigler, head of an F/A-18 combatant jet squadron on the USS Truman, estimated that planes flying right side the carrier headed north over the Persian Gulf to Iraq were confined to one-fifth of the airspace available the last time he was in the region in 2002 because of increased airline traffic.

“You consider to carve a strip off out of the middle of the Gulf and that’s frequently below 15,000 feet, which for us is like confining your car to the footway,” said Sigler. “It does not accord. us much to work with.”

The Truman’s battle group ended its Gulf deployment this week and is returning to Norfolk, Va. It was replaced by the carrier USS Abraham Lincoln.

Civilian air commerce controllers work by U.S. pilots flying to Iraq to keep them on their designated routes, a case that has become more complicated since the number of flights has ballooned.

“Now it is a spider web of networks that crisscross the Gulf,” said Sigler.

Civilian air traffic in the Mideast doubled between 2002 and 2007, according to the International Air Transport Association. Mideast airline traffic is still relatively light compared with North America and Europe, but the region’s growth duty galloped at else than 18 percent last year - far faster than any place in the West.

The boom in Gulf air traffic - particularly with carriers such as Emirates and Qatar Airways - has been driven by oil-funded airline investments and the region’s strategic locality as a nave between Asia and the U.S. and Europe, said John Strickland, a London-based airline analyst.

“Between their geographic location and the ultra-long range aircraft that are becoming available, they can pretty much fly nonstop anywhere in the earth,” related Strickland. “They have in truth introduced services that wouldn’t have been possible 5-10 years ago, and the demand has really come through.”

Capt. Fredrick Pawlowski, commander of the entire air wing on the USS Truman, said the increased port traffic has made flying missions into Iraq from the Gulf more difficult but also reflected stability and growth in the space.

From: seattletimes.nwsource.com