Good Evening Everyone,

I hope you have all enjoyed your long weekend. I can assure you this is not a late April Fools joke, but simply another opportunity to update our members on what has been going on ‘behind the scenes’ since my previous post.

Beginning with recent staff appointments, @Archie Middlefell and @Alice Ford were appointed as an Aerodrome Operations Coordinator and Operations Assistant respectively. Last month we also welcomed @Dylan Parkes into the Member Services Team as a Member Services Assistant. Dylan will be working alongside the rest of the Member Service Team, including @William Shaw who took over as the Member Services Director at the end of January. Myself and Will have since been working closely to remove administrative burden on our Technology Team and this work is still underway. Aside from some new/renamed Helpdesk topics, this change will not directly affect our members, however it will free up capacity within the Technology Team, allowing them to spend more time working on projects for the Division.

On the topic of Technology, most members will have already interacted with our new online roster and reactivation system. This was first showcased to the DSG during our February meeting where it worked flawlessly, and the public launch of the system was equally impressive, delivering all of the functionality we required to be compliant with GCAP, on schedule, and with nothing breaking in the process! This is no easy feat and is testament to the hard work and ability of our developers to whom I extend my deepest gratitudes. The Technology Team is likely to remain busy for a while longer with the release of TVCP, which requires changes to our existing Visiting and Transferring Controller system, however more will be shared on this in the future. For those unfamiliar with TVCP, I would recommend a brief read of the following TVCP update.

ATC Training remains an area of great focus, and today marks the first ‘currency check’ since the introduction of our roster. While I will leave this to Adam to comment on in greater detail, I expect a reduction in both waiting list and training times which will benefit our members greatly. March also saw the introduction of a new S2 syllabus and changes to Heathrow training. It is hoped that the former will result in greater efficiencies in the S2 training process and a further reduction in waiting list and training times. The latter, although required by GCAP, will allow our S1 rated controllers to request training on Heathrow Delivery and Ground positions. Fraser has been working alongside Will J and Adam to ensure that the training process for these controllers thoroughly prepares our newest controllers for the busiest airport on the Network as of late. It is great to see Heathrow being staffed so frequently despite the high traffic numbers and problems this can often bring. The quality and consistency of service from our controllers has not gone unnoticed from Regional staff, so a big well done is thoroughly deserved on this front!

Moving on to Marketing, applications for the role of Marketing Director were closed at the end of February, however we sadly could not find a suitable candidate for the job. I would nevertheless like to thank everyone who took the time to apply for this position. In terms of future plans for the department, this currently remains unclear and is subject to internal discussion by the DSG. I will remain in my caretaker role, with Luke and Tom taking care of the day-to-day running of events and social media respectively until we decide on a way forward. We have seen some recent, large events, such as the Heathrow - Zurich Citypair and Mancheaster, pass without the usual overload of traffic. This is largely due to the introduction of the Events Team who have provided support during these events, but also due to not posting these events on myVATSIM. We expect the myVATSIM will still be a useful tool for events at smaller airfields, however for larger events where traffic levels are not a concern, advertising internally and within a select number of Virtual Airlines will likely become the norm to prevent overload and burnout of our controllers. CTP is also looming, and Heathrow was selected as a departure field for this edition. It remains to be seen if the rumours of the PMDG 777 and FlyByWire A380 releasing in time for CTP are true, but in any case it is safe to assume that this CTP will be as busy as ever. If you are free to control, please do put your name down on the expressions of interest!

I hope this update has proven helpful or insightful in some way - as always if you have any questions, concerns, or comments, please reply below or get in touch via the Helpdesk or Discord DMs.

Ben