AVIATION BUSINESS SOLUTIONS CASE STUDY

Operations and Fuel Assessment

  • Featuring

    Aviation Operations consulting services

  • Customer

    A North American airline

  • Solution

    Fuel assessment and audit

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The challenge

A North American carrier with a mixed fleet of 737-400 and 737-800 aircraft had communications, processes, and organizational alignment issues that led to elevated fuel use, repeat operational disruptions and poor recovery time. There was a lack of clarity on the company's strategic direction to support departmental planning and priorities.


In addition, their mixed fleet drove inefficiencies and schedule reliability challenges. We saw there were other challenges, including:

  • Lack of fuel management and contract dispatch oversight
  • Communication gaps between departments that lead to inefficient day-to-day operations and ineffective management of unexpected events
  • A need for standard operating procedures to fully optimize operations

We identified the annual costs of delays:

  • $3.1M in crew delays
  • $5.5M in technical delays
  • $1.9M in passenger services and ramp delays
  • 98.4% TDR (98.3% 400s, 98.7% 800s)
  • 62% of flights landed with >3500kg of fuel
  • Opportunity to decrease arrival fuel

Our approach

In partnership with the organization, we performed a comprehensive, onsite review of airline operations, including:

  • Evaluated operational policies and procedures
  • Surveyed airline operations control and fuel planning
  • Interviewed with dispatch, aircrew, and management staff
  • Observed aircraft turns and provisioning
  • Observed In-flight aircrew procedures
  • Performed a policy and procedure gap analysis

Through this review and audit, our team exposed and quantified the most significant systemic sources of disruption of the airlines' operations using:

  • Root-cause delay tracing algorithm
  • Airline delay benchmarking
  • Boeing patented delay cost calculation
  • Block time and aircraft turn time analyses

Results

Our Aviation Operations team successfully recommended and implemented multiple solutions to solve some of this airline's biggest challenges.
  • Implemented a Boeing-provided Event Notification System that improves situational awareness across organizations during IROPs (IRregular Operations)

  • Hired a Chief Dispatcher to oversee contract dispatch

  • Published an on-time performance program and benchmarking document for use across all of the airline's functional areas

  • Remained a trusted advisor for the VP of Flight Operations