I just wanted to send out a little update to let everyone know where we are with starting off 2018.

I recently attended meetings with NUW regarding airspace and possibilities for the MRU they want to start operating.  Some key points affecting TMU are:

  1.  A temporary fix for the issues A and C areas have with Molson S High is to cap the airspace at FL320.  There has been a memo in CEDAR about this and they already started doing it (although it was ahead of time).  We will revisit this to see how it is working.
  2. We also talked about possibly moving the boundary of Molson North to be able to accommodate NUW's need for FL350 but also accommodate the YVR departures climbing out.  Then Molson S high wouldn't exist anymore.  But that was just an idea that may take a while, if it even happens.
  3. As far as the multiple event numbers utilizing the same airspace at the same time, pilots are going to be instructed to specify that they are last man out for their specific event.  If they aren't sure (maybe a flight of 5 went as a flight of 4 because one broke), they can tell the sector they aren't sure and the MC can call NUW to investigate.  Hopefully that should help for the few times we've had airspace called cold when there was either another event still in the airspace or if another aircraft departs late.
  4. NUW is going to reiterate to their pilots that if they are departing somewhere besides NUW (ie. YKM or SKA), they need to call NUW to still activate their airspace 30 minutes prior.  I had told them we have had that several times that they just call up airborne and want airspace that hasn't been activated.
  5. The MRU is looking like a start time around June.  At first, it will only be for Olympic and W237 A-G.  They are looking to operate approximately 40 hours per week, 8 hours a day.  We will be meeting again sometime between February-March to hash out the LOA.  If everything goes well, they may look at operating more frequently and maybe also taking over the eastside airspace as well.

Just to clarify on the spot leave requests in WMT for 2019, beginning January 6th, 2018 we will not be able to request leave in WMT 365 days out.  After all rounds of bidding for 2019 are complete, then WMT will be open to request spot leave for 2019.  For this reason, we hope to start the bidding process earlier so that we are done with bidding 2019 in a timely manner.

For schedules this year, we will now be putting in automatic return to shift requests for shifts that were moved 2 hours or more for coverage.  We figured since we only have 10 people now, people may be moved a hour here or there and that would be a lot of requests being put in.  

I think that's it for now.  I'm looking forward to being your rep for the next 2 years.  If you have any issues or ideas, please don't hesitate to reach out to me.  

~ Sherri

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