Air traffic noise? (Lounged)

[alieh]

Is it just me or is there suddenly a huge increase in the air traffic noise in East Dulwich? I moved over a year ago, but have only noticed this in the last couple of months. Either I have been living under a rock for 12 months or something has changed in the flight paths!? Anyone else notice the same?

[MadWorld74]

No you are right. We moved here about 2 years ago and heard nothing.

Then suddenly I lie awake at night and get woken up about 5.30am from the jets. They are so loud it's unbelievable.

[BarryRoad]

There has indeed been a change to the approach into both Heathrow and London City Airports.

I'm trying to search for some hard evidence but can't find anything on paper (or interweb pdf).

The change I've noticed hasn't been the actual direction or density of aircraft, but the altitude - particularly on London City inbound flights. It's lower, and because of that, noisier.

Given there's nothing I can find on the interweb about this, I will use some aviation geekery to make a guess or two:

- The weather : We all know it's been rubbish, and cloud cover may be leading to lower approaches for safer operations.

- The weather II : Wind direction. Planes like to take off and land facing into the wind. Wind going over the wing increases lift, in addition to the lift produced by the aircraft moving forward. Heathrow's main active runways are 27R and 27L because the wind usually comes from the west (the 27 on the runway name indicates a bearing of 270 degrees, West). If the wind isn't doing what it usually does, the flight path including the altitude may have to be changed to deal with this. We've been having dodgy weather and it might be because we're getting more northery or easterly winds that normal. Also, about a month ago I was at work up near Blackfriars and saw a few planes departing the area in the opposite area to usual (eg, taking off on 9L or 9R). This is very noisy because the engines are on almost full power. Haven't seen that happen since, though.

- Marketing push to wind people up until the A380 starts operating and then they can show off just how quiet it is? ha ha

EDIT - I also just read that wind can actually blow noise pollution around, so again, changes in wind direction could be causing more noise. Mental.

So, as I said, there probably is some paperwork that would point us in the right direction as to why this would be the case, but I can't find it. But maybe it is just down to the weather....

[Ant]

BarryRoad, I stand in awe of your aviation geekery. :)

Can't say I've noticed more noise than usual, but then I grew up over Kew/Richmond way so anything here seems quiet by comparison.

[LostThePlot]

alieh Wrote:

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> Is it just me or is there suddenly a huge increase

> in the air traffic noise in East Dulwich?

Personally I think it's you!

Seriously though, been here since 1998, and the good old days of stopping what you are doing to watch Concorde pass over. (THAT was loud....) but other than that I've not noticed a difference.

BTW, when I came into City airport recently, (http://www.everytrail.com/view_trip.php?trip_id=3915) we dropped straight in from the east, so didn't get to look for the house.... :-(

Of course, it could be (As they did in the Iranian embassy seige - so the SAS could operate in the building, to spy on the hostages and their takers, prior to the rescue of the hostages.) that flights are being brought in lower over the area so the noise disguises other sounds. Probably best to blame Foxtons....

[Brendan]

I too grew up under an airport approach (although considerably further away than Kew) so I don?t even notice the planes. Mrs B does sometimes complain that they wake her up though.

[Asset]

I thought they were particularly loud this morning.

[alieh]

Glad to hear that at least a few people have noticed a change too. It's not enough noise to change your life, but just interesting that it seems to have come out of nowhere. Thanks for the aviation insights, BarryRoad! If you come up with any evidence about what has changed -- apart from weather and Foxtons-related espionage -- I would be interested to hear more!

[LuvPeckham]

Hi alieh

I have lived here for over 13 years now, and in my experience, the flight paths get changed over this way every so often, then without any rhythm or reason they shift away again.

Something that you may also consider is that as it is summer (he laughs at the concept of this being summer) then you may also be noticing an increase in noise due to open windows (not saying this is the sole cause but it may contribute to it)

I expect that one day soon you will wake up and notice something missing, the now familiar sound of the 5:45 flight in from Hong Kong (or wherever they have been)

[Clazza]

Hi, I've really noticed it & this is with windows closed. Sounds like they are landing on top of you about 5.30am. Friends who stayed over the weekend complained as they live in South Manchester & said how much worse it was here. Have taken to sleeping with earplugs in, if I really need a good nights sleep. Hopefully will get better after the summer!

[fractionater]

get double glazing windows fitted!

[Clazza]

I do have them! Not that daft :)

[kford]

I noticed aircraft this morning. Strange. It was a higher pitched drone, usually found on 757s and some Airbus. Don't notice earlier flights ordinarily because they're mostly deeper sounding 747s or A340s from the states, far east or down under.

[Ultraconsultancy]

I'm sure I read somewhere that Camberwell is the 'reserve' stack for both Heathrow and City; this means that you don't get it continuously enough to get used to it, but only in peak times. In the summer of course these peaks are much more often and longer. it quite noticebly gets louder earlirer in the morning at the beginning of June IIRC. Thanks for the reminder about concorde - i remember looking up at 4.20 or so every day, like the farmers in 'night mail' -oo arh that be the way of science be that.

Ultraconsultancy

[Annasfield]

So it would appear that we have quite a few plane spotter types in ED........

[LostThePlot]

Ultraconsultancy Wrote:

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> Thanks for the reminder about concorde - i remember looking up at 4.20 or so every day,

You must have had a sore neck! NY incoming went over at 6:05 each day I thought?

(http://www.dooyoo.co.uk/airline/concorde/427032/ reveals a 17:25 landing...which is midway between our thoughts)

[Asset]

Concorde always made me stop and look. I know it was a gas guzzling noisy monster, but it looked fab and I miss it.

[Marmora Man]

In my view aircraft noise peaks when the skies are cloudier and is, perhaps, related to them flying slightly lower. It does seem to vary through the year but I haven't attempted to correlate it with wind patterns or peak holiday times. It's nowhere near as bad as it is closer to Heathrow.

On Concorde - I used to live in the West Country. When we moved in we wondered what the explosion was every evening at 5.20pm. It was Concorde going thru' the sound barrier outward bound along the Bristol Channel about 150 miles away. I also used to see it when living in Surbiton area - one glorious late summer evening we were in the local open air pool, with a barbie going, cold beer and blue skies when Concorde flew over at about 1000ft (or so it seemed) - fabulous sight, the unique design, engineering expertise and sheer theatricality of that evening was totally uplifting and made my heart soar.

[Peckhamgatecrasher]

I remember when the three concordes flew on their last flight. I was driving up Blackheath Hill at the time and fortunately all the other drivers shared my emotions - we all stopped to watch. V.V lump in throat time.

[Cuthbert Dibble]

Geekery alert - hacan.org.uk has some good info on this....

There are a number of variables but, if you're under the Heathrow flightpath (as opposed to City) - you can at least know in advance whether the early morning planes will be waking you up - by watching the weather forecast the night before.

If the wind arrows are pointing east (ie a westerly wind - something which happens around 70% of the time on average) then I'm afraid you should get the earplugs on standby. The planes will land into that wind, probably over East Dulwich. Several come in from the Far East from around 5-6am. In the morning Heathrow uses both runways (we're under the approach for the southern runway I believe)

HOWEVER - if its easterly winds forecast (which often happens if it's clear weather blowing in from the continent - ie arrows pointing west) then - yipee! - stand by to enjoy your lie in uninterupted. The planes will approach from the west instead (Windsor etc - why on earth did they build the castle so near the airport??) This happens around 30% of the time.

So sometimes during a period of sustained easterly winds there may be no Heathrow planes flying over our lovely town at all (this happened last summer for about a week I recall)

Now all you have to do is to get your neighbour to switch off their sodding car alarm.

[BarryRoad]

... please don't lounge for this..

"Now all you have to do is to get your neighbour to switch off their sodding car alarm"... and put some tyre spikes down for the Apollo 21 ice cream van that operates throughout winter.

[Annasfield]

How do you lot know all this? :-S

[lozzyloz]

I've heard that Virgin are now starting their descent earlier and at a higher altitude to save on fuel. Will this reduce noise and if so why don't all airlines follow suit? Less fuel, less noise = more happiness.

Now could somebody do something about the paper delivery boy (man) that runs down the pavement dragging a noisy trolley behind him at 5.30am and the Milky that seems to relish flying over speed bumps and doing emergency stops in his float around 4am! (6)

[downsouth]

I am in awe of your collective wisdom!!

Must say I'm a heavy sleeper,I could have the runway beside my house and I wouldn't wake up for anything. Hurricane Gilbert? Not from where I was sleeping.

[BarryRoad]

http://lhr.webtrak-lochard.com/template/index.html

Above is a link to webtrak - it monitors the aircraft inbound to Heathrow (haven't watched long enough to see if it's all London traffic). There's a 24 hour delay due to obvious security reasons, but if you note down the times of disturbance you can track down who's fault it was.

I wouldn't bother phoning BAA to ask them if the 0603 VS002 Virgin flight inbound to Heathrow, which you tracked at 4,300ft over your house 24 hours previous, can be re-routed from now on. They'll laugh in your face... Actually, it might be funny to do that prank call. If you do, record it for me :-)