High Elevation Airport Operations

 Many environmental factors affect the performance of every aircraft, such as temperature, wind, or ice. Still, today I am going to focus on operations in high-elevation airports because these airports are common in my country. Have you ever noticed that when we are at high elevations, our physical performance decreases? Well, the same thing happens with airplanes. Airframe and engine performance are degraded as the altitude increases because static pressure (Ps) and air density (ρ) decrease; that is, air molecules are more spaced from each other than they would be at sea level. Thus, the true airspeed (TAS) must be increased because you need to compensate for air density reduction.

As a rule of thumb, airports located at high elevations have long runways because take-off and landing runs are increased, and engine performance is reduced. However, it is crucial to do exhaustive performance calculations before attempting either a take-off or a landing from one of these airports, even more so if temperatures are high.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=058KXk74RiA

This video took place in Medellin, Colombia. This airport has an elevation of 7000ft and a runway of 11200ft long. Despite the long runway, the DC 8 took off at the end of it and barely cleared the obstacles. This incident happened because performance calculations were made at 9 am but the take-off occurred at 3 pm when the temperature was higher. Therefore, operations in high-elevation airports are so critical and the flight crew and dispatch must work together to conduct the operation as safe as possible.

References 

chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://www.smartcockpit.com/docs/Getting_to_Grips_With_Aircraft_Performance.pdf 

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