The SAAF Forum

Hi All

For the record, I admit to being extremely pedantic when it comes to aviation related data collection and that such should be done with only a complete accuracy mindset. It was with this mindset that I originally calculated the 1,000 increment milestones for Emirates and up to the latest achieved increment of 5,000 arrivals.

Some weeks after having done this, however, I started getting a nagging feeling that something wasn't right and that I should recalculate these figures. This feeling wouldn't go away. So, at my earliest inconvenience (!) I did indeed recalculate the figure, only to find it different to the one that I already had! This was unacceptable. Clearly, the margin for error for this system was too great.

I needed to find a simpler means that would eliminate any error, but how to do this? The only solution I could come up with was to introduce a counter, but this would need to be retrospectively applied from the very first flight of Emirates to Durban on May 1, 2010 – no small feat given that I wanted a record of each arrival to boot!

The other big advantage would be that all future milestones would be easily identifiable even in advance and with no chance of missing any. This alone would make all the considerable effort well worthwhile

Clearly, this was going to be a huge task which I estimated would take about 5 weeks to complete for Emirates alone.

Having quickly determined the best page format to accommodate future ever-growing counter numbers, I made my first flight arrivals data entries that very day.

Making as few as 9 entries on one particular day and as many as my record of 354 entries one Saturday, I averaged in excess of 100 arrivals per day and reached the record 5,000th one month and 2 days later!

After completing each page of arrivals, I would check each entry for accuracy and make any corrections before starting the next page. I found at least one and sometimes as many as three errors on each page despite my efforts for 'zero defect'.

The new system revealed that the only milestone that had originally been correct was the first (1,000th) arrival. Thereafter, a huge error had crept in to the calculation of the second (2,000th milestone) and this was obviously carried forward to all subsequent milestones, rendering them faulty.

Herewith, the corrected milestones for those who may be interested. I am now convinced that these are as accurate as it is possible to determine anywhere:

1,000th arrival: 24.01.2013;
2,000th arrival: 14.07.2015;
3,000th arrival: 01.04.2018;
4,000th arrival: 26.04.2022;
5,000th arrival: 20.02.2025

My next goal is to apply the same counter to the remaining two of the Big Three at King Shaka - Turkish Airlines and Qatar Airways. Obviously, these will not take so long to do.

I applied a counter to Air Botswana's arrivals from the outset and am watching this build slowly, but steadily, with great interest towards its first milestone, the 100th arrival at Durban's King Shaka, looming.

Any subsequent FBSPOs will have a counter applied from their first arrival.

I have seen the light!

It certainly makes things way more interesting, but crucially eliminates any margin for error.

Ends