Covid-19; Impact on the aviation industry

PommieBast

Irish Steve wrote: »

With increasing numbers of people being fully vaccinated, I suspect that these requirements will also be changed in the next few days.

I think it may well be a case of the regulations being changed before they lose all respect and become widely flouted/bypassed. I don't see how inter-county travel can be allowed without defacto allowing NI-RoI travel.

Ironically I am scheduled to get my jab on the 24th..

Irish Steve

PommieBast wrote: »

I think it may well be a case of the regulations being changed before they lose all respect and become widely flouted/bypassed. I don't see how inter-county travel can be allowed without defacto allowing NI-RoI travel.

Ironically I am scheduled to get my jab on the 24th..

Again, as I understand it, NI-ROI travel is now permitted, albeit not advised at the moment.

I'm in the happy position of being fully vaccinated and beyond the waiting period, and yes, it was very nice to have a "normal" day visiting my son and his family that we've not seen for 7 months, and we had (outdoor) food as well, also very normal, made a very nice change for all of us.

The whole credibility aspect of Government performance is a subject that needs to be looked at in great detail once Covid is no longer an issue, I don't think they've done a particularly good job of making it up as they went along, and the latest twist of the hacking of the HSE just makes it worse, and for that monumental faux pas, some serious heads should roll, but that's unlikely to happen, more's the pity.

Given the EU is about to roll out this green passport scheme, to expect people to isolate or quarantine if they've been fully vaccinated and been in a place where they should not have been at significant risk is just another example of the absurd manner that this whole scenario is being cobbled together from day to day.

Hotblack Desiato

Irish Steve wrote: »

and the latest twist of the hacking of the HSE just makes it worse, and for that monumental faux pas, some serious heads should roll, but that's unlikely to happen, more's the pity.

The equivalent of newspaper comments demanding that pilots be sacked any time there is an incident :rolleyes:

Public sector IT already has very unattractive T&Cs for the industry and can't fill anything other than entry level posts. The post of director of the National Cyber Security Centre is being offered at €89k FFS - no surprise it's been vacant for a year.

How about we wait for the investigation?

IT salaries in public sector are derisory. They can't attract or retain anyone.

PommieBast

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

Public sector IT already has very unattractive T&Cs for the industry and can't fill anything other than entry level posts. The post of director of the National Cyber Security Centre is being offered at €89k FFS - no surprise it's been vacant for a year.

Probably one for the Coding Horror thread..

Irish Steve

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

The equivalent of newspaper comments demanding that pilots be sacked any time there is an incident :rolleyes:

Public sector IT already has very unattractive T&Cs for the industry and can't fill anything other than entry level posts. The post of director of the National Cyber Security Centre is being offered at €89k FFS - no surprise it's been vacant for a year.

How about we wait for the investigation?

The problem is not with the people at the sharp end driving the keyboards, it's way higher than that, where people are making decisions like keeping WinXP and other out of date and insecure operating systems in service beyond their end of support dates. There are also a number of ministers of various governments that should be made to answer for their failures to properly deal with many of the issues around the HSE, and other state services, significant decisions about streamlining and merging many out of date and unsuitable IT systems should have been made a long time ago, but they were not willing to deal with the fallout that would have followed from both internal and external vested interest groups that are not willing to see real change happen.

And in passing, my thoughts are not "The equivalent of newspaper comments demanding that pilots be sacked any time there is an incident", I spent my entire working life working with computers and systems, at every level, from single user PC tyoe systems up to and including multi national company administrative computer networks, so I have more than a passing knowledge of the unspoken background issues behind this sort of incident, and the complexities of fixing them.

NSAman

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

The post of director of the National Cyber Security Centre is being offered at €89k FFS - no surprise it's been vacant for a year.
?

What?

Has no ministers family member even done a FETEC level one course on websites?

I am shocked!

DubDani

Irish Steve wrote: »

Where are you getting your information from?

The last time I looked, (like now to be sure) there was NO test requirement for travel from NI to UK, and no test requirement from ROI to UK. There is a PCR test requirement within 72 hours of travel before returning to ROI from UK, but there is no test requirement from UK to NI. THere is still a requirement that travel is for essential purposes only until May 24th from NI, and there is still a restriction on travel to from ROI at present, with no definite end date.

There is a recommendation, but not mandatory, to get a test before UK departure and at 2 and 8 days after arrival in NI from UK after May 24, but it can be the cheap test, it does not have to be PCR test, which is way more expensive. Self isolation for up to 10 days is also recommened.

With increasing numbers of people being fully vaccinated, I suspect that these requirements will also be changed in the next few days.

BBC for one have been reporting it, as have many other outlets in the North.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-57119439

New guidance states those exempt from self-isolation must take Covid-19 tests before departure and on later dates.

The Northern Ireland Tourism Alliance described this as "unmanageable".

Previously, Stormont ministers had only advised that people could travel from Northern Ireland to the CTA for essential reasons.

On Thursday, the executive announced relaxations to this rule, but introduced certain requirements for travellers arriving into Northern Ireland.

The new guidance sets out that anyone exempt from self-isolation will be asked to take lateral flow tests for Covid-19 pre-departure, as well as on days two and eight post-arrival into Northern Ireland.

All other visitors will be required to self-isolate on arrival for 10 days.

Irish Steve

DubDani wrote: »

BBC for one have been reporting it, as have many other outlets in the North.

It seems that there is a considerable level of confusion about the actual plan at the moment, in as much as the official NI web site is still not giving clarity of information about the plan. The only clarity is the requirement for a pre travel test, the cheaper lateral flow, with a repeat at 2 days and 8 days after arrival, and it seems that this will only be applicable to visiting family and friends, so no holidays as such, even if there are places open to stay at. Not sure how this will be interpreted for things like owner occupied caravans etc.

I am still expecting that there will be changes to even this plan before the 24th, but it's all still a complete mess, and the absence of an island wide strategy is only adding to the problem for all concerned.

MrMusician18

Irish Steve wrote: »

The problem is not with the people at the sharp end driving the keyboards, it's way higher than that, where people are making decisions like keeping WinXP and other out of date and insecure operating systems in service beyond their end of support dates. There are also a number of ministers of various governments that should be made to answer for their failures to properly deal with many of the issues around the HSE, and other state services, significant decisions about streamlining and merging many out of date and unsuitable IT systems should have been made a long time ago, but they were not willing to deal with the fallout that would have followed from both internal and external vested interest groups that are not willing to see real change happen.

And in passing, my thoughts are not "The equivalent of newspaper comments demanding that pilots be sacked any time there is an incident", I spent my entire working life working with computers and systems, at every level, from single user PC tyoe systems up to and including multi national company administrative computer networks, so I have more than a passing knowledge of the unspoken background issues behind this sort of incident, and the complexities of fixing them.

I have to say I find this comment strange, particularly on an aviation forum. Given the cost of machinery and hardware as well as certification in aviation, I can be absolutely sure there are computers being used in workshops and maintenance hangars running XP. Should airlines be scrapping 10 year old planes because their avionics interface with out of date operating systems? Of course not and the same is true of medical systems.

If anything, those interested in the aviation industry should be stepping up and encouraging cyber security professionals to adopt it's accident and disaster reporting culture. This is nothing to do with covid and aviation though so I'll leave it at that.

Noxegon

Related to the above:

https://www.theverge.com/2020/8/11/21363122/boeing-747s-floppy-disc-updates-critical-software

bk

MrMusician18 wrote: »

I have to say I find this comment strange, particularly on an aviation forum. Given the cost of machinery and hardware as well as certification in aviation, I can be absolutely sure there are computers being used in workshops and maintenance hangars running XP. Should airlines be scrapping 10 year old planes because their avionics interface with out of date operating systems? Of course not and the same is true of medical systems.

It all comes down to if those XP systems are air gapped or not.

If they are networked, then you are screwed. I really, really hope that those XP systems in hangars aren't networked or it could be very dangerous.

There are of course valid reasons to run old software, but if you do, you really need to lock it down and isolate it.

Irish Steve

bk wrote: »

It all comes down to if those XP systems are air gapped or not.

If they are networked, then you are screwed. I really, really hope that those XP systems in hangars aren't networked or it could be very dangerous.

There are of course valid reasons to run old software, but if you do, you really need to lock it down and isolate it.

Few years ago now, a friend of mine was the local support engineer for a French biz jet, and it had a range of things that needed updates on a regular basis, and to do that, there was a toughbook laptop that came with the aircraft, the only problem being that it was made very clear that it was NEVER to go near an internet connection, despite having all the relevant hardware to be able to do so, as it was a "virgin" unpatched XP machine, which meant that if we got some sort of error message from the PC or the aircraft, it had to be saved on the machine, then transferred to a memory stick, so that the error message could then be taken to a machine with internet connection to connect to the manufacturers web site to find out what the message meant. To make it worse, the aircraft had on board Sat connect WiFi, and the aircraft was able to connect itself, so we had to be paranoid to make sure that the toughbook didn't connect via the sat system on the aircraft, if it had done so, it would have been downloading updates for about a week!

If EVERYONE involved knows exactly what the rules are, it can be made to work, but too many commercial organisations made bad decisions about keeping end of life operating systems in service beyond cut off, and then wondered why they had so many problems, and in some cases, the people using the machines neither knew or cared what operating system it used, they just used the computer for whatever tasks they had to do, and in some cases, for other things not work related, and that's all too often where the problems come from. If the network security is not set up to monitor risky web site address ranges, then anything can and does happen, as has been seen in recent weeks both here and in the USA with their pipeline shutdown.

Part of the problem is a complete lack of international legislation with teeth that can enable the ransomware originators to be tracked, and dealt with, in some cases, national governments are happy to see other countries caused problems, as long as they can't be blamed, so it's a much bigger issue than just stopping the rot in the first case.

basill

Allegedly they are based in Russia. Chaos and misinformation is in their national interests so I wouldn't have thought that signing them up to an international treaty would do much other than illicit a few token press releases that they are doing all they can etc etc.

bk

Irish Steve wrote: »

If EVERYONE involved knows exactly what the rules are, it can be made to work, but too many commercial organisations made bad decisions about keeping end of life operating systems in service beyond cut off, and then wondered why they had so many problems, and in some cases, the people using the machines neither knew or cared what operating system it used, they just used the computer for whatever tasks they had to do, and in some cases, for other things not work related, and that's all too often where the problems come from. If the network security is not set up to monitor risky web site address ranges, then anything can and does happen, as has been seen in recent weeks both here and in the USA with their pipeline shutdown.

This is the biggest problem with old XP systems and using it to run specialist tools, software, etc. To non technical users, it looks like a general purpose PC, hey, it is running windows after all, it has Internet Explorer and office and outlook, why not use it to surf the web and complete that spreadsheet.

But non of these are patched and thus are highly vulnerable.

As you say, it isn't unusual to have dedicated machines for running specific tasks. It also isn't unusual for IT folks to physically lock down such machines, remove wifi, bluetooth and networking cards from them. Epoxy USB ports, epoxy the case shut, etc. Remove all unnecessary software, just have the software and interface required to run the specialist tool.

L1011

Most modern websites look awful in the browsers for XP (and even worse the older you go - on 98, unless you have the last version of Opera for 98, you don't have TLS 1.2 so can't get on any decent website) - but on 7, there's still good browsers.

Also, if you point an unpatched Win7 machine at Windows Update now, it almost certainly won't work. You need to manually install a pile of updates first! There could easily be people who'd paid for the extra years of support but have machines that are broken and not pulling updates.

Covid-19; Impact on the aviation industry for me: first flight on a Lufthansa CRJ900. Up until now the smallest plane they'd use on this route was an Airbus 319.
I guess they are using the A320s on routes that would have been served by A330s in the past.

Van.Bosch

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Covid-19; Impact on the aviation industry for me: first flight on a Lufthansa CRJ900. Up until now the smallest plane they'd use on this route was an Airbus 319.
I guess they are using the A320s on routes that would have been served by A330s in the past.

3 flights a day some days this week, granted all smaller aircraft but surprised at that

mr.anonymous

https://www.irishtimes.com/business/transport-and-tourism/aviation-interests-let-fly-at-government-over-state-of-industry-and-lack-of-recovery-plan-1.4570718

Article on another bad week for the Irish aviation industry.

Mebuntu

If anyone missed the the Joint Commitee meeting with Willie Walsh on Wednesday it can be watched back at the link below.

Be warned you will need your blood pressure tablets to hand.

It starts around the 13 minute mark.

https://www.oireachtas.ie/en/oireachtas-tv/video-archive/committees/4228

Word of warning:
Do not expect a valid HSE PCR negative test confirmation by SMS to be sufficient to allow travel with some airlines. If you think the PCR test will provide a hyperlink to a certificate you can print out you will be disappointed. It will include a referral ID which is of little use to you at time of departure or arrival.
Despite the Agent having phoned the HSE to confirm the validity of the PCR test based on the Referral ID contained in the SMS the Check-in agent would still not allow me to fly and would not issue to me a boarding pass.
The Check-in agent feared that Border Control in Germany would fine the Carrier.
On account of being hacked the HSE are in disarray, can neither accept nor process notification results by e-mail and heir promise of following up can take anything up to 24hours if at all.
Randox on site at Dublin airport can issue antigen results in 1 hour at a cost of 49 euro which I consider very expensive for an antigen test but a small expense in comparison to the cost and frustration of having to miss a flight especially as there are so few flights scheduled these days.
Take care out there and happy flying.

Van.Bosch

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Word of warning:
Do not expect a valid HSE PCR negative test confirmation by SMS to be sufficient to allow travel with some airlines. If you think the PCR test will provide a hyperlink to a certificate you can print out you will be disappointed. It will include a referral ID which is of little use to you at time of departure or arrival.
Despite the Agent having phoned the HSE to confirm the validity of the PCR test based on the Referral ID contained in the SMS the Check-in agent would still not allow me to fly and would not issue to me a boarding pass.
The Check-in agent feared that Border Control in Germany would fine the Carrier.
On account of being hacked the HSE are in disarray, can neither accept nor process notification results by e-mail and heir promise of following up can take anything up to 24hours if at all.
Randox on site at Dublin airport can issue antigen results in 1 hour at a cost of 49 euro which I consider very expensive for an antigen test but a small expense in comparison to the cost and frustration of having to miss a flight especially as there are so few flights scheduled these days.
Take care out there and happy flying.

HSE tests aren’t for travel, you need a private test

Van.Bosch

Van.Bosch wrote: »

HSE tests aren’t for travel, you need a private test

Your carrier won't tell you that your HSE negative PCR test is not the one you need.

Tenger

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Your carrier won't tell you that your HSE negative PCR test is not the one you need.

Isn't it up to the individual to ensure that any test you get is sufficient for the airline or destination?

I've had 3 HSE test so far, all mandated by my GP. I didn't think you could book one for personal reasons.

Tenger

Tenger wrote: »

Isn't it up to the individual to ensure that any test you get is sufficient for the airline or destination?

I've had 3 HSE test so far, all mandated by my GP. I didn't think you could book one for personal reasons.

Tests are available at their drive thrus without appointment.

goingnowhere

You need a certified PCR test, i.e. a sheet of paper in English or other accepted language

This should have your details, DOB, passport number optional but recommended
The date and time of sample (most counties have a 48/72 hour requirement)
The test used (i.e. the parama companies detail of the assay used)
It must clearly state it is a RT-PCR test
The lab which processed the test
The result

A 'not detected' SMS is worthless and easily faked

goingnowhere

goingnowhere wrote: »

You need a certified PCR test, i.e. a sheet of paper in English or other accepted language

This should have your details, DOB, passport number optional but recommended
The date and time of sample (most counties have a 48/72 hour requirement)
The test used (i.e. the parama companies detail of the assay used)
It must clearly state it is a RT-PCR test
The lab which processed the test
The result

A 'not detected' SMS is worthless and easily faked

Worthless where? Rules vary across the globe. Some Governments are stricter than others. There is ample scope for confusion so the travelling public should beware.

feelings

Some further news expected from EI today or tomorrow, if rumours are to be believed.

basill

feelings wrote: »

Some further news expected from EI today or tomorrow, if rumours are to be believed.

North American west coast city noted for gambling and late nights?

Lustrum

basill wrote: »

North American west coast city noted for gambling and late nights?

They're launching direct to Reno, just to annoy some people on boards ðŸ˜