The controller at TNCM has not answered a single message in over 15 minutes with a full airport waiting for departure in the Expert Server. Nobody wants to move cause nobody wants a level 2/3 vio but we’re all stuck because the controller isn’t doing a thing. If you’re not going to actually control, don’t sit on the frequency in the Expert Server and hold everybody up!
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Finally decided to just go because I requested pushback 10+ times over nearly an hour with zero response, and the controller instantly gives a level 2 vio, and for some other violation that wasn’t the pushback, Why is an IFATC controller allowed to sit around baiting violations from people getting bored?
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Hello! @ryera334
As you know, TNCM is the hub airport today and it’s very busy. Although I can understand your eager mood, make it a public thread is not a good choice. If you have any issues with the controller, feel free to send a private message to them but not to complain here since we can’t do anything for it. If you want to appeal your violation, please contact with the controller to explain or IFATC Appeals Team.
Thank you for your understanding!
Please check the atis before complaining about a controller in expert server. A gate hold is currently in affect and has been in affect for a while. They aren’t “not doing anything”, there is simply no space for aircraft to go because there is limited room
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Similar thing happened to me. I had to wait behind 5 737’s for taking off around 25 minutes. “No intersection departures” wasn’t selected in ATIS either. Dude I’m in a CRJ2. I can’t afford to wait 35 minutes just to take off. I left after a while lol
TNCM isn’t built to handle that much traffic. Aircraft landing have to back taxi, and widebody aircraft can’t fit in the furthest taxiway (which is the reason no intersection departures wasn’t in the atis, because some aircraft need to take an intersection). For efficiency purposes, widebody aircraft were sent to the end, however realism wise, it is too big for widebodies. If you can’t wait for 25 minutes, why would you choose to fly out of a hub airport?
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I highly recommend any flying into TNCM to read this topic TNCM - Operation Guide for Pilots to help you avoid some of the things that happened here
Dear Ryera,
Thanks for hopping onto TNCM. A beautiful island in the Caribbean. TNCM isn’t an airport that can accomodate this amount of inbounds and outbounds.
I’m never responding to messages openly on IFC as it might cause further frustrations with the writer(s) and/or readers, but I felt that this is needed to make it a bit clearer to you.
When a controller is busy, especially with this amount of traffic and can go to the gate only by back taxiing in most cases (as seen today), he/she can’t deal with some duplicated messages. As far as I remember, I responded to all messages. Ofcourse, when it gets busy, duplicated messages happen. I will send a: “Please avoid sending duplicate messages”, and hope you will not do it again. Well, probably you did. As I am very lenient in the reports I hand out, I do not want to report it straight away, so I just click it away. I just simply do not have alot of time responding with the same message over and over again.
At one point, or maybe at all points, there was a gate hold in effect as can be seen on the ATIS. You saw the line of deps waiting to depart, but that is hardly possible when aircraft are taxiing down the runway with 10kts, and another aircraft is on a 6nm final already.
I’d gladly continue explaining it in DM, where it’s more suitable for these kind of conversations. You don’t like to be thrown publically under the bus for no reason too, right?
Thanks for flying in/out of Sint Maarten ! Bon Dia!
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Did you ever think about QUITTING THE FLIGHT? Did you actually end up taking off? After wasting an hour and racking up multiple violations, it would be pretty funny if you never even made it off the ground.
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Breathe. It’s not that serious
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And I got one violation for an offense I didn’t actually commit, appeals is dealing with it
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I should’ve been clearer in my post- I was waiting for over an hour, and the controller didn’t make any radio correspondence for 25 minutes. I had landed and was taking off again, I didn’t spawn at tncm
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Hello, good morning and welcome to the community forum, we understand your frustration because ATC has not given instructions.
First of all, saying that ATC does not respond at all through the radio is something not very well said since if it were, the controller would be expelled from the session for not responding to messages within 40/50 seconds This to clarify.
- ATC Controlling the entire Local GTS (Ground, Tower and ATIS)
- If you are given a hold position, keep in mind that it is not to forget it, it is to maintain an order on the ground.
- The controller has not forgotten about you, if you checked the D-ATIS and there were remarks like: Gate Hold in Effect, remember that this helps to manage a lot the load on the ground at the boarding gates, in a maximum of 10 minutes while the tower cleans the large wide queue that is generated after being authorized to roll on the track.
- Requests that result in spam result in a quick report, and all the pilots know this, the pilot’s ATC panel itself warns you that a duplicate message can result in reports. 5. TNCM was not made to receive a large load of planes, in IRL it is not like that in a virtual environment this breaks, you will see too many Jumbo planes landing and that requires them to make a back taxi which makes it take longer to leave, I would recommend leaving an alternate airport if it is difficult to leave in a HUB, so you avoid delays and avoid these comments
- Remember that we all put a grain of sand in contributing, that the controller sees these comments can generate a feeling of disgust since he will think that the session he did was wrong for a simple request which was not denied but that it was expected due to the high volume of traffic, we cordially and cordially invite the pilots to put a grain of sand and accept things as they are if they are delayed an hour then do it is not on a whim it is for the need for the arrival traffic to leave the track well while this happens, back taxi is made, another entrance arrives and back taxi if there are too many things this will be long which would lead to high hours of wait
I made a guide that I will leave below, take the time to read it 
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Exact reason why I made my Live Fleet AIBVA flights into LEBL/one of tomorrow’s featured airports and not TNCM. 
Not because of IFATC whatsoever, but because of the amount of arrivals/departures and therefore no room to likely park.
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Appeals will definitely deal with it, that’s where you should have gone immediately. But this front of having done nothing wrong even though you blatantly admitted taxiing without permission in your opening topic is not going to get you anywhere good.
Just take a breather, contact the controller and/or appeals, and refrain from making topics like this in the future. It just tends to cause chaos and discord among the community.
And finally, remember that hubs are always going to have delays. Especially at an airport as small as today’s, 1-2 hours is not uncommon. Keep that in mind when choosing your airports in the future! 
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