Europe to take a third attempt at sorting out the Single European Sky

The Single European Sky is a mess. After more than a decade of attempting to sort out the chaos of Europe's legacy air traffic management system, the programme has yet to make good on its promises. Two packages of regulations have been put in place and a third is now on the way, but for European airlines that are suffering under the existing inefficient system, the lack of progress is both frustrating and economically damaging.

In 2010, European member states made firm commitments to merge their national air control spaces into nine Functional Airspace Blocks (FAB) by 04-Dec-2012 and to evolve progressively towards a single European sky. However, only two such blocks are ready: the block put together by the Danish and Swedish air navigation service providers and the UK-Ireland FAB. They also made commitments to a performance scheme for national air navigation service providers, most of which have yet to hit even watered down targets.