Narrative:

Use of captain's authority; declaration of minimum fuel; no delay to airport. We had been rerouted through mci center and had received delay vectors several times. The base plan provided by dispatch had minimum extra fuel of 0.5 and I added 1.1 as a contingency for possible enroute delays; light turbulence descent/climbs and potential reroutes. I tend to add fuel conservatively and not go too much. I add only what my judgment and route experience suggests I will actually use. We touched down in ord with 4.7; still one hour's fuel; but had we not declared minimum fuel we would have landed with less than one hour forecast fuel. After the declaration there were no additional delays to the field and we were able to execute a successful stabilized visual approach to 27R. The first officer and I discussed what should be our minimum fuel number for the declaration and we examined fuel consumption due to the reroutes and altitude/speed/vectoring changes. We jointly agreed that if not with approach control and more than 30 minutes from the airport; a minimum fuel number for today would be 6.0. Also of consideration and in the back of my mind concerning the uploading of fuel is the rumor mill concerning the monitoring of captain's and fuel uploads. There is a rumor circulating that says captains who routinely increase fuel above the planned fuel are subject to disciplinary action. I would suggest that this issue needs to be addressed and the truth about how the program works sent out as a just the facts or through each chief pilot's office. I added fuel because I saw the weather channel the night before; was aware of early morning ord haze and mci weather; and saw that this had not been planned for by dispatch. We had a successful outcome and I thank ATC for their response to a 'minimum fuel' declaration.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: An A319 Captain declared minimum fuel on arrival to ORD. A minimum fuel state was reached after enroute delays and vectors for weather as they approached ORD. The flight was dispatched with too little fuel even after the Captain added additional fuel. ATC gave the flight priority handling.

Narrative: Use of Captain's authority; declaration of minimum fuel; no delay to airport. We had been rerouted through MCI Center and had received delay vectors several times. The base plan provided by Dispatch had minimum extra fuel of 0.5 and I added 1.1 as a contingency for possible enroute delays; light turbulence descent/climbs and potential reroutes. I tend to add fuel conservatively and not go too much. I add only what my judgment and route experience suggests I will actually use. We touched down in ORD with 4.7; still one hour's fuel; but had we not declared minimum fuel we would have landed with less than one hour forecast fuel. After the declaration there were no additional delays to the field and we were able to execute a successful stabilized visual approach to 27R. The First Officer and I discussed what should be our minimum fuel number for the declaration and we examined fuel consumption due to the reroutes and altitude/speed/vectoring changes. We jointly agreed that if not with Approach Control and more than 30 minutes from the airport; a minimum fuel number for today would be 6.0. Also of consideration and in the back of my mind concerning the uploading of fuel is the rumor mill concerning the monitoring of Captain's and fuel uploads. There is a rumor circulating that says Captains who routinely increase fuel above the planned fuel are subject to disciplinary action. I would suggest that this issue needs to be addressed and the truth about how the program works sent out as a just the facts or through each Chief Pilot's office. I added fuel because I saw the weather channel the night before; was aware of early morning ORD haze and MCI weather; and saw that this had not been planned for by Dispatch. We had a successful outcome and I thank ATC for their response to a 'minimum fuel' declaration.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.