Factor
Woodstock, VA
Male, 65
My life in ATC began with 4 years Air Force then another 30 years with the Federal Aviation Admin. working tower & radar at some big international airports. I fought in the 1981 war with PATCO, survived the strike and kept a job that was just too exhilarating to walk away from. While there was nothing better than working airplanes, I did move on through several air traffic supervisory and management positions. It was a long, crazy career but I wouldn't trade a moment of it for love or lucre!
Thanks for stopping by again! Bring your friends next time. I give group discounts!
During my years in military air traffic control, there were fairly frequent emergencies. Low fuel, engine fires, engines out, hung ordnance, smoke in the cockpit – all kinds of problems. No surprise though. The military pushes their planes pretty hard. I once saw a single engine fighter jet touch down without landing gear and slide down the runway in a shower of sparks. That was riveting enough but Just as it was coming to a stop, the pilot ejected from the aircraft. Maybe he thought the thing was going to catch fire. We sure did! Maybe he just panicked. I don’t know but his parachute barely had time to open before he bounced onto the runway. That had to hurt.
Once in the civilian end of ATC, emergencies were infrequent. There were occasional unsafe landing gear indications in the cockpit. The pilot would usually request to fly past the tower so we could make a visual check. Even if the wheels appeared to be down, the landing gear could still collapse when the plane landed. We would alert the emergency responders and keep our fingers crossed. There were several other kinds of “routine” emergencies where procedures required that we activate an emergency response. Although the outcome was completely safe most of the time, you wanted those folks standing by at arm’s length just in case! You know – the Murphy’s Law factor.
Once an emergency was declared; the most challenging part of dealing with it could be moving all of the airborne and ground traffic out of the emergency aircraft’s way. Emergencies, even the more routine ones, are given number one priority.
In my experience, both military and civilian controllers reacted to emergencies in a way commensurate with the crisis at hand. If you walked into a tower or radar room during most of those “routine” emergencies, you’d probably never know the controllers were dealing with a problem. Things are, as you say, “pretty calm.” But there are those rare and extreme emergencies when we knew, by the nature of the problem, that something bad was very likely to happen. A landing flight might have only two of the three main landing gear down. In that case, you know part of that plane is going to hit the runway but you don’t know what’ll happen after that. There was a situation I described in an earlier question, where the pilot died and his passenger, who was not a pilot, had to land the plane. Another nail-biter. “All hell” never breaks loose but the tension among controllers is palpable.
Thanks for your interesting question!
Cheers,
Factor
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Well Ruben, You’ve asked a very insightful question! The key word is “medications.” There are very few medications that controllers can take and still be allowed to do their job. The kinds of drugs that enhance concentration are strictly prohibited. There may be some non-prescription botanicals (herbal medicines) that would help but they’re really not necessary. The most effective concentration/focus enhancer a controller can use is more traffic! The busier we get, the more concentration is required and the more focused we become.
In the Seventies, when I was a newly minted journeyman controller, I had an interesting discussion with my neighbor one day, during a pause in our lawn mowing. I told him about my recent certification and what it felt like to work a busy radar sector without an instructor backing me as a safety net. Having all those planes and passengers depending on me alone was both terrifying and exhilarating. I’ll tell you though; I was never more focused in my life.
My neighbor, a Cardiologist, smiled and spoke of a similar feeling when, during his first open-heart surgery, he touched a live human heart. When you absolutely have to depend on your own knowledge, skills and judgment to get a job done; there is no need for medication. You concentrate, you focus and you may even experience an adrenaline rush.
Through most of my career, the only consumable stimulants used in our workplace were great quantities of caffeine and nicotine. Oh yeah! Back then, people smoked in the tower till you could hardly see out the widows.
Thanks for asking!
Factor
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Good question! Basically, the answer is - If you are still actively engaged in the separation and control of air traffic by age 56, “they just boot you out the door!” There is an exception though. FAA regulations state that they may exempt a controller “having exceptional skills and experience as a controller from the automatic separation provisions until the controller becomes 61 years of age.” Assuming you were hired before turning 31 (the maximum age you can become an FAA controller is 30), you will still retire with at least 25 years of service. Depending on where you were working; you might be ready to run for the door by age 56!
There are “other FAA roles” that controllers can move into, such as staff and upper management positions, but they shouldn’t wait till they are about to get the boot before bidding on such jobs. I suspect the competition is tough.
On the bright side, Federal retirement benefits are still fairly good. Also, retiring at age 56 means you still have plenty of time left to write that book, open a lemonade stand or start up the career ladder in the fast food industry. Actually, several of the controllers I knew went to work with Aviation consulting companies that do business with the FAA. I hear they pay pretty well!
Thanks for writing!
Factor
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Hi Tom. Congratulations on your upcoming graduation! My initial advice is to disregard what people are telling you. Either that or find someone who will say you’ll probably win the Powerball Lottery before you turn 31. Between us; I think your odds of being selected for a controller position are much better. What I’m trying to say is that you shouldn’t believe what people are telling you unless they officially represent the recruiting arm of the FAA. Even then, they can be misinformed. Try for a second opinion.
Assuming you are enrolled in the Air Traffic Collegiate Training Initiative and will graduate with a degree in Air Traffic Control Management, I’d recommend you work as hard as you can and be optimistic about the outcome. As more and more controllers reach the maximum age limit of 56, the FAA will definitely have to hire new ones. They will be looking for people like you.
Thanks for writing!
Factor
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Greetings CollegeGirl! I am happy to see a continuing interest in the ATC profession.
The situation you describe is going to make it difficult for you to land an ATC position with the Federal Aviation Administration unless you can somehow get two to four years of college with an aviation related degree. Other options include gaining ATC experience in the military, which was my pathway in. Or perhaps you might apply for employment with one of the private ATC providers. You should also consider flight training while you are in college. Having your pilot’s license will help you meet the threshold for aviation related experience.
Best of luck and thanks for writing!
Factor
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Hi Emilio. From what I read and hear, the days of being able to keep secrets are gone. But, to your question, the process by which pilots could alert air traffic control to a hijack situation never was a secret. Pilots and controllers alike are trained in notification and response procedures. Whenever there are changes made to hijack response procedures and procedures for handling other special situations, the Federal Aviation Administration has systems in place to alert all concerned parties. Although most of it is unclassified and available to all, you probably wouldn’t see it unless you were involved in either ATC or flying airplanes.
Back in simpler times, when people were hijacking airliners to Cuba or D. B. Cooper was hijacking for the chance to skydive for dollars, the pilot’s response was relatively unknown by all but those in the aviation industry. With a hijacker in the cockpit, it might be a bit awkward for pilots to broadcast the situation to controllers until the hijacker wanted it known. However; a simple change to the aircraft’s transponder (a special radio that transmits a continuous, cryptic broadcast to ATC radar equipment) could surreptitiously alert controllers to the situation without the hijacker’s knowledge. Those days are probably gone as well. The 9/11 hijackers were obviously well schooled in transponder operation and made sure the equipment was either disabled or never set to the appropriate code broadcast.
Thanks for writing!
Factor
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Hello Jim! Thanks for bringing up a very important issue. Whether pilot or controller; thunderstorms are the bane of their workday. All three factors you mentioned can affect the safety of flight. Lightning can be pretty disconcerting but not as dangerous to an airplane as you might imagine. Today’s planes are given extensive lightning certification tests to ensure the safety of their design. That could be why the last commercial plane crash attributed to lightning happened in 1967.
The lack of visibility, although a hazard in some instances, is not a major problem for pilots flying in or near thunderstorms. Rather than looking out the cockpit windows, they’re normally relying on the aircraft’s flight instruments to keep it properly oriented.
By far, the biggest safety hazard relates to the tricky winds found in and around those things! Accident investigation reports are rife with accounts of what can happen when airplanes experience the vertical wind shears and microbursts associated with thunderstorms (See Eastern Airlines Flight 66 landing JFK in 1975 or Delta Flight 191 landing DFW in 1985 as examples). Especially hazardous when planes are operating near the ground (taking off or landing), such winds can cause the aircraft’s wings to lose the lift they need to maintain flight. If this happens to a landing airplane (and it can happen instantly), all the available engine power may not be enough to save it.
When a plane loses the lift needed to maintain flight it becomes more like a brick that someone has thrown. It may still be traveling forward but only due to forward momentum and only for a very short time. I saw this happen from one of the control towers I worked in. An airliner flew through a thunderstorm situated on the final approach course and turned into that “brick” within a mile of the runway. When I finally saw the plane; it was no longer really flying but wallowing left and right as it fell. Fortunately, it fell onto the grass adjacent to the runway and eventually slid to a stop. The aircraft was destroyed but incredibly, there were no fatalities. I’ll tell you though; my shift couldn’t have ended fast enough.
Thank you for writing,
Factor
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