Radar Love

Radio Detection And Ranging, known more affectionately as "Radar," appears to be going the way of dinosaurs and Dodos; replaced by a system of satellites that would deign to look down on the ever changing, challenging and, to me, charming world of aviation. Me and my radar always looked up to that world though. I guess we always will. 

Call it progress, like the days when low frequency radio ranges (LFR) were being replaced by a network of VHF omnidirectional ranges. Sure; the VORs were far more precise but still a long leap of faith for airmen. Or how about the first pilots to descend their planes into thick clouds and/or rain squalls while watching a couple little instruments on the console; ending up relieved and amazed, just 200 feet above the surface, with the runway in sight. They all must have experienced the trepidation of change; as I would over the advent of "NextGen." Fickle though it was, I did love my radar. We worked a lot of planes together, moved millions of people and even saved some lives. We kept each other company during those long, tail-end hours of every mid-shift; when my frequencies were silent and radar's eye saw nothing but empty sky. There were a few brief separations but, as we know, the lack of something we love and rely on serves to intensify our desire for it. I know this to be true and have the gray hairs to prove it. 

I remember the first radar PVD (plan view display) I ever laid my nineteen year old eyes on.  It was inside a Ground Controlled Approach (GCA) radar trailer at the Air Force's Air Traffic Control School. Up till then, I'd never even heard of radar. Learning how to work airplanes from inside a GCA , using a relatively tiny PVD was tough enough when I had no idea what I was looking at. Even so; I felt a stirring of love at first sight. There was an allure to the ceaseless sweep of energy around the scope, the itty-bitty blips it revealed and the glow of the compass rose. Even the little back-lighted knobs used to adjust the display were pure magic to me. They were warm to the touch; like a woman's nipple. Maybe it was just the heat from all those circuits and such behind the radar display but they made me hot.

Unlike the fixed radar antenna you might see spinning at your local airport; GCA units were designed to be moved - sometimes frequently. They have wheels; which means they can be rolled onto an airplane or across the landscape, to end up along the runway of some far away airport. Whether it's a war zone or just another time zone; GCA units make it possible for military controllers to take their old friend Radar along whenever they have to travel.

GCA trailers can also be installed semi-permanently on a large turntable and rotated whenever the wind dictates a change in landing direction. Whether rolled or spun, the unit must be re-aligned whenever it is moved. At my Base, radar reflectors, which looked similar to satellite dishes, were mounted at each end of the runway. Whenever the unit was turned around, the display had to be re-calibrated to align perfectly with the reflector. Chances are the GCA might have shifted a little during the turn but that reflector was always in the same place. They were permanent echos, at a known range and azimuth. Alignment could be tricky but if you didn't do it correctly; the next precision radar approach you conducted could end up heading for the base housing area or worse. The Airman's Club, with all its cold beer, was out there somewhere.

Arriving at Big Time Tower in the early Seventies, I had never seen an ASR-7 display. My first impression? It was huge; like looking at today's flat screen TVs compared to that little portable you once kept on the kitchen counter. And to deepen my love affair with radar; it had been adorned with some dazzling accessories like digital data-blocks that displayed, among other things, each aircraft's callsign, altitude and ground speed. Everything was all wired into a large antenna that spun continuously atop its tower between the runways. Altogether, it did a fine job of helping us guide our traffic into, out of and through Big Time's airspace. Well . . . most of the time anyway. As I said; radar could be fickle.

Those radar scopes needed a relatively dark room. Light, even a modest amount, would bleach out the display; making it nearly impossible to see what was happening. If you came into the TRACON and saw all the lights on; it was either very late at night, when the janitor did his cleaning, or the radar had failed. If the room was quiet, you could assume the former. Assume the latter if there was a lot of noise and commotion. No, the controllers wouldn't be the ones causing all the stir. It would be the shift management. One Supervisor might be talking to a departure sector at the center. "Do you see Lear five eight alfa, ten east of Big Time, leaving seven thousand?" The answer; "Yeah, he's radar. Climb him to twelve and switch him." Another Supe would be pumping one of the radar technicians for answers about what went wrong and how long it would take to fix. Above it all, the Area Manager would be terminating one discussion with the Regional Office and starting another with the Command Center. But how about the controllers? What happened during those first few minutes after the radar quit?

Along each side of the radar room; controllers would sit at their now opaque radar scopes, intensely focused on finding a way out of the Hell that comes with sudden blindness. Just moments before; departure controllers would have been sorting out airplanes that burst off the airport like a fountain display, vectoring them toward their route of flight and handing them off to the enroute facility.

Now the departures, stalled on ramps and taxiways, were stopped indefinitely. This was not the time to be in the tower working Ground Control. At times like this; you were liable to hear the dark side of a few otherwise affable and professional pilots who suddenly found themselves stranded; up a creek without a prognosis.

Approach controllers would have been tweaking their long lines of airplanes; merging, slowing and spacing whatever they had between the outer fixes and the outer marker. Most of their traffic would be in-trail and at the same altitude. Now, the flow of additional traffic from arrival fixes was stopped. Holding patterns were filling up. With a blind eye, approach controllers scrambled to gain some kind of "non-radar" separation between the planes already on vectors to the final approach course. That meant diverging courses, altitude changes for some or, if fortune smiled, visual separation. Anything to keep the planes apart.

Everyone was concentrating - trying to recall what the radar picture looked like in their sector just before it blinked out. At times like this; good flight strip management paid big dividends for controllers. It meant they could still tell who was following who, what altitudes the planes were cleared to, the last assigned speed restriction and maybe even the last assigned headings. Next to radio communications, our flight progress strips were the only other clue as to what was going on just before the radar died.

Some controllers were meticulous about their strip marking and could recover from radar loss fairly quickly. Some tried their best but would get so busy they'd forget to keep their strips updated. Like me; they relied heavily on their habits and past practices to fill in the blanks. For others; strips were merely a distraction that diverted their attention away from the traffic. They were the ones voted most likely to shake, sweat and swear when the radar stopped spinning. Even if the radar was running, problems could arise when it came time to relieve one of those guys. But if the radar was out? Inherit the sector and, for better or worse, you also inherit the outgoing controller's flight progress strips.

My first unexpected radar failure occurred while I was working an arrival sector, in the middle of a moderately flurry of inbounds. My display flickered a few times then, just as radar's eye swept past the 'seven o'clock' position, it went dark. Everyone in the room gasped and studied their strips; hoping it was simply a 'blink' rather than an extended outage. I had seven or eight planes on vectors at the time but there were more coming. Fear, hope and despair kicked in immediately but there was no time to deal with it. I gave my traffic the bad news, advised them that radar contact had been lost then called my adjacent center sector to break the news. They'd have to hold whatever was headed my way. I climbed or descended some of my planes to get a little altitude separation then reached above the console to grab a copy of Big Time's non-radar "cheat sheet." This included a set of maps showing non-radar (pilot navigation) routes from our outer fixes to the approach in use, timed approach procedures, some unpublished holding patterns where we could hide a few airplanes till the dust settled and other information we couldn't remember due to its infrequent need. Everyone on the frequency got a new clearance limit, along with some detailed holding instructions, while we sorted this thing out. I may also have pooped myself but, through the miracle of selective memory, I prefer to forget certain things.

I felt as blind as the radar. With those 'first time' jitters rattling my self-confidence; I began to recall some radar failure horror stories the old timers used to tell around the camp fire - just to frighten us new campers. There was the one about the DC-9 in a holding pattern somewhere, who's pilot took a descent clearance intended for another flight. The plane ended up spiraling down through three or four holding altitudes occupied by other aircraft - in instrument conditions the whole way. Nobody else in the pattern saw or said a thing. The controller only realized there was a problem when the DC-9 reported reaching the altitude intended for another aircraft. Unfortunately, that aircraft was not supposed to be a DC-9. The descent clearance was supposed to be for a DC-8; which was still holding 1000 feet above the altitude now occupied by a death-defying DC-9 driver. Apparently there's some truth to the "Big Sky Theory."

The other popular "scary story" involved a controller running timed approaches from a holding pattern at the outer marker. A light twin engine aircraft had been cleared for the approach and was now on the tower frequency. The next flight to be cleared was an air carrier. Somehow, as if by magic, the air carrier landed ahead of the light twin and without a scratch. I didn't know whether these stories were factual or simply ATC folklore but they haunted me just the same. Left groping for my traffic picture; I kept hoping the radar would come back for me. I loved my radar and was truly sorry for the times I'd cursed its infrequent foibles.

Radar returned in about 45 minutes but we controllers learned long ago to not jump right back into a 'business as usual' operation. Traffic was resumed tentatively; as though we expected radar's recrudescence to be temporary - a sucker play. Our confidence in the system had to be regained before we could get back into the furious radar operation we used to move so much traffic with.

Most controllers have been through an unexpected radar failure at least once in their career. Like sex; they probably remember that first time. But unlike sex; they hope it never happens again. It's just one of those things you do not want to repeat simply for a chance to improve your score.

"We've got a thing that's called radar love.
We've got a line in the sky, radar love."
Golden Earring - 1973

© NLA Factor, 2014

The Persistence Of Memory

Those who've been following this Blog understand it's mostly about memories. In the beginning, I was afraid I'd forget the many things that happened before I could capture them in print. You know, before too much time passed. I now understand those memories are persistent, palpable and perpetual. They're always here with me. I can even feel them. Salvador Dali illustrated it pretty well in his masterpiece "The Persistence of Memory." With apologies to Salvador, I flew an airplane into his painting because, to me, the memories of air traffic have a persistence all their own.

Time, on the other hand, is of no real significance. It comes and goes; preceding each passing second and concurrently vanishing; leaving us with a "now" that is just too short to measure. Thankfully, it does leave those persistent memories of ours behind; scattered across the panorama of our lives.   

As to my life, it seems I spent most of it diligently winding clocks and watches, setting alarms or trying to correct the time if it was running fast or slow. According to the clock; I usually ended up being too early or too late anyway. It took a while but I finally figured out that I shouldn't even bother trying to set, sway, speed or slow the hands of time. The Universe calibrated my clock, then synchronized it to my life - and life isn't measured by hours and minutes. It's measured by events and those events always happen precisely when they're supposed to; which could be described as "right on time." I may never have believed my entire life happened on schedule - but it did. Take the early Seventies for example . . .

Life was moving at the speed of continental drift since my departure from military service. My application for an ATC position, eagerly and optimistically submitted, had apparently vanished into some minor FAA functionary's file drawer. I found an odd assortment of menial jobs to keep me busy. If you're interested, they're described somewhere in the back end of this blog. The work kept me afloat financially but my spirit was being swamped by waves of anxiety. I knew it was crazy but whenever my travels took me past the local airport, I'd glare at the control tower,  mutter a few expletives and shake my head. Frustration brought me to a point where I was seriously considering the idea of going back into the Air Force - just so I could work airplanes again. Looking back on life, I have to love that and every other mistake I almost made.

Living high on the extravagances that a minimum wage income allows, I moved into an affordable efficiency apartment on the north side of town. Although the classified ad called it an "efficiency," I referred to it as the "deficiency." There were so many deficiencies that I lost count half way through the list of health violations. Small, slightly smelly and unnecessarily outdated; it was the kind of apartment where police might one day discover 200 cats and a desiccated corpse. It was affordable though - as long as I stuck to my diet of deviled ham and bananas. I worked onward but could never quite reach my future.

Years passed. In the long run, the FAA did make me a job offer. Ironically, I had to think twice about accepting. By then, I'd worked myself into a pretty well paying and enjoyable job. I even had a better apartment! Going with the Feds would mean an initial (and substantial) decrease in pay. There was also a requisite relocation in the deal. The move would put me in an expensive metropolitan area that I couldn't possibly afford on a GS-7's salary. The offer was a "take it or leave it" deal though. I had one week to respond. That wasn't much time but it didn't really matter. My decision was preordained, so naturally I had to accept. There was simply no choice because, by the end of my Air Force career, air traffic control had become a vital organ that I couldn't live for long without.

I remember the subsequent months being a blur. The only time that mattered was my training time. Then, in nothing but an eight month instant, I found myself checked out through all tower positions and working on my radar certifications. Two years from that first foot in the door, I was fully certified at Big Time. Now that wasn't so hard, was it? Looking back, I'd say no. But back then? Looking ahead was intimidating.

It wasn't long before my first round of mids as a journeyman was scheduled. Trainees were always sent to the tower on mid shifts. But now, as a full performance controller, I could pull TRACON duty. Driving in to work, I knew what I would find when I got there. After all, I'd been home all evening, watching the lightning and listening to the din of heavy rain on the roof. I knew the crew on duty was dealing with a mess and that there'd be plenty left for me and my teammates to clean up when we arrived.

Mids, for me, usually began with a touch of circadian sleep disorder. Failing in my attempt to nap that afternoon, I would arrive at work a little out of sorts, off-balance and unshaven. By 10:45, traffic would normally be light and most of the radar sectors combined at two or three positions. Not tonight though. Walking into the TRACON I saw a Supervisor tearing strips off the printer and running them to the sectors. There were five still open and all were busy. Three of the evening shift guys would be held over for a couple hours to help us put a lid on the madness.

My mid shift teammate relieved both departure sectors and combined them into one. I was told to relieve the Final controller and let her go home. Airplanes that had been delayed at their departure points, some of them thousands of miles from Big Time, were only now beginning to show up at our arrival fixes. It was exciting. The approach controllers talked non-stop and their lines of planes stretched more than 40 miles from the airport. Radar vectors were flying in every direction. At least the bad weather had moved out and the field was VFR for the first time since that morning. After a brief consultation with the tower, I tried cutting some downwind traffic in tight on visual approaches. The first two worked nicely so I told the approach guys to start tightening up the arrival sequence. Everything was going well. The departure backlog was gone by 1:00 AM. Our holdovers from the evening shift left at 2:00 but the persistence of air traffic continued till after 3:00. The mid-shift Supervisor sat silently at his desk; counting strips, calculating the delays and catching up on log entries. In the ensuing years, there would be many more such mid shifts.

In sharp contrast with the FAA; I remember mid shifts in the Air Force being abnormally quiet. Still in the early stages of learning how impossible it was for me to sleep during the day; I'd lumber up the tower steps with my mid shift teammate, moving like a reanimated cadaver. Where I was stationed; most of the military air traffic was down for the night before 11:00 PM, so we'd be greeted by a bored looking NCOIC (Non-Commissioned Officer In Charge) who'd dutifully mutter his way through a review of the tower's daily log. I would dutifully nod with feigned interest in what he was saying. He and his evening shift crew would then rush down the steps as though the fire alarm had just sounded. In a moment, my partner Vince and I would be left in the complete silence of an empty tower cab, overlooking an empty runway. It was on such a night that a most incredible thing happened. My memory of it hangs on like the melted clock on Dali's tree limb.

By 3:00 AM, each of us had pretty well covered what we knew of the latest Squadron gossip and were settling into our chairs, feet up on the console, for a little quiet time (sleep). A light appeared across the airfield, just above the the horizon. It was moving slowly in a northerly direction; almost parallel to the runway and definitely inside our Control Zone. Certain it was a plane without a working transmitter; we simultaneously hailed it on both UHF and VHF emergency frequencies while signaling "Cleared to land" with the tower's light gun. As the craft continued north, we could see there were actually several lights glimmering; like the windows of an airliner's fuselage. But unlike the lights of an aircraft, these were indistinct; almost ethereal. They glowed like pale blue neon.

Curious about any sound this thing might be making, Vince dashed down the first flight of steps and out onto the catwalk. I called the radar unit. Did they see a target just Northeast of the field and moving North? I expected a wise-ass comment about flying saucers in the traffic pattern and I wasn't disappointed. Of course, the radar guys saw nothing on their scopes. After listening to the requisite dose of sarcasm and good-natured ridicule; I was told to leave them the hell alone and go back to sleep. Vince returned to report the night outside was as quiet as a crypt. None of the jet or propeller noise we were used to hearing. Nothing. The strange lights soon vanished over the northern horizon.

Me and Vince had an odd feeling about what had just happened. I picked up a phone and dialed the Watch Desk at our local Center. I was afraid that telling this story to anyone else was a mistake but decided it was worth the risk for a chance to have it corroborated.  The Supervisor, clearly much older and vastly more experienced than me, listened to my story. I could tell he was writing things down and figured he was making notes for a future discussion with our Squadron Commander. I'd be in trouble for sure. But no. He said my description of the object, its low altitude, slow speed and direction of flight matched reports some of his controllers had received from pilots flying across the region. Several people claimed to have spotted it but no one ever saw a radar image.

I remember watching the sunrise that morning, making a fresh pot of coffee for the day shift crew and talking to Vince about what we should do. The Air Force had a reporting program in place at the time. Named "Project Blue Book," it was a way of officially documenting what may have been a UFO sighting. Vince and I concluded there would be no report and no further mention of the incident to anyone; especially the incoming day shift guys. Along with the wry ribbing, we'd likely be labeled as lunatics by the Squadron brass; thus hobbling our chances of ever seeing another promotion. It was decided that what we saw that night must surely have been a weather balloon or another of those spontaneous outbreaks of swamp gas. We just left the tower, lingered over breakfast then moved on to the first open bar we could find. By the third round of beers, we were ready to admit what we'd really seen - but only to each other.

Another mid shift sticks in my memory - one clear and very cold night in the 1970s. A Center controller's urgent sounding voice came across the handoff line. "Hey Big Time, you talking to that guy twenty east of MALYN squawking 4543 at eleven thousand?" It was nearly 5:00 AM and for the last hour or so I'd only been talking to myself.  I saw the target he referred to though, so I pushed the handoff line button and responded. The center controller said he'd been working the plane, a Piper Navajo, for the last 45 minutes but had recently lost radio contact. It was also way off it's planned route, now about 70 miles off course and headed toward some very unfriendly terrain. After checking with the other sectors, it was clear the pilot wasn't talking to anyone at the Center. The controller was now calling all towers and approach controls along the aircraft's flight path. It seemed no one was talking to the Navajo, which was still holding its last assigned altitude of eleven thousand feet. The situation would change but as we know; change isn't always a good thing.

I called the tower and, between us, we transmitted on every frequency we had. No joy. The plane flew on and soon left my radar coverage. It wasn't till nearly 7:00 AM that the Center sector called and told me the plane eventually began losing altitude then vanished from his radar screen. Wreckage was never found and we were left with our theories about what happened. The most plausible one was that the pilot had dozed off - his plane eventually running out of fuel. With luck, he died in his sleep. This incident lodged itself in my memory like a fishhook and became a shot of adrenalin whenever I felt myself getting sleepy on mid-shifts or long drives.

I have so many many memories; some good and others, well, not so good. They don't go away though. They accumulate over a long career and, like my old record collection, become disorganized and eventually take up a lot of space. I've put some of them away in storage but still retrieve them now and then for my own enjoyment. In a way, memories are a lot like my old records. They can both be played over and over again. Someone or something just needs to push the right buttons. Case in point; I recently discovered one of my old teammates from the Big Time days, on a social media site. That pushed some long unused buttons and the memories started playing immediately. Like me; this guy was brutally insane in those days. We shared secrets and experienced many control room tantrums, terrors and temptations together. The memories of them persist, even after all this time.

Time passes. I don't even care where it goes. It takes nothing of mine when it leaves but it leaves me with plenty. Those persistent memories; they stay like my skin color. I don't know exactly where each one is at the moment but, like my old Big Time buddy, I'll eventually find them again. 

© NLA Factor, 2013

A Good Shift

It was the drug of choice for most controllers and could actually make us pretty high. It induced an undiluted euphoria and served as an effective antidote for it's ugly antipode. I'll call this drug "the normal day." It was one of those seldom seen shifts when little to nothing went wrong. Everything seemed to click into place like the tumblers inside a combination lock. Kind of like the "Seinfeld" show, it was a shift about nothing ~ nothing broke, nothing happened we would regret or be chided for and there was nothing to complain about. There was nothing to it. Sweet nothing. Those were the shifts that reminded us why we loved being air traffic controllers. 

It was just past shift change and I was already busy on Local Control. My first choice would have been a TRACON assignment but Pete sent me upstairs. He said I "needed some tower time." Since most of my shifts were spent working radar, I suppose I was a little rusty. As it turned out, I was glad to be in the tower.  It was one of those 'Ray-Ban' kind of afternoons when you could see forever. A steady wind kept the city smog at bay and Big Time International seemed to glitter under the setting sun. The last song I heard on the car radio was still spinning in my head as I scanned the airport, one runway at a time ~ trying to keep up with everything that was happening at once. Airplanes, like cars lined up at an Interstate toll booth, moved incrementally along the parallel taxiways; hoping to get out of town on time. It was the afternoon rush and there were a lot of planes waiting to go. I'm sure the pilots queued up in line gazed envyingly out their cockpit windows whenever a departure rolled by, lifted off and vanished with a receding rumble.

The guys in the radar room were doing a hell of a job, jamming the localizers with airplanes. Jets were whistling down the glide slopes, squeaking onto runways, slowing up and ducking into the high-speed turnoffs. My farewell transmission of "Ground point nine." was always cheerfully responded to. I was doing what every busy tower controller does; making cold calculations, bold predictions and decisive moves ~ squeezing departures out between landings as fast as I could without pissing off the Departure Sectors. It was all part of the grand spectacle of an unencumbered airport running at peak performance. Well ~ almost peak. One of the main arrival runways had been closed for rubber removal on the thresholds. Not a big issue today. Weather was good enough that doing the 'mixed use' runway thing wasn't worth whining about. Tower and TRACON Supervisors, who usually tried to match the strongest controllers with the most challenging positions, were standing back to enjoy the show. They knew the show would only be as good as the actors in it.

Winds had been forecast to change direction sometime before 6:00 PM. That's exactly what happened but it happened a bit more abruptly than anticipated. In just a few minutes, the wind direction moved about 130 degrees clockwise. A few pilots started complaining of tailwinds on final, making the decision to turn the operation around appear unavoidable. Although timing couldn't have been worse, the odds of something happening to screw up a perfect day couldn't have been better. You learn to expect it. Pessimism isn't just part of the controller's genetic make-up; it's also a built in safety feature. Problems should never come as a complete surprise.

Winds don't often change direction so quickly. They usually worked their way around a few degrees at a time; giving us a chance to see a trend and take action before there was an unavoidable crisis. Changing runways right now was going to be ugly. I figured Pete was already on the phone to the center's weather unit - looking for a fresh wind forecast. Pete was always way ahead of the game. The TRACON Supervisor would be making calls to every tower we had a line to - asking what their surface winds were doing. Nobody wanted to cause delay and dismay based on a short lived quirk. From what we heard, it appeared a cool front was moving in sooner than expected. Pete made his decision to turn the ship around.

Changing the landing direction and moving all the active traffic  from here to there can become an epic exercise in patience. Planes waiting to go, eight to ten deep at the runways and more taxiing out of the ramp areas, would have to be moved or redirected to the other end of the airport. The trick was to make sure the original departure sequence didn't change ~ or at least not change too much. Whoever was number one to go now would expect to be number one after the turn-around or there'd be some bitching. Down in the TRACON, approach controllers had dozens of flights on vectors to final approaches that would soon turn into departure corridors. They'd all have to be delayed somehow.

The tower Supervisor got a call from his TRACON counterpart. "How many yah got to go?" was the question. After a quick look around, the reply was; "Looks like about twenty or so." Negotiations began immediately over which aircraft in the pattern would be the last to land and who would be the last to take off. The rest would have to be taken for a tour of the area while the Ground Control guy went nuts trying to move all his traffic to the other end of the airport. It was a little past sunset and dusk was settling in.

Billy K. was a decent Ground Controller, as long as everything clicked along normally. Like me, he spent most of his time in the radar room, so working tower positions during peak traffic was more than a little challenging. But Billy ~ on Ground after dark, during a peak hour? That was like firing a gun on the ski slopes. All it took was a small shock wave, like maybe a pilot turning onto the wrong taxiway, and Billy would soon be buried in an avalanche of confusion. In the time it took him to straighten one problem out, there'd be another mess somewhere else. Worse was the fact the airport was changing from an array of discernible airplanes, taxiways and runways into a huge black hole adorned with dark silhouettes and colored lights ~ some moving and some not. Billy looked tense. Nobody was landing or taking off right now, so I did what I could to help him out.

Tampa, our Supe of the day, knew what was coming and took quick preemptive action. He called the TRACON and, within minutes, we saw Eddie bounding up the tower steps. Good news for the flying public. "Relieve Billy on Ground." was all Tampa said ~ but with an undertone of urgency.  There were lines of planes taxiing down the runways toward the new departure lineup. A few arrivals, the last to land with a tailwind, were stopped at intersections to let the departures roll by. Seemingly forgotten flights sat on their ramps, waiting for taxi instructions. Potential conflicts in traffic flows were brewing all over the place and the Ground Control frequency squealed with the sounds of frustration.  Billy K. gave Eddie the position relief briefing like a burglar listening to police sirens. As soon as he was done, he made a hasty exit from the tower.

Eddie was probably the best tower controller I ever saw. Chattering away non-stop, pointing at planes, waving his hands and bouncing up and down on his tiptoes, he marshaled the traffic with aggressive efficiency. Still; Billy had left him with a mess on Ground and sorting it out would take some doing. Eddie didn't mind. He had the finesse to fix this. Although bold and confident, he maintained a delicate touch. Watching Eddie, I imagined he could have written his name on a soap bubble; even dotting the I's. He also knew how to keep the traffic picture at night ~ a tricky exercise in planning, shuffling departure strips around and getting the eyes on the ground (a.k.a. the pilots) involved.  Soon after Eddie took control, the departures were repositioned to the new runway configuration with a minimum of complaining from the cockpits.

I glanced up at the tower's BRITE radar display. It appeared the Approach controllers had pretty much reorganized their arrival flows. The sky was full of airplanes and a few were close to turning toward the airport. In the back of the tower cab, Tampa spoke quietly to the TRACON Supervisor. Yes, there was a new ATIS. Yes, the approach lights and ILS systems had been switched around, etc. The conversation over, he said simply; "Release the departures." The entire turn-around had taken less than 20 minutes. There were a few reportable delays but nothing out of the ordinary. Soon the airport was again running at a full gait. For the remainder of our shift, all we had to do was keep the 'planes in - planes out' pressure on our runways. There must have been a meal break in there somewhere but during times like this, eating was the last thing on my mind. Tampa pulled his usual sandwich and banana out of the brown bag he carried whenever he came to the tower.

The remainder of our shift was high volume happiness. 'Strings of pearls' ~ long lines of landing lights strung out across the night sky, moved in an endless pageant toward the airport. The ground shaking grumble of jets taking off was barely audible from the tower cab but we could see their lights racing along the runways then vanishing against the city backdrop.

An hour after shift change, me and my carpool buddies joined a few other crew members who were already leaning on the bar at our favorite watering hole. Eddie wasn't there but Billy K. was. Unlike the hours after a bad shift, when we'd each be citing the calamities, casting blame around and wishing we'd taken sick leave ~ tonight there was hardly a word spoken about the past eight hours. There simply wasn't much to say about nothing, so we drank beer, told jokes and surveyed the place for any flight attendants who might have stopped in on their way to one of the nearby hotels. What the hell. After such a shift; anything seemed possible.

Carpool Carl, our driver, said something to Billy K. as we left the bar for home. Billy was assigned to the Final Control sector that afternoon after leaving the tower. There, he dealt with an impatient backlog of arrivals that had been spinning in holding patterns or riding out delay vectors while the runway change took place. The TRACON Supervisor knew Billy was a guy who could always meet or beat our hourly arrival rate, no matter what.

Billy ran the Final Sector like Eddie ran Ground. It was instinctive. He attributed his skills to the year spent in a mobile radar unit (GCA), recovering fighters at one of South Vietnam's busiest air bases. In that time, he provided radar approaches to thousands of jets returning from missions in monsoon weather conditions. Many of them were down to "Minimum" or "Emergency" fuel status, which meant he had just one chance to get these guys onto the runway. Every vector had to be on target. Sloppy or unnecessary turns caused delays that could mean losing an airplane and possibly it's crew to fuel exhaustion. Billy had developed a good vectoring eye and perfect timing long before entering the FAA. Carl slapped him on the back and said; "Nice job with the finals, man!" We all shook his shoulder gently as we passed behind. Billy smiled but I don't think he ever looked up from his beer.

Nobody mentioned the tangle he had created earlier in the shift while working Ground. That's because a functional team of controllers compensates for their member's weaknesses and capitalizes on their strengths. Criticizing controller deficiencies was someone else's job and they usually did it well. We always passed out the praise when warranted though. It was a rare occasion when someone else did that.

The next afternoon, as our crew checked in for the evening shift, we all stopped at a small bulletin board outside the TRACON. Early each morning, the previous day's airport traffic count was posted there and everyone wanted to know how we did. Although not a record setter, the arrival and departure numbers were high, while reportable delays were low. There was nothing else to say. It had been a good shift!

© NLA Factor, 2013

Airway Facilities & Abilities

Sometimes I dream in VFR ~ only to awake amid rapidly deteriorating conditions. Why am I always surprised? Pilots and controllers know full well that clouds can conceal some pretty nasty twists, so we should also recognize that even the most ideal flight conditions might take an unexpected turn against us. In perfect VFR weather though, we're not always as mentally prepared for problems. Favorable conditions, complacency and high expectations are powerful drugs. They could make me so high that unforeseen troubles and the subsequent emotional plunges would result in harder landings and longer recovery times. When those nasty twists occurred at work, I was always thankful for those who could step up and somehow clear the air. If the twist involved one of the many tools of our trade, I was thankful for the technicians of our Airway Facilities staff.

Late 1970s, early November. It was one of those days when the idea of going to work really energized me. From the first morning cup of coffee to that last post-shift bottle of beer, life was going to be good. When I met up with my carpool buddies, I could see they were equally anxious to strap on their headsets. As we sputtered onto the main highway in Carl's slightly out-of-tune Beetle, everyone bubbled enthusiastically about the great weather. Winds were light, so the airport would most likely be running on our optimum runway and airspace configuration. Visual approaches would rule the day and there'd probably be very few departure restrictions. In other words; it looked like we were in for a high volume, happy to be here, whipped cream kind of shift. We knew it was going to be smooth, sweet and a hell of a lot of fun!

When Carl's VW finally skidded to a stop in the facility parking lot, everyone clambered out and peered over at the airfield. As expected, things were looking good. Aroused by the possibilities, we started our brisk walk into work. Carl was so excited that he didn't even notice the Beetle's right front tire was going flat. Neither did the rest of us. We wouldn't discover that till shift's end, when it would be referred to as the last straw.

Arriving at the facility's secure entrance, someone swiped their badge, punched a code into the keypad and the four of us hurried, in tandem, toward the sign-in log. Unlike most evening shifts, I was actually hoping for a tower assignment. Conditions were perfect for watching airplanes and Big Time's lofty tower cab was the place to do it. I really needed some tower proficiency time anyway, and a "CAFB" day like this was the best way to get it. I just needed to convince Pete to send me up. That wasn't going to happen.

Entering the TRACON we immediately noticed something different about it. But what? There was still the usual cacophony of control instructions, the hollering back and forth between sectors and, of course, the cigarette smoke. Actually, there was a bit more smoke than normal. It was so thick, in fact, that I couldn't tell whether it was coming from the ashtrays, the equipment or both. Still, there was something missing from the continual din of our musty, timeworn radar room. I noticed an abnormally large group of people standing at our Flight Data position. That's when I realized what was different. The incessant chatter, usually emanating from our Flight Strip printers (FSPs), was missing. 

There were three printers mounted at the Data position. One printed the arrival and overflight strips, one printed departure strips and the third machine was a spare.  Under normal circumstances, the arrival and departure printers ran nearly non-stop. Sounding like a chorus of teleprinters, they banged out new and amended information controllers would need on traffic entering or exiting their airspace. 

Sample departure strip from a little aerodrome in Texas.

Strips would be slid into plastic holders and disbursed to the appropriate radar sector. This particular afternoon though, in the smoky chaos of the pre-evening rush radar room, they sat like cinder blocks ~ stone still and silent. There was, however, another ominous noise coming from the Data position. It would be the sound of those deteriorating conditions I mentioned earlier.


What met our ears sounded less like an ATC facility and more like a call center in the basement of some desperate and acutely confused telemarketing company. I heard one controller muttering; "Yeah . . . yeah . . . uh huh. What was the airway after Falmouth?" As he spoke, he was writing on a flight strip. Two other controllers stood at the data console; each one scribbling frantically on blank strips. A couple of Airway Facilities technicians wearing worried faces brushed quickly past me. They were pushing a cart piled high with parts and tools. That was the moment when I realized this was not going to be a "whipped cream kind of shift." It was going to be some kind of nightmare. Imagine your Sunday paper not showing up on the doorstep. Maybe a wheel fell off the kid's bike? Who knows. So the phone rings. You pick up the receiver and a guy says; "This is The Gazette calling with your Sunday edition. Are you ready to copy?" You scramble for a pen and several large pads of paper. That kind of nightmare.

For some reason, the whole scene made me think of my old Air Force roommate William.

The old AFCS patch

I lived in the barracks during much of my Air Force time. It was a building that controllers, radio and radar technicians, plus many of the other enlisted troops who had jobs in the Communications Squadron called their home. The place was more like a college dormitory where everyone wore uniforms for half the day. The rest of the time was usually spent in civilian clothes, planning and executing forays to any of the many bars and clubs that thrived outside the base perimeter.

 William, my first roommate, was a freckled redhead from central Pennsylvania. A radar technician ~ he was one of the guys who, armed with a selection of scewdrivers and diagnostic tools, kept our aging GCA unit operational. The two of us shared a bathroom, ate at the same table in the chow hall and trekked across the base together when it was time for work. I'd often find voluminous technical manuals strewn around our room; each opened to a schematic of one of the many systems he maintained. William studied a lot and I admired him for it. After all; two or three chapters in just one of his books were thicker than the entire Air Traffic Control manual I kept, mostly unread, under my bunk. He and the other guys in his shop were all that stood between us controllers and the huge pain in the ass of a radar failure.

Ground Controlled Approach (GCA) Unit

There were several technicians in my squadron. Their areas of expertise covered radios, radar, telephone equipment and nearly everything else a controller needed to get through the day. Some of the techs even maintained our VOR and TACAN sites. We had no idea what they did between equipment outages and didn't really care. As long as someone showed up when something broke, we were happy . . . very happy.

Although the pilots in our Base's fighter wing flew the most advanced aircraft in the Air Force's inventory, our ATC equipment was fragile, antiquated and capricious. Somehow though, our techs kept everything running fairly well. They saved our asses nearly every day and, for that, we regarded them as peers and partners in the mission.  Still, during those after-hours forays into inebriation, we'd rib them mercilessly and they'd do the same to us. The truth was that every Air Force controller I knew had the highest regard for those guys. We'd lie for them, trade countless rounds of drinks in the local gin mills and, when they transferred out, we'd lament their departure. Years later, I would discover a kind of caste system in the FAA that placed Airway Facilities (AF) personnel a few notches beneath the "Air Traffic elite." It seemed AF existed solely to support us and, in the opinions of many, that could only be done from below.

Standing in that late afternoon TRACON, with three inoperative strip printers, I could hear frenetic muttering coming from the Flight Data position as controllers hand-copied flight plans, subsequent amendments, GENOTs and other data from the Center. Information on departing flights would then be relayed to the tower, by phone, where another controller had to make a copy for Clearance Delivery, Ground and Local Control.

I could also hear an undercurrent of dissatisfaction and mild contempt coming from controllers seated at the approach sectors, like "What the hell is the point in having a spare printer if those idiots can't keep it working?!!" They were writing their own arrival strips by using information from the alpha-numeric data on their radar displays. This was a time-consuming and annoying distraction that only intensified as the evening rush of inbounds began creeping toward the outer fixes and the airplanes needed more and more attention. Although we had Handoff positions, where someone could sit next to the radar controller and write strips, they were rarely staffed. Today was no exception. There was a lot of angst and anger in the air, and it was all being directed at the Airway Facilities technicians who just couldn't seem to get those printers running.

Those damned printers, among the most plain and plebeian pieces of equipment in our inventory, were major labor-saving devices. As with most things, we took them for granted until something went wrong. Then we wondered why such a basic device couldn't either be fixed quickly or replaced. In this case though, replacing any of them wouldn't have helped. None of the three devices were working and we were far beyond the quick fix time frame.

More problems emerged. The extra manpower needed to make calls and write strips was wreaking havoc with the break schedule. Guys were working well beyond the desired two hour limit on their sectors and people were getting testy. Arrival restrictions had been imposed on all surrounding facilities and departure delays were beginning to mount. Phones kept ringing at the Watch desk but no one was there to answer. The TRACON Supervisor kept glaring at those technicians ~ expressing his frustration in any way he could without interrupting their work. Outside, the sun was setting on what should have been a perfect day for working airplanes.

By now, a Data Systems Specialist had joined the group huddled around the inert printers. He was talking to his counterpart at the Center. Apparently the issue was not a mechanical malfunction after all. It took an hour or two of disassembling and diagnosing but someone finally determined that Big Time's printers were actually in fine working order. They were simply not receiving data from the Center's host computer (from which all our flight data originated). It would later be discovered that someone using a backhoe, many miles from the airport, had inadvertently ripped up the cable that connected Big Time's FSPs with the Center. Repairs would take more hours than we had left on our shift.

The two AF techs vanished but the mayhem continued. We kept making calls, writing strips and working airplanes. A few controllers were asked to stick around for a couple hours of overtime. I felt bad for those AF guys. They had been the focus of much derision for several hours but took no exception to it. Understanding they could do nothing more to help, they packed up quietly and went back to their office. Nobody apologized to them and no one thanked them for their trouble ~ myself included. By the time they left, I was too busy arguing with a Center controller about the spacing between two arrivals.

The shift finally ended. Walking out of the facility, I felt sluggish, like I was wading through quicksand. A mild breeze wafted the smell of jet exhaust across our path as we four carpoolers trudged toward the parking lot. Feeling pretty deflated by events of the last eight hours, nobody had much to say. All we wanted to do by now was have a few beers and head home to bed. As we neared the lot, it looked like the right front wheel of Carl's Volkswagen had rolled into a pothole. When we realized the tire was flat, we were relieved to learn that Carl had a spare. He popped the trunk lid, only to discover the spare was also deflated. Feeling fairly flattened ourselves, we were almost too tired to figure this thing out.

Although sympathetic to our plight, none of the other guys in the lot were headed in our direction. They were   also as anxious as we were to get home. In less than five minutes, we were all alone in that lot, glaring at the useless tire in the same way we had glared at those AF techs earlier in the day. Then we started glaring at Carl. There was a difference though. Unlike our AF guys, this was a situation that Carl could have prevented from happening.  He muttered something about "the last straw," then started walking back to the tower. There, he was able to borrow one of the mid-shift guy's car keys. We grabbed the VW's spare tire, threw it into the trunk of a blue Ford sedan and sped away from the airport.

It was oppressively quiet in that Ford until we got to Carl's place. Climbing out of the car, I reminded the others it was my turn to drive tomorrow ~ making a mental note to check my spare tire.

Here's the epilogue. As a Supervisor dealing with an equipment problem, I'd sometimes have to go looking for the AF guys if they didn't answer their desk phone. The search eventually took me to one of the facility's equipment rooms. Along with radio and telephone switching equipment, they kept tools, spare parts and a lot of broken things in there. It looked like a shop that repaired pocket watches, refrigerators and old television sets by interchanging the parts. 

A wiring diagram for the Great Pyramid?

Of course there were also the ubiquitous stacks of technical manuals; one or two of which were usually opened to a page of schematics. To my brain, they might as well have been hieroglyphics. Either was equally undecipherable. I could neither walk like an Egyptian or talk like a technician but was glad to know someone actually understood the stuff. While us controllers got through the day largely on our quick wits and aggressive decision making ~ these guys had to study constantly, work unerringly and go off for weeks of additional training whenever new equipment came on line. And they did it to support us. You just had to love 'em.


I should add a few lines about how we in Air Traffic could place the AF staff squarely in the middle of our own internal issues. Anyone in air traffic supervision knew that all equipment required periodic checks and preventive maintenance (PM). If such checks were not performed within prescribed time intervals, the particular piece of equipment would lose its certification. That meant we couldn't use it again until it was re-certified. For example, a tech might arrive at the Watch Desk one morning and ask us to release an ILS system for three hours of PMs. It would be up to shift management to approve it or not.  Sometimes existing conditions (weather, traffic volume, etc.) made approval unwise or impossible. Sometimes though, a technician's request was denied solely because that Supervisor and/or that team felt they needed every security blanket they could keep in their clutches ~ thus foisting approval and associated impacts onto another team. I believe the popular euphemism might be "Kicking the can down the road?"

Eventually though, AF would have to take that system down or be in violation of maintenance timetables. They weren't about to let that happen. If a situation ever got to that point, Air Traffic would lose their right to refuse. Think of it this way. You miss that 36,000 mile service mentioned in your car's owner's manual, simply because you didn't feel like turning the car over to some mechanic for a day. The "Check Engine" light eventually comes on and your car immediately shuts down ~ no matter where you are or where you're going. Even worse; it won't start again until you get that servicing done. The rules made PMs a kind of technical time bomb that would eventually go off if not disarmed in time.

© NLA Factor, 2012

ATC ~ Music To My Ears

I had a little fun recently, working at what turned out to be a very illuminating part-time job. It added up to five weekends in a restaurant kitchen, assisting a slightly crazy and more than slightly corpulent Bulgarian Chef who had just landed the catering contract for a local music festival. The restaurant was located near the festival grounds and the owners graciously, perhaps foolishly, allowed us to use their kitchen for our purposes during off hours.

I've known Yuri for years. He used to have a fantastic restaurant nearby. Now he only does freelance work and consulting. Anyway, he needed someone reliable who lived nearby so he asked me to help out. I hesitated because it was Summer and I had several big outdoor projects to get done. I also hesitated because this was new territory for me; a fact that actually brought me around to agreeing.  Although I’d never done commercial kitchen work before, I ended up seeing many similarities between the food service game and my years in air traffic control. There was the boss ~ scurrying around in circles, scowling and sputtering at everyone. The workplace was chaotic, the help temperamental and unreliable, product quality was inconsistent, customers complained, management offered baffling excuses and, of course, knives could be thrown at any moment. Sound familiar? Also like ATC, it was a continual learning experience and one hell of a lot of fun!

Chef Yuri is considered a genius among his peers. He's always been very successful and, having worked for him a while, I think I now understand why. His main emphasis with me and the other three who were helping with the festival project was absolute standardization throughout the preparation process. You'll understand the importance of this when you think about the many times you went to a particular restaurant and ordered the same menu item ~ maybe a cheeseburger. Chances are, if you ordered it five different times, it was served five different ways. Sometimes it was a little over or under done. Sometimes there was hardly any cheese or so much lettuce and tomato that you couldn't get your mouth around the bun. Not so at Chef Yuri's table.

Yuri preached standardization ~ literally at knife point; starting with the most basic steps in preparation like slicing and dicing each ingredient. Every piece had to be cut to the prototypic size or, according to Yuri, you'd end up with some parts either overcooked or undercooked. Weights, measures, cooking temperatures and times always had to be the same for any particular dish. These constraints yielded constancy, which meant his customers were rarely disappointed. Innovation and creativity were things to be tried off-line ~ NOT when the restaurant was full of anxious customers and food orders were flying in and out of his kitchen! The consecutive culinary successes served up to customers at Chef Yuri's table were prepared in strict compliance with his table of weights and measures.

This was one aspect of the job that was starkly different from air traffic control which, unlike Yuri's tightly controlled recipe standards, I always considered more analogous to music. To me, a controller's prescribed standards were really nothing more than sheets of music, from which one could, like a fine musician, spontaneously improvise on the melody line, change the rhythm or pick up the pace. The best controllers I knew were valued for their innovation and creativity under pressure. They didn't rely solely on the sheet music. They knew the score and could play it by ear.

We've all either worked with them or, with luck, will one day. These controllers reveal a prodigious touch when it comes to moving airplanes. They always seem to have a sixth sense about what needs to be done and can innovate on the fly to meet their goals. They were out there, moving airplanes, long before the hackneyed phrase about thinking "outside the box" was coined. To me, they were also a litmus test for shift Supervisors; the best of whom were always willing to endorse a new or different way of doing something. The worst Supervisors would cling to conventional thinking like a security blanket. They'd often end their shift with at least two problems. Operational inefficiencies could lead to reportable delays ~ delays they'd have to justify (never fun). They had also just reinforced at least one controller's stereotypical belief that Management never listens. Remember; just because something is considered a stereotype doesn't mean it's not true.

So this was as it should be in our business. As long as safety is never compromised, air traffic control should be an exercise in freedom of expression. That also means giving other people's ideas some consideration. Sure, we have our necessary constraints and limits. Your old, dog-eared copy of the point sixty-five is full of them. It's a manual of minimums and must-do standards ~ the printed sheets of music I mentioned earlier. We need it for safety's sake. Think, however, about what all the relevant air traffic directives don't tell you. Here is small slice of wisdom from that book we all love:

Among other things, this paragraph advises us of our "not optional" obligation to provide additional services. However, it doesn't give us any specifics.  So what are we talking about here?  An extra wind check for the guy on short final? Clearing an airplane direct to some point a couple hundred miles away at 3:00 AM? Coordinating with an overlying sector so a departure can climb above 10,000 sooner? Could it be something like entering a flight plan into the system for some poor sap caught VFR on top? All of this and more ~ but don't ask the people who wrote this time-honored tome for a definition. Paragraph 2-1-1simply tells us it's okay, in fact, expected that we be "musicians" but does not tell us how to do it. You have to know the score, then be free and willing to use your imagination. That's the moment when ATC, like music, becomes an art form. Be mindful of those "security blanket" Supervisors though. They may not appreciate your creative instincts . . which reminds me of Old Jack.

The first time I saw one of our most accomplished journeymen get hollered at was on a stunningly VFR Winter morning at Big Time. We were having our problems though. The area had gotten about 12 inches of snowfall overnight. This left us dayshifters with just one landing runway and a few main taxiways to use while snow removal crews worked on the rest of the place. Holding patterns stayed full since the tower needed an honest 5 miles in-trail (MIT) to allow time for each airplane to clear the runway. Only one exit taxiway was open at the far end and it took the landing traffic a while to get there. As a result, inbounds were trickling off the outer fixes, 20 MIT, and merging into one long, widely spaced line to the airport.

Old Jack was working at one of the approach sectors when word came down that another landing runway was opening. I was a newly minted journeyman, seated at one of the other approach positions and completely engrossed in managing my own holding pattern. The TRACON Supervisor came around and told me, Jack and the other approach sectors to empty the holding patterns and "run 'em, ten in trail!" That was all Jack needed to hear.

Old Jack had "street cred." He'd worked at two other high density facilities, was smart, level headed and well respected by all. On the other hand, our TRACON Supervisor had come to us from the Regional Office because . . . well, because it was his turn to get supervisory experience at a busy facility. A bureaucrat with relatively little field experience, we grudgingly tolerated his frequent dithering because we knew he'd be gone in a year or two ~ probably back to the Mother Ship as a Branch Chief, then off to some other field facility as Manager. This was the typical career path for those anointed by the Air Traffic Division.

"Run 'em!" was the call, so I obligingly cleared the bottom aircraft out of my pattern, started descending the rest to the next available altitude, updated a few EFC times and thought about letting the Center sector know what my highest holding altitude now was. Chef Yuri would have been proud of me because it was all being done by the numbers. Then I glanced over at Old Jack's traffic. In the minute or two since we got the word to run planes; he already had two off his holding fix and a third about to join the line.

The next thing I knew, Mr. Security Blanket was standing behind Jack and yelling something about "first come, first served." Rather than starting at the bottom of his holding pattern (like me), apparently Jack had pulled a couple of flights from the middle of the stack because he saw an opportunity to "organize and expedite" his traffic (See Par. 2-1-1 above). Both airplanes happened to be inbound toward the holding fix when the "Run 'em " order was heard. Therefore, they could be on vectors toward home quicker than the guys on their outbound leg. To Jack, they were targets of time and money saving opportunity.

Old Jack couldn't have pulled off this cunning feat without some interfacility coordination either. Up at those altitudes, he didn't own the airspace outside the holding pattern. All was quickly and quietly accomplished with the imagination and virtuosity of an accomplished musician.

As the team neophyte, I'd never seen such a move and was impressed. Our annoying Regional superstar was not. He was now ranting about which flights had been holding the longest, who had the earliest EFC times, who would be calling to complain and blah, blah, blah. Jack turned his head briefly and made what I thought was a very appropriate, albeit vulgar suggestion. I heard the word "insubordination" being used repeatedly. That's when Pete, our Area Manager appeared. After assessing the issue, Pete told the Supervisor to stop by the Watch Desk. We couldn't hear all of what was being said but we could feel the heat radiating out from their discussion. Two minutes later, Pete sent him upstairs to relieve the tower Supervisor.

Once Mr. Security Blanket left the TRACON, Pete walked over to check on the arrival sectors. Everything was running according to plan and we'd soon be out of reportable delays. Later in the shift, he and Old Jack had a long discussion which, according to Jack, went well. He and Pete had both come up through busy facilities as controllers. They both understood how useless any extra miles between arrivals were and while "first come, first served" was an equitable way of conducting business, it wasn't always the best way to "organize and expedite the flow of traffic."

Pete eventually moved on to another facility that was closer to where he planned on retiring. We would soon miss his uncanny ability to cut through the most complex crap, identify the underlying issues and take action. The idea of Management taking action would gradually fade as the years passed; trending instead toward a "wait and see" attitude that allowed problems to grow out of hand.

The "security blanket Supervisor" did, as expected, return to the Regional Office. I saw his signature on the bottom of several mindless memos sent out to the facilities. Each one of them served to accelerate the loss of credibility our leadership had with the controllers, Supervisors and other field personnel.

Old jack retired a couple of years later; taking his music out the door with him. As we settled into the post-strike, point and click era, I met fewer and fewer controllers like Jack, who "knew the score and could play it by ear."  

Not to discount the value of standards in our business. In my time, I saw too many aggravating examples of sub-standard performance. There was inattentiveness, horrible phraseology, non-compliance with procedures, too much room between departures or arrivals, holding airplanes too long or not long enough, being oblivious to the traffic situation in adjacent sectors and the list goes on. I saw it all and was occasionally a part of it. Things like these, if viewed singularly, had relatively minor impact on the big picture. But taken cumulatively, they would subtly erode overall system efficiency.

I also saw the rise of a workforce who grew to need everything spelled out for them. If it wasn't in writing somewhere; they didn't do it. A kind of security blanket, I suppose. Spontaneity, creativity, taking the initiative and seizing the moment was fading into my old friend Chef Yuri's vision of success through "doing everything the same way." That's why, in my later years, if I heard a controller who dared to do something different; it was truly music to my ears!

© NLA Factor, 2011

Signs Of Trouble

There's something a little unsettling about a silent TRACON. Without any hollering back and forth between sectors, without the FDEP machines hammering out their endless scroll of flight strips, without urgent squawking from the overhead speakers, or alarms, buzzers and badgering pilots to unravel your nerves; the TRACON assumes an eerie aspect of serenity.

It happens sometime after midnight. That's when Big Time's normally hectic scarespace reverts back into what nature intended; more air than airplanes. By 3:00 AM you can almost hear the radar's circular sweep as, once every four seconds, it lights up the few targets creeping across sectors temporarily deserted by their regularly resident havoc.

The big jets were all down; tucked into their gates to await the morning departure push. These hours were for the box haulers and mail carriers. Mostly piston powered airplanes; they seemed to traverse Big Time's airspace at the speed of night. Like a few ants crossing a football field, they appeared more like permanent echoes on the radar than moving targets.

I was pulling a round of mids with four other guys. Two were upstairs in the tower, me and Jay had TRACON duty and, somewhere in the back, there was a Supervisor doing the daily paperwork. It was a warm night in August of 1982. Tired and bored, I sat tapping mindlessly on the "Enter" key of my ARTS keyboard and staring at the video map. Jay had just switched the only airplane he had to the Center and was off to the breakroom for a fresh cup of coffee.

We'd cleaned up all the backlog from the evening shift, released the ARTS computer to Airway Facilities for some routine checks and were now settling into the long hours of the midshift. These were the hours when air traffic control came down to the simple challenge of staying awake. Maintaining separation meant ~ don't let your eyelids come together for more than a second. Coffee helped but just barely. The only sure-fire way for me to to avoid sleep was through conversation. Fortunately I had a topic in mind.

Jay sat back down at his scope. "Damn." I muttered. "Its been a year already." I paused, unsure of the reaction to my upcoming question. Then; "What made you come back to work?" Jay turned his head about 20 degrees toward my direction but never looked up. The late night TRACON silence hung in the air like cobwebs.

One year ago, intoxicated by a sense of invincibility and the promise of victory, Jay had gone on strike with most of the other Big Time controllers. He shook his head, leaned back in his chair and raised his eyes to the ceiling. I made a handoff that I'd been waiting 25 minutes to initiate. Then, on that quiet August night in 1982, Jay spoke to me of how his job, his family and perhaps his life were saved one day in August of '81. I can paraphrase his story but you'll have to imagine the pensive, palling looks on his face as he spoke.

He and his wife were attending one of many PATCO sponsored rallies happening across the country immediately following the strike. This one took place at a small park just a few miles from Big Time Airport. These rallies, meant to impose unity and extol its surely "inevitable" benefits among the striking controllers, also gave Union officials a way of keeping track of everyone. Since this particular rally was being held within Reagan's 48 hour grace period, there was always a chance someone might lose nerve, turn tail and run back to work. Jay told me he'd been sitting at a picnic table with his wife and two kids; sweating with everyone else under the August sun. Although there were several reasons to sweat; the heat was good enough for the moment.

Nearly everyone was either drunk or about to be. There was a lot of shouting, chanting and Union rhetoric. Some talked of revenge and retaliation against those who stayed on the job. Others talked of how different things would be when they made their triumphant return to work. Jay watched, listened and took it all in.

Big Time's local Vice President was speaking to the crowd. Dick had been staunch proponent of a strike for at least the last year or so. Although a controller with above average abilities; Dick was a chronic complainer and, in the final few months preceding the strike, became perennially petulant and antagonistic. By Spring of '81 I saw Dick as a man who seemed to have opted out of evolution ~ an animal who growled and snarled at those of us who were either undecided or unwilling to strike.

Standing next to Dick was Sal. He'd been one of the PATCO Local's team representatives. Also known for his pre-strike truculence, Sal nodded his head in agreement as Dick preached the gospel according to Poli. Silent skies and abandoned control rooms would soon bring FAA and the aviation industry to their knees. That is; if the scab controllers and blundering supervisors didn't kill hundreds of people first in a spectacular midair collision. Everyone swallowed beer, hollered and cheered. Some even laughed. The air was filled with flourishing fists and fluttering signs. It resembled a kind of chaotic carnival.

The air was also filled with other signs. These were the signs of trouble for PATCO. In an ironic contrast with the rally's pitiful propaganda, big jets could be seen, nose high and climbing over the distant cityscape. Most rolled quietly into a turn toward some distant navaid but a few eventually roared over the little park; briefly drowning out the bombastic blather below. These skies were far from silent. But why? Jay sat sipping his beer, watching the evolving spectacle and worrying.

His wife was worried too. She peered out across the crowd with a look that reflected a darkening mood, disbelief in what she was seeing and growing doubts about the success of this venture. Two of Jay's teammates were throwing a frizbee back and forth. He said he couldn't help but see the irony in what had become of their aviation careers. Two air traffic controllers - working plastic departures and arrivals while someone's dog jumped and barked at the overflights.

Jay's wife turned suddenly in his direction, threw her arms out toward the crowd and said the whole thing was insane. He could see she was on the verge of tears as she continued. "This is not working. Everyone is going to be fired! You need to get your ass back to work!"

There was no argument. Jay told me he looked around, nodded his head in agreement and wandered off through the melee to find a pay phone. He called the TRACON, spoke with the Area Manager and was soon back on the schedule.

"Why did you go out to begin with?" Jay stood up, stretched and grabbed his empty coffee cup. He looked tired and uneasy. "Now I don't even remember. Everything was all messed up back then. Grievances, management bustin' our balls all the time and nobody listening to us. And in case you missed anything, you had PATCO kinda playin' it all back to you every day. If you weren't already pissed off; they'd get you there! You know; when they don't stop talking at you; you start seeing the things they're talking about." He sighed. "I guess I didn't know how bad things were till I really started listening to 'em. Then I got mad. I came to work mad every day. By August I thought there was only one way to get the FAA to listen."

He started off toward the breakroom; empty cup dangling from his index finger. "It was just all fucked up, you know?" I knew. I pressed one of the lines to the center. "Fourteen, Big Time, eighty-three line with another handoff." Silence. I tried again. It was about 4:30 a.m. The whole damned time zone was asleep and my traffic was creeping up on the boundary. The handoff line was dead silent. Jay walked back in. "Hey, somebody forgot to bring in more coffee! Pots empty and there's nothing in the cabinet." I wondered if I was going to have to spin this guy. "Sector fourteen, Big Time, eighty-three with a hot one!" Almost three hours to go, no coffee and now the center won't... "Whaddaya got Big Time?" The midshift headed slowly toward dawn. We resorted to drinking Coke for our caffeine.

Jay had made it back from the brink. Most people in the facility never even knew he'd been on strike. And now a year had passed. Much of the early, post-strike fervor had passed as well. Supervisors still worked traffic occasionally but were mostly back to supervising. PATCO had long since been decertified. The FAA was busy trying out various human relations initiatives in what would ultimately be a failed effort to convince controllers there was no need to reorganize. Everyone was fighting fatigue and some were losing.

It was the new Management by Objective. I thought of it this way... Management was a pistol and controllers were simply the bullets. Our target, or objective, was full recovery from the strike's impact. But the "bullets" had no say over what direction they were being fired in. Consequently there were ricochets, unintended casualties and collateral damage. People began complaining and were skillfully ignored by a management team that had years of practice at it. Furtive palavers were taking place behind the backs of those who were too busy fighting to keep a hold on their waning credibility to notice. It was the worst kind of deja vu.

There were signs of trouble everywhere.

© NLA Factor, 2010