The Air Traffic Controller Thread

[Borg]

:zzz::zzz::zzz:

 

[lisab]

 

[gb7nash]

lololol

 

[turbo]

At least there has been some action. Airports with low overnight traffic levels now have to have 2 controllers per shift. They are "small" airports like Reno, Burbank, and others.

 

[DaveC426913]

 

[jhae2.718]

At least there has been some action. Airports with low overnight traffic levels now have to have 2 controllers per shift. They are "small" airports like Reno, Burbank, and others.

I'd think that (assuming it's ever implemented...) NextGen would help as well by reducing ATC workload.

 

[JaredJames]

So, as someone who rarely watches the news...

What's this about?

 

[lisab]

So, as someone who rarely watches the news...

What's this about?

There's been a recent flurry of stories about air traffic controllers falling asleep on the job. In some small airports, there's only one person on duty, so I guess it can happen pretty easily.

 

[JaredJames]

There's been a recent flurry of stories about air traffic controllers falling asleep on the job. In some small airports, there's only one person on duty, so I guess it can happen pretty easily.

Ah, I see.

 

[Borg]

So, as someone who rarely watches the news...

What's this about?

I figured that the thread would eventually devolve into a serious discussion but, I just couldn't resist starting it off this way.

 

[DaveC426913]

So, as someone who rarely watches the news...

What's this about?

More to the point:
- in Washington, dead air left two loaded passenger jets dangling in the breeze for about twenty minutes before they landed themselves without Air Traffic Control.
- somewhere else (Kansas?), the tower was off the air for five hours. In this case, the controller had actually laid out blankets and a pillow.

 

[JaredJames]

More to the point:
- in Washington, dead air left two loaded passenger jets dangling in the breeze for about twenty minutes before they landed themselves without Air Traffic Control.
- somewhere else (Kansas?), the tower was off the air for five hours. In this case, the controller had actually laid out blankets and a pillow.

Wow, just wow.

 

[DaveC426913]

And completely unrelated: did anyone see the video where an A380 behemoth clipped a tiny commuter jet's tail, and spun it around like a top?

http://www.wcti12.com/news/27537148/detail.html

Man, they're lucky they're not dealing with cracked skulls...

 

[JaredJames]

And completely unrelated: did anyone see the video where an A380 behemoth clipped a tiny commuter jet's tail, and spun it around like a top?

http://www.wcti12.com/news/27537148/detail.html

Man, they're lucky they're not dealing with cracked skulls...

Yeah, funny enough it appeard in FAIL blog. Can't imagine why...

 

[Borg]

More to the point:
- in Washington, dead air left two loaded passenger jets dangling in the breeze for about twenty minutes before they landed themselves without Air Traffic Control.
- somewhere else (Kansas?), the tower was off the air for five hours. In this case, the controller had actually laid out blankets and a pillow.

The guy with the blankets had even been woken four or five times by people from other floors in the tower. Each time, he promised to stay awake and went right back to sleep.

Yesterday's news story was about a controller that couldn't be reached again while a Life Flight was trying to land in Reno with a sick passenger on board. I believe that one landed itself also.

 

[Borg]

And completely unrelated: did anyone see the video where an A380 behemoth clipped a tiny commuter jet's tail, and spun it around like a top?

http://www.wcti12.com/news/27537148/detail.html

Man, they're lucky they're not dealing with cracked skulls...

I posted it in the https://www.physicsforums.com/showpost.php?p=3243008&postcount=1140" thread that day. I was thinking the other night that they're also lucky that the smaller jet didn't snag somehow and get dragged over by the 380's engines. That probably wouldn't have been a good thing.

 

[DaveC426913]

... get dragged over by the 380's engines. That probably wouldn't have been a good thing.

Ever see the Mythbuster's ep where they put stuff in the wake of a 747? Awesome.

 

[Borg]

Ever see the Mythbuster's ep where they put stuff in the wake of a 747? Awesome.

Something with a flying taxi?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLB0qadBPwU

 

[BobG]

Air Traffic Controllers working a night shift need naps.

Air traffic controllers need naps on the job, scientists say

It would probably be good to let airline pilots nap during the flight, as well. It's ironic that pilots aren't allowed to touch alcohol before flights, but are allowed to fly so fatigued that their performance level drops to being roughly equivalent to that of a person with a BAC of 0.04 (with 0.08 being legally drunk).

Other countries allow napping by both pilots and air traffic controllers. Germany even provides cots and rest rooms for its controllers (which can't help but bring back memories of an old Candid Camera skit).

 

[DaveC426913]

Air Traffic Controllers working a night shift need naps.

Air traffic controllers need naps on the job, scientists say

It would probably be good to let airline pilots nap during the flight, as well. It's ironic that pilots aren't allowed to touch alcohol before flights, but are allowed to fly so fatigued that their performance level drops to being roughly equivalent to that of a person with a BAC of 0.04 (with 0.08 being legally drunk).

Other countries allow napping by both pilots and air traffic controllers. Germany even provides cots and rest rooms for its controllers (which can't help but bring back memories of an old Candid Camera skit).

No one's arguing that ATCs or pilots don't need naps. But pilots have copilots. Reasonable people are arguing that an ATC should not work a night shift alone.

 

[TheStatutoryApe]

No one's arguing that ATCs or pilots don't need naps. But pilots have copilots. Reasonable people are arguing that an ATC should not work a night shift alone.

Alone or not, in America you are not supposed to nap at work. A while back I even had a coworker get in trouble for taking a nap on his break. If you're in a position of responsibility no one is ever supposed to see you as human and requiring the same needs as any normal person.

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

Another air traffic controller suspended for sleeping
http://www.cnn.com/2011/TRAVEL/04/16/air.traffic.controller.asleep/index.html?hpt=T1

 

[mugaliens]

More to the point:
- in Washington, dead air left two loaded passenger jets dangling in the breeze for about twenty minutes before they landed themselves without Air Traffic Control.
- somewhere else (Kansas?), the tower was off the air for five hours. In this case, the controller had actually laid out blankets and a pillow.

While it's verbotten for ATC to fall asleep, it's not exactly like pilots are incapable of landing themselves. I've made hundreds of takeoffs and landings from uncontrolled airfields, including in Class B and C aircraft (it's a weight category). Nearly all airline pilots have had plenty of experience doing the same.

The thing of it is, most of the airfields to which they're flying require communication with the control tower, without which they're not supposed to land, except in an emergency (with the aircraft). I suppose controller who's out for the night constitutes a type of emergency, as well, and how's the pilot supposed to know whether he's just asleep or deep in the throes of a heart attack or stroke?

The pilots did the right thing by holding, communicating, and when all else failed, landing anyway, after following standard pattern procedures for a non-controlled airfield.

Having flown many thousands of hours throughout the U.S. ATC system, and similar systems in more than thirty countries, I can assure you that constantly changing shifts is a prelude to disaster. Humans are built that way. We can easily jump forward eight hours, but it takes a couple of days to settle in, and that new shift should be held for at least a couple of weeks.

Moving a shift backwards, say from mids to days, can only be done safely with at least three days of rest.

The FAA's announcement today that they'll add 1 hour (9 hrs instead of 8) is an utter joke.

For pilots, even though they have co-pilots, it's 12 hours on, 12 hours off, and of the 12 hours off, 8 of them are uninterrupted. In the air force, if someone from the squadron called us any time during the 8 hours prior to a mission, and we couldn't get back to sleep, it was a crew rest bust, and you simply didn't fly that day.

Imagine if Air Traffic Controllers worked the following Day Shift (6 am to 6 pm):

Day Shift A: Controller Jones
Mon: 12-hrs
Tue: 12-hrs
Wed: off
Thu: 12-hrs
Fri: 6-hrs
Sat: off
Sun: off

Day Shift B: Controller Smith
Mon: off
Tue: off
Wed: 12-hrs
Thu: off
Fri: 6-hrs
Sat: 12-hrs
Sun: 12-hrs

That's 42 hours per week. When I did scheduling for a ground control function, our A and B shifts started and ended at 2 am and 2 pm (0200 and 1400). That gave both A and C shifts time to sleep when it was dark outside, as well as time to be awake while it was sunny outside. It also maximally preserved exactly half of our natural 10pm to 6am sleep window. Our B and D shifts started and ended at 8 am and 8 pm.

We'd rotate personnel forward 6 hours to the next shift once every two weeks. Thus, there were always two people on duty at all times, one fresh in the first 6 hours of their cycle, and the other fatigued in the last six hours of their cycle.

 

[AlephZero]

A bit of job redesigning might fix the problem. A good way to stop workers falling asleep on the job is to make sure they actually have some work to do. Paradoxically, fewer ATCs might be better than more. There is no reason why they have to be located where they can physically look out of the window to see what's going on, especially at night. One ATC center could handle several airfields with low levels of traffic.

Another feature of these incidents would seem to be that the ATCs were not interacting with any other people on the ground, who would presumably have the capability to go and see what was happening if communications stopped for no reason. Presumably there were no a/c takeoffs or ground movements going on at the time.