CONTROL FREAK
Jann Burner
August 13, 2007
(Oct. 20, 1980)
A letter from Ronald Reagan Letter to Robert Poli, head of the Air Traffic Control Union, PATCO.
Dear Mr. Poli:
I have been briefed by members of my staff as to the deplorable state of our nation's air traffic control system. They have told me that too few people working unreasonable hours with obsolete equipment has placed the nation's air travelers in unwarranted danger. In an area so clearly related to public safety the Carter administration has failed to act responsibly.
You can rest assured that if I am elected President, I will take whatever steps are necessary to provide our air traffic controllers with the most modern equipment available and to adjust staff levels and work days so that they are commensurate with achieving a maximum degree of public safety....
I pledge to you that my administration will work very closely with you to bring about a spirit of cooperation between the President and the air traffic controllers.
Sincerely,
Ronald Reagan
Less than one year later:
On August 3, 1981 nearly 13,000 of the 17,500 members of the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (PATCO) walked off the job, hoping for better working conditions.
PATCO leaders were hauled off to jail for ignoring court injunctions against a strike. The Justice Department proceeded with indictments against 75 controllers. Federal judges levied fines amounting to $1 million a day against the union while the strike lasted. Over 11,000 strikers received their pink slips. At least 63% of all the air traffic controllers in the entire United States were fired, probably a lot more!
Having been an Air Traffic Controller I feel I can speak to the subject. Of course I was only a controller in the U.S. Air Force. I say “only” because, for some reason, people always let out an audible sigh when I mention that I was a controller in the Air Force instead of at a civilian facility. As if being a controller in the Air Force somehow doesn’t qualify as being quite as “real” as being a controller at a facility where everything is scheduled down to the minute and there are very few if any surprises. Sort of like comparing an F-14 pilot with an Air Bus driver. Don’t let anyone tell you an Air Force controller isn’t as qualified as a civilian controller. That’s like comparing a Navy Seal to a professional wrestler. They both may be in excellent shape but the similarities end there.
Let me give you an example. By the time I was twenty-one I was a qualified controller in both tower and GCA final approach radar at a large B-52 base in the American Desert, a very busy fighter base in Northern Japan and a secret facility which shall not be named, located somewhere in S.E. Asia.. By the time I was twenty two I was back in college living it up on my $110 per month G.I. Bill. I graduated from air traffic control school and became facility rated at my first station during my eighteenth year.
The things I’d seen and heard before I was twenty years of age. Once I was working final approach radar at a very busy B-52 base. It was snowing heavily and two fighter planes called Emergency. They were almost out of fuel, they couldn't see ANYTHING and one didn't have an altimeter, so he really didn’t know how high he was above the ground. As a Ground Control Approach radar operator my job was to speak to the pilot at least every five seconds so that he would have confidence that I “knew” what I was doing. Let too much time go by and the pilots were apt to get a little anxious.
While I spoke to them I fixed my gaze on a very poor approximation of an early computer game. Two blips slowly moved down a line. Every few seconds I would advise them that they were left or right of course and ten or fifteen feet above or below the glide path. Or, ideally, they would be on course and on glide path. I really hadn’t a clue. It was 8 parts intuition and two parts technical expertise.
As I spoke I could tell they were scared to death. They could see nothing. It was zero visibility. When I advised them that they had crossed over the end of the runway neither of them could see the ground. Finally at a very specific moment I advised them that their wheels would touch down...”NOW!” It was an educated guess on my part, and yet although they STILL couldn’t see the ground, I could tell they were within ten feet of the surface. Still, when I said, “your wheels will touch down now”. They let out a gasp...their wheels did, indeed, touch down at that very moment. They STILL couldn’t see the ground! But they were on the ground and they were alive. Needless to say they were thrilled.
What I had forgotten in all the excitement and what the six other men standing around behind me had forgotten as well, was that I had cleared a B-52 for take off about ten minutes before. During the life and death drama with the fighter pilots, I had totally forgotten the huge bomber!. The Bomber pilots were on a different radio frequency and as usual they thought they were the only thing happening in the Western World. They had just started to roll when the two F-100’s flew over them so close they scorched their canopy!
These bomber pilots came in to our facility to let me know in no uncertain terms just what they thought. But they stood in the background and listened quietly as the fighter pilots shook my hand and told me how I had saved their lives. The B-52 pilots stood there. Finally they just smiled, nodded and left. Whew! So many dramatic moments and I wasn’t yet old enough to legally order a drink in a bar.
The Air Force likes to get their ATC trainees young. Heck, by the time they are twenty two, they are used, abused, discharged and ready to begin work for the Civilian ATC system. Which brings us to the present situation.
2007:
1,100 fewer air traffic controllers are working in U.S. facilities than three years ago, despite increasing air traffic.
The number of controllers who chose to retire exceeded the Federal Aviation Administration's expectations for the third year in a row.
In more than 40 percent of FAA air traffic control facilities, at least a quarter of controllers will be eligible to retire by the end of September 2007
Short staffing is causing some controllers to periodically work 10-hour days and six-day weeks, increasing the possibility of mistakes from fatigue, according to the union.
Mistakes made by controllers rose 68 percent between 1998 and 2005, according to FAA data.
And the wave of retirements is just starting.
About 70 percent of the Federal Aviation Administration's controllers will become eligible to retire through 2015.
(Data provided by the National Air Traffic Controllers Association)
The FAA plans to hire 11,851 controllers through fiscal 2015 to offset the retirements and meet an expected 25 percent increase in air traffic. The agency says it's hiring controllers two to three years before expected retirements to allow time for training and stay ahead of the curve.
But that hiring strategy only began in fiscal 2006, too late to immediately replace the larger-than-expected number of controllers retiring now with people who are fully trained, according to the controllers' union.
A large number of controllers will soon retire because many were hired in the early '80s when President Reagan fired more than 11,000 striking controllers. As the FAA replaces these veteran controllers, a growing percentage of the work force - as high as 20 percent by the agency's own estimates - will be less experienced trainees.
Some major facilities already have a higher percentage of trainees. As of 2006, Oakland Air Route Traffic Control's work force was 44 percent trainees, according to union data. More than a quarter of controllers in Philadelphia International Airport's tower were trainees. Nearly 30 percent were trainees at the Las Vegas approach control facility.
The Air Traffic Controller’s union facility-by-facility breakdown shows 734 controllers retired in fiscal 2006, 57 percent more than expected.
The National Air Traffic Controllers Association says some facilities are critically understaffed, causing delays and increasing the possibility of mistakes by tired controllers working 10-hour days and six-day weeks. The union says, because of the longer work stretches without a break, controllers are retiring as soon as they can.
In 2006 at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport's tower, the nation's busiest, there were 34 controllers handling takeoffs and landings, well below the 55 the union and FAA agreed in 2003 were needed there. Since then, traffic has increased and a new runway has opened, complicating the workload.
(From Gannett News Service)
When President Reagan “fired” the controllers in 1981 for wanting to improve their working conditions I tried to get hired. I was told that even though I was a college graduate and I had four years experience as an Air Traffic Controller, I could not even be considered. Why? It seems that since I had just turned thirty, I was too old.
Now I read where twenty six years later, our Air Traffic Controllers are seriously over-worked and under staffed and just when we need more experienced controllers, over half are due to retire within the year. There are some areas where it may be prudent to be frugal or “cheap”, air safety and providing reasonable hours and working conditions for our Air Traffic Controllers is not such an area. We are setting ourselves up for a Perfect Storm.
A letter from Ronald Reagan Letter to Robert Poli, head of the Air Traffic Control Union, PATCO.
Dear Mr. Poli:
I have been briefed by members of my staff as to the deplorable state of our nation's air traffic control system. They have told me that too few people working unreasonable hours with obsolete equipment has placed the nation's air travelers in unwarranted danger. In an area so clearly related to public safety the Carter administration has failed to act responsibly.
You can rest assured that if I am elected President, I will take whatever steps are necessary to provide our air traffic controllers with the most modern equipment available and to adjust staff levels and work days so that they are commensurate with achieving a maximum degree of public safety....
I pledge to you that my administration will work very closely with you to bring about a spirit of cooperation between the President and the air traffic controllers.
Sincerely,
Ronald Reagan
Less than one year later:
On August 3, 1981 nearly 13,000 of the 17,500 members of the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (PATCO) walked off the job, hoping for better working conditions.
PATCO leaders were hauled off to jail for ignoring court injunctions against a strike. The Justice Department proceeded with indictments against 75 controllers. Federal judges levied fines amounting to $1 million a day against the union while the strike lasted. Over 11,000 strikers received their pink slips. At least 63% of all the air traffic controllers in the entire United States were fired, probably a lot more!
Having been an Air Traffic Controller I feel I can speak to the subject. Of course I was only a controller in the U.S. Air Force. I say “only” because, for some reason, people always let out an audible sigh when I mention that I was a controller in the Air Force instead of at a civilian facility. As if being a controller in the Air Force somehow doesn’t qualify as being quite as “real” as being a controller at a facility where everything is scheduled down to the minute and there are very few if any surprises. Sort of like comparing an F-14 pilot with an Air Bus driver. Don’t let anyone tell you an Air Force controller isn’t as qualified as a civilian controller. That’s like comparing a Navy Seal to a professional wrestler. They both may be in excellent shape but the similarities end there.
Let me give you an example. By the time I was twenty-one I was a qualified controller in both tower and GCA final approach radar at a large B-52 base in the American Desert, a very busy fighter base in Northern Japan and a secret facility which shall not be named, located somewhere in S.E. Asia.. By the time I was twenty two I was back in college living it up on my $110 per month G.I. Bill. I graduated from air traffic control school and became facility rated at my first station during my eighteenth year.
The things I’d seen and heard before I was twenty years of age. Once I was working final approach radar at a very busy B-52 base. It was snowing heavily and two fighter planes called Emergency. They were almost out of fuel, they couldn't see ANYTHING and one didn't have an altimeter, so he really didn’t know how high he was above the ground. As a Ground Control Approach radar operator my job was to speak to the pilot at least every five seconds so that he would have confidence that I “knew” what I was doing. Let too much time go by and the pilots were apt to get a little anxious.
While I spoke to them I fixed my gaze on a very poor approximation of an early computer game. Two blips slowly moved down a line. Every few seconds I would advise them that they were left or right of course and ten or fifteen feet above or below the glide path. Or, ideally, they would be on course and on glide path. I really hadn’t a clue. It was 8 parts intuition and two parts technical expertise.
As I spoke I could tell they were scared to death. They could see nothing. It was zero visibility. When I advised them that they had crossed over the end of the runway neither of them could see the ground. Finally at a very specific moment I advised them that their wheels would touch down...”NOW!” It was an educated guess on my part, and yet although they STILL couldn’t see the ground, I could tell they were within ten feet of the surface. Still, when I said, “your wheels will touch down now”. They let out a gasp...their wheels did, indeed, touch down at that very moment. They STILL couldn’t see the ground! But they were on the ground and they were alive. Needless to say they were thrilled.
What I had forgotten in all the excitement and what the six other men standing around behind me had forgotten as well, was that I had cleared a B-52 for take off about ten minutes before. During the life and death drama with the fighter pilots, I had totally forgotten the huge bomber!. The Bomber pilots were on a different radio frequency and as usual they thought they were the only thing happening in the Western World. They had just started to roll when the two F-100’s flew over them so close they scorched their canopy!
These bomber pilots came in to our facility to let me know in no uncertain terms just what they thought. But they stood in the background and listened quietly as the fighter pilots shook my hand and told me how I had saved their lives. The B-52 pilots stood there. Finally they just smiled, nodded and left. Whew! So many dramatic moments and I wasn’t yet old enough to legally order a drink in a bar.
The Air Force likes to get their ATC trainees young. Heck, by the time they are twenty two, they are used, abused, discharged and ready to begin work for the Civilian ATC system. Which brings us to the present situation.
2007:
1,100 fewer air traffic controllers are working in U.S. facilities than three years ago, despite increasing air traffic.
The number of controllers who chose to retire exceeded the Federal Aviation Administration's expectations for the third year in a row.
In more than 40 percent of FAA air traffic control facilities, at least a quarter of controllers will be eligible to retire by the end of September 2007
Short staffing is causing some controllers to periodically work 10-hour days and six-day weeks, increasing the possibility of mistakes from fatigue, according to the union.
Mistakes made by controllers rose 68 percent between 1998 and 2005, according to FAA data.
And the wave of retirements is just starting.
About 70 percent of the Federal Aviation Administration's controllers will become eligible to retire through 2015.
(Data provided by the National Air Traffic Controllers Association)
The FAA plans to hire 11,851 controllers through fiscal 2015 to offset the retirements and meet an expected 25 percent increase in air traffic. The agency says it's hiring controllers two to three years before expected retirements to allow time for training and stay ahead of the curve.
But that hiring strategy only began in fiscal 2006, too late to immediately replace the larger-than-expected number of controllers retiring now with people who are fully trained, according to the controllers' union.
A large number of controllers will soon retire because many were hired in the early '80s when President Reagan fired more than 11,000 striking controllers. As the FAA replaces these veteran controllers, a growing percentage of the work force - as high as 20 percent by the agency's own estimates - will be less experienced trainees.
Some major facilities already have a higher percentage of trainees. As of 2006, Oakland Air Route Traffic Control's work force was 44 percent trainees, according to union data. More than a quarter of controllers in Philadelphia International Airport's tower were trainees. Nearly 30 percent were trainees at the Las Vegas approach control facility.
The Air Traffic Controller’s union facility-by-facility breakdown shows 734 controllers retired in fiscal 2006, 57 percent more than expected.
The National Air Traffic Controllers Association says some facilities are critically understaffed, causing delays and increasing the possibility of mistakes by tired controllers working 10-hour days and six-day weeks. The union says, because of the longer work stretches without a break, controllers are retiring as soon as they can.
In 2006 at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport's tower, the nation's busiest, there were 34 controllers handling takeoffs and landings, well below the 55 the union and FAA agreed in 2003 were needed there. Since then, traffic has increased and a new runway has opened, complicating the workload.
(From Gannett News Service)
When President Reagan “fired” the controllers in 1981 for wanting to improve their working conditions I tried to get hired. I was told that even though I was a college graduate and I had four years experience as an Air Traffic Controller, I could not even be considered. Why? It seems that since I had just turned thirty, I was too old.
Now I read where twenty six years later, our Air Traffic Controllers are seriously over-worked and under staffed and just when we need more experienced controllers, over half are due to retire within the year. There are some areas where it may be prudent to be frugal or “cheap”, air safety and providing reasonable hours and working conditions for our Air Traffic Controllers is not such an area. We are setting ourselves up for a Perfect Storm.
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