|
Crunk Abortion posted:I'm getting ready to apply for an off the street position, and would love any advice TRACON goons could offer. I just had Parahexavoctal update my resume, did you guys also include a cover letter when you applied? How much should I specialize my resume to include FAA keywords and stuff? Most information available on how the hiring panels select people is complete rumor-mill. I don't think anyone knows exactly what they're looking for. I will say that the interview portion of my hiring took about 15 minutes out of a year long process and I felt it probably had the least to do with me being selected. I believe I included a cover letter, short and sweet. The shorter and sweeter for everything, the better, I really don't believe the resumes get looked at that closely beyond verifying you have met the prerequisites. xaarman posted:So if someone reports an ELT, what is the process that happens? Today, ATC asked several planes if they could pick it up, how strong it was and if it was getting stronger/weaker, but then what? My understanding is that the satellites have stopped listening for 121.5/243.0 bands of ELT(Emergency Locator Transmitter, aircraft distress beacon) and so it's now entirely up to other aircraft and ATC facilities to notice and report them. Newer emergency beacons broadcast on 406MHz and include the transmitter's location, registration information, and phone number contact (probably for the owner or pilot). The old style ELTs just beep. And beep and beep and beep. If the ATC facility who takes the report is a terminal facility (Tower/TRACON) then the information is forwarded to the overlying Center and they take over responsibility for activating search and rescue. They'll coordinate with Flight Service, the Air Force, and reports are probably made to the Domestic Events Network to ensure efforts are made to locate the signal. If it's a strong signal heard in the vicinity of an airport, one of the first things we'll do is ask airport management to drive around and check the hangars. A lot of the times these ELTs go off after a hard landing and the flight crew parks the airplane without realizing they're "beeping." The Civil Air Patrol (CAP) still takes part in hunting down ELTs, as far as I know. Their band of cadets will drive around all over creation with a handheld receiver attached to a big dorky "H" shaped antenna, scanning for the strongest signal until they narrow it down to the plane's location. I used to be in CAP when I was younger and had several calls at 1am on a school night to go run through fields looking for an airplane. It was never a wreck (thankfully) only aircraft parked with beeping ELTs. Pilots and maintenance crew are also authorized to test their ELTs within the first 5 minutes of any hour, no more than 3 beeps. You'll often hear these tests pipe up over the emergency radio frequencies (121.5/243.0). They sound like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_AMzBuoLs0 It just goes on and on until the ELT battery dies or someone finds it and shuts it off. The Ferret King fucked around with this message at 18:18 on Feb 14, 2014 |
#
?
Feb 14, 2014 18:14
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 20, 2024 00:37 |
|
|
Tommy 2.0 posted:I am pretty sure you would have to talk to a flight doc. Be careful with what you say. Some want to disqualify people just for sneezing once a day. Hit me up on steam CoX bro. The general rule is to not tell them about anything you don't have to. Nope, I never get headaches, I don't drink, I've never been dizzy, etc... Don't loving volunteer anything. I'm going to die of some super easily fixable thing because I still do my best to not go to a doctor because of some irrational fear they'll find something stupid and meaningless that will cost me my job.
|
|
#
?
Feb 14, 2014 18:43
|
|
|
The Bramble posted:So I have something called REM sleep behavior disorder. All it does is make my legs twitch while I sleep, no other symptoms. I have a prescription for 0.5mg klonopin that I can take to stop the twitching, but I could certainly live without it. As far as the medical goes, how long would I have to be off klonopin to not have it disqualify me? Aviation Medicine.com is a great resource for folks expecting complications with obtaining or retaining their medical clearance. Our union uses them. It may cost a little bit out of pocket, but an inquiry through them could save you thousands down the road. Are you an AOPA member by chance? They too have a medical department, as well as a subforum with a very experienced medical examiner providing guidance. The Ferret King fucked around with this message at 20:19 on Feb 14, 2014 |
|
#
?
Feb 14, 2014 18:49
|
|
|
SCOTLAND posted:Anybody here work MIA? I'm curious if it's actually a big deal that you check in 10 prior when overflying Cuba on the way back from South America? Or have relations thawed enough that you talk to each other these days? Are you talking about a comms change, or something to do with your overflight permits? "Contact Miami center on frequency ten miles south of MAXIM," is just a non-radar comms change. They want you to monitor their (Havana's) frequency until that point, then call Miami. The Westside Coastal area in ZMA (Miami Center; MIA is Miami Approach/Tower,) has the majority of Cuban overflights, and their Letter of Agreement with Havana specifies non-radar separation and procedures for all handoffs, because their radar is hilariously spotty and unreliable. As for relations, they're still pretty icy, officially, but to move airplanes, the two facilities have to talk to each other quite a lot more than you might imagine. Each aircraft going either direction is a phone call to the other facility with a non-radar handoff. They'll specify everything on the flight strip, including your estimate for the coordination fix, (CANOA and MAXIM are the only two I can remember,) altitude, TAS, etc, etc, and the Miami controller will either find the automated flight plan, (their automation does talk to ours, but not particularly reliably, hence the requirement for manual coordination,) or enter a new one, and accept the handoff. Havana's calls to WSC come out over the speaker until someone picks up the line, so being anywhere near that area (mine is across the hall,) is essentially a case study in amusing Cuban accents. After that handoff is made, if the Havana controller has no further instructions for you, you'll get that comm change. If your question was something regarding your overflight permits, Welp. 
|
|
#
?
Feb 14, 2014 19:12
|
|
|
Yeah at my facility we work the Mexico/US border and have similar non-radar (manual/verbal) transfer of flight information for anyone crossing over. Our responsibility as ATC is distinctly different from any procedures pertaining to authorization to actually cross the border. We don't know anything about an individual flight's legality for entering US airspace, that's more the jurisdiction of US Customs And Border Patrol, and the Department of Defense. I have had pilots call me up asking for "clearance" into the United States airspace. We don't do that. The pilot is supposed to have all that handled before they even depart. I believe much of this is coordinated through Flight Service and Customs, but I'm not sure since I've never flown across the river myself. Our situation is a little different than MrYenko's, in that our verbal coordination procedures aren't required as a result of unstable equipment. The Mexican approach controllers on the other side of the river are 100% non radar. There is no radar coverage for them to use there, so it all has to be handled verbally. The Ferret King fucked around with this message at 20:20 on Feb 14, 2014 |
|
#
?
Feb 14, 2014 19:22
|
|
|
The Ferret King posted:Yeah at my facility we work the Mexico/US border and have similar non-radar (manual/verbal) transfer of flight information for anyone crossing over. Our responsibility as ATC is distinctly different from any procedures pertaining to authorization to actually cross the border. We don't know anything about an individual flight's legality for entering US airspace, that's more the jurisdiction of US Customs And Border Patrol, and the Department of Defense. This is actually pretty fascinating to me. My wife butts up against Houston Center and she says they DO NOT PLAY when it comes to weather if they start even looking at crossing in to Mexican airspace. It isn't something she has to deal with personally so she doesn't know the rules on all that. When I was working in Maine I didn't work close enough to the Canadian border to have to deal with it so I'm not sure how different, at all, it is there.
|
|
#
?
Feb 14, 2014 22:09
|
|
|
Most of the ideas people have about your job is that it's highly stressful and causes premature death or some poo poo like that. Basically, that it's one of the most stressful jobs in the world. Speaking from your experience, is the level of stress really that high?
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2014 06:13
|
|
|
I'd say it's no more stressful than working in customer service. You're in control of the situation and most find working the busy traffic the funnest part. Personally most of the stress comes from other controllers or management doing something stupid or deciding to not follow standard operating procedures.
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2014 06:31
|
|
|
chocolateTHUNDER posted:Most of the ideas people have about your job is that it's highly stressful and causes premature death or some poo poo like that. Basically, that it's one of the most stressful jobs in the world. I would say it comes down to the ways the individual in question handles stress. If you're the kind of person that takes your stress home with you, and dwells on slights and interpersonal drama, it could be stressful, yes.
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2014 15:39
|
|
|
I have found the job has all the normal stress of a job that deals with lots of management on shift work. The only time it is more stressful than normal jobs is during training. Training is as fun as wading through a bag of smashed assholes. After that, it's good stuff and the same thing you would deal with at other jobs really. Luckily, the job attracts a larger percentage of intelligent people. I tell you what, it was drat near shocking only being around controllers from the ages of 18-24, getting out of the military, then being exposed to normal people again. I remember thinking "dear god I forgot what REAL stupid was like".
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2014 16:48
|
|
|
chocolateTHUNDER posted:Most of the ideas people have about your job is that it's highly stressful and causes premature death or some poo poo like that. Basically, that it's one of the most stressful jobs in the world. Sinbad's Sex Tape posted:I'd say it's no more stressful than working in customer service. You're in control of the situation and most find working the busy traffic the funnest part. I will personally attest that I had way more stressful periods of my life working in customer services than I've yet to have in ATC. I think so much of that has to do with the fact that I actually like my job now and I'm empowered to do it. The control aspect is very important, it's great being the one in control. Not to get a big complex about it, but we don't have to deal with complaining customers (not in the moment anyway) and the whole operation is shielded by layers upon layers of professionalism and anonymity, which makes it a very polite environment to work in. Some exceptions apply of course. You adjust to the level of stress put forward by the job. You also can't let yourself get wrapped up in the reality of the number of lives you're responsible for. That doesn't help anyone. All the passengers care about is that they're not delayed and don't die. All the pilots care about is that they're not delayed and that they don't die. You'll often hear people say that we have to be perfect in this job. That's not entirely true. What you do need to do, is operate at a high level of cognitive function and have good overall judgment. I never go a day without correcting a few instructions I made. If I did, it'd be a fluke. But you have to be good enough to realize you need to make the correction. And the thing you did requiring correction should not be SO screwed up that you can't recover from it. But minor mistakes happen all the time. We're perfectionists but we're hardly perfect. Training is absolutely horrible. You don't know what the gently caress you're doing and you're taking it from all sides. The pilots want to know why they haven't been cleared to come into the airport yet, your instructor wants to know why you're so loving stupid, and your supervisor wants to know if he's going to be able to go home early today without having to do paperwork. You have to handle the inherent stress of the job along with the stress of not being comfortable with your own abilities and limitations. You don't even know what you don't know yet. It slowly gets better and better as you certify on positions within your facility. Your coworkers start treating you better, you begin to understand more of the local operation, and you free up that valuable brain capacity for things like sequencing and monitoring your traffic, instead of focusing on the simple stuff like what that airport on your scope is called again.
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2014 17:29
|
|
|
Is "mark the tape" still a formal thing you have to do, or is it just a holdover that old disgruntled pilots say?
|
|
#
?
Feb 16, 2014 07:55
|
|
|
For the first year I was at my first facility, we actually still had tapes that we changed out every morning and marked with a grease pen. We had a whole tray of them that we'd cycle through (starting over every 45 days). It's an antiquated term now that it's all digital recording, but the message still gets across. We wouldn't need to actually "mark" anything but if we knew a pilot was going to be calling in later to complain, the smart ones would probably try to get their story straight with management and quality assurance so no one was surprised by the phone call. They can pull up the audio and radar data immediately by date/time.
|
|
#
?
Feb 16, 2014 13:15
|
|
|
Has everyone already asked how realistic "Pushing Tin" is? Like, everyone you've ever met?
|
|
#
?
Feb 17, 2014 21:55
|
|
|
I.C. posted:Has everyone already asked how realistic "Pushing Tin" is? Like, everyone you've ever met? A lot. What is funny about that movie isn't so much the actual traffic, but the drama around the people. There isn't a single controller I would ever describe as "normal". It seemed that every character in that movie had something to make them stand out from the rest.
|
|
#
?
Feb 17, 2014 22:06
|
|
|
I.C. posted:Has everyone already asked how realistic "Pushing Tin" is? Like, everyone you've ever met? Most people think we're the guys with the orange batons marshaling the planes to the gate. (Did this joke already happen?)
|
|
#
?
Feb 17, 2014 22:37
|
|
|
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NSLqRXyxiBo So in theory and possibly in practice it's possible for a guy with a computer in the airport parking lot to fake ADS-B signals and create a phantom airplane or airplanes. My question is how does the ATC equipment handle this? If there is a fake ADS-B signal, but no corresponding aeroplane detected by the primary radar, then does the fake plane just not appear on the screen? What if it was over a part of the USA which isn't covered by radar, what if there were hundreds of fake signals?
|
|
#
?
Feb 18, 2014 02:22
|
|
|
Thanks for the write up. How long or what needs to happen for it to be taken seriously vice "another hard landing at a random airport" ?
|
|
#
?
Feb 18, 2014 03:29
|
|
|
The Ferret King posted:If the ATC facility who takes the report is a terminal facility (Tower/TRACON) then the information is forwarded to the overlying Center and they take over responsibility for activating search and rescue. They'll coordinate with Flight Service, the Air Force, and reports are probably made to the Domestic Events Network to ensure efforts are made to locate the signal. If it's a strong signal heard in the vicinity of an airport, one of the first things we'll do is ask airport management to drive around and check the hangars. A lot of the times these ELTs go off after a hard landing and the flight crew parks the airplane without realizing they're "beeping." Lazy pilots, or incomplete checklists. When I was flying, the last thing we always did before shutting off the avionics was to monitor 121.5 to see if we'd accidentally set off the ELT (or if there was another signal, I suppose, in case no one else had noticed it). I assumed this was just standard procedure to prevent the sort of situation you describe, but maybe it's not as common as I thought and it was just the school's policy.
|
|
#
?
Feb 18, 2014 03:58
|
|
|
xaarman posted:Thanks for the write up. How long or what needs to happen for it to be taken seriously vice "another hard landing at a random airport" ? It's taken seriously immediately, and hopefully you figure out it was a hard landing before too many resources were activated. It took so many minutes for the ELT satellites to scan a given area twice. I think it was between 30min to 1 hr. Two passes were needed to confirm a persistent ELT signal, attempt to triangulate the location, and begin the search and rescue procedures (though they'd begin notifying people sooner if aircraft/ground based facilities were also receiving the signal). If a signal is received for a few minutes, then stops, it will probably be assumed that it was somebody testing their transmitter, or otherwise becoming aware that it was broadcasting. If the signal is no longer transmitting before satellite triangulation can occur, there's not much you can do to find it anyway. On the old 121.5/243.0 system, it now has to be detected by other aircraft or ground facilities since the satellites don't listen anymore. If we're hearing it at an ATC facility, it's probably pretty close and very annoying, so we'll have the airport guys out looking within 10 minutes to shut it up. I'd say conservatively you could expect activation of SAR resources no more than 1hr after first hearing the signal or being notified of one. It could take them several more hours to find the transmitter. The newer 406MHz digital transmitters can encode GPS coordinates with the distress signal, so it makes finding it a lot easier. All of us terminal facilities (towers and TRACONs) monitor 121.5/243.0 continuously. Not only for ELT signals but for anyone broadcasting on those frequencies for help. I've been told that Centers don't necessarily listen to those frequencies at the control positions, though it may be monitored at a supervisor or coordinators desk. Generally when aircraft call on 121.5 it's because they missed a frequency change and want to know who they need to contact next. Terminal facilities or other aircraft are the ones that reply to these requests, I don't think they usually get a hold of a Center through 121.5. EDIT. I promise an effort post on radar systems is forthcoming. It's taking me a lot longer to compile interesting information/images than I thought. The Ferret King fucked around with this message at 04:17 on Feb 18, 2014 |
|
#
?
Feb 18, 2014 04:14
|
|
|
In my facility, not every sector has a guard-tuned transceiver. We just have one in the area, at 46. (The midnight sector.) Because of the range in the middle of the training sector, there's an additional 243.0 channel, but not 121.5. When we need to raise someone on guard, we just PVD the data block to 46, and ask them to call em up for us. Our area is physically the smallest in the facility, though. Ocean has sectors bigger than our area. (PVD is a computer function that let's you put a data block on another controllers scope, so he can see it, even if it isn't in his airspace.)
|
|
#
?
Feb 18, 2014 04:47
|
|
|
MrYenko posted:In my facility, not every sector has a guard-tuned transceiver. I think my facility only has one area that can receive/transmit on guard.
|
|
#
?
Feb 18, 2014 05:18
|
|
|
Yeah when I hear airline pilots or other folks way up high calling out for help finding a frequency I always hear them call for Center and think to myself "center can't help you, buddy, they're not listening." It's fun reaching out to them and finding out they're hundreds of miles away from my tower, but so high up that the radio quality is still excellent. It's like a contest between pilots (and occasionally controllers) to see who can be first to bitch out a pilot accidentally transmitting on 121.5 (guard) frequency. Diligent pilots will try to monitor guard on a second radio in case anyone calls out for assistance, but might accidentally set their radio to transmit instead of receive only. Then you get this coming out every speaker: "Center N12345 leaving 10,100 climbing 15,000" "YEEEEERRRRR ON GUAAAAAARRRDDDDD!" "Oops sorry." Bonus points if multiple guard police jump on the poor guy at the same time, toning out the frequency and causing a horrible screeching sound, as they race to be the first douchebag to yell at the guy for making a simple mistake.
|
|
#
?
Feb 18, 2014 06:20
|
|
|
The Ferret King posted:Bonus points if multiple guard police jump on the poor guy at the same time, toning out the frequency and causing a horrible screeching sound, as they race to be the first douchebag to yell at the guy for making a simple mistake. This sounds hilarious. It makes me think though, can two emergency transmission/beacons not go off at the same time? I work in corporate security for a large company and we have multiple autonomous centers that are capable of handling small crisis situations for our organization, so if one of us happens to go down or cannot activate the work gets split between the other centers across the country. What happens if inclement weather occurs and not enough air traffic control individuals are able to staff an airport (or is there not a minimum)? What if there is a power outage, I assume you have back-up generators?
|
|
#
?
Feb 18, 2014 13:26
|
|
|
We do have emergency generators which we run during certain situations (thunderstorms, ice storms, etc). Makes most of the facility smell faintly of diesel exhaust. At my small tower/TRACON we have to have at least one fully certified controller to work the approach control and a trainee that is at least certified in the tower to work upstairs. We pretty regularly have this kind of staffing for a few hours in the mornings when we open or after 10 PM (we're open from 6 am - midnight). Obviously larger facilities are going to have different minimums. If we don't have the staffing, our radar completely fails or we have to evacuate we go "ATC0" and hand over control of our airspace to Albuquerque center. They work our airspace when we are closed anyways so they know what's going on. We got 18 inches of snow in one night last year and the airport had no chance of plowing it so they just closed. I got a free day off, it was nice.
|
|
#
?
Feb 18, 2014 15:44
|
|
|
Centers themselves have a rather impressive standby generator system. They test them once every couple of months, always makes me feel like I'm working at the airport again.
|
|
#
?
Feb 18, 2014 17:05
|
|
|
I'm possibly going on a tour of SLC tower/TRACON tomorrow, anything in particular I should ask about if I'm looking into this as a change of career? Is there any chance I would get my "home" airport once I come out of training (even if I get that far)? For background info some of you know me from that other thread as the fulltime CFI who teaches those  students...
|
|
#
?
Feb 19, 2014 03:02
|
|
|
Purely speculation but I fully believe visiting the facility is what got me selected so fast as a PUBNAT 6. Get them to know your name and they'll be more inclined to select you.
|
|
#
?
Feb 19, 2014 03:14
|
|
|
Butt Reactor posted:I'm possibly going on a tour of SLC tower/TRACON tomorrow, anything in particular I should ask about if I'm looking into this as a change of career? Is there any chance I would get my "home" airport once I come out of training (even if I get that far)? I may be incorrect but as far as I know there hasn't been anyone actually put through the new placement process yet so it is still a mystery how it will work exactly. It sounds like the placement process is going to be out of the facility manager's hands, just that they can request to receive x number of new hires and it is decided by performance at the academy. Placing new off the street and college hires at higher level facilities (both SLC and the TRACON are level 10s IIRC) has been discouraged because so many were training failures in the past. I know that the TRACON has a pretty high turnover rate because they work a good amount of traffic and once you check out there you can pretty much work anywhere. If you get a chance to meet with the air traffic manager and/or facility representative they can be good people to get to know.
|
|
#
?
Feb 19, 2014 04:14
|
|
|
Zochness posted:I may be incorrect but as far as I know there hasn't been anyone actually put through the new placement process yet so it is still a mystery how it will work exactly. It sounds like the placement process is going to be out of the facility manager's hands, just that they can request to receive x number of new hires and it is decided by performance at the academy. Placing new off the street and college hires at higher level facilities (both SLC and the TRACON are level 10s IIRC) has been discouraged because so many were training failures in the past. I know that the TRACON has a pretty high turnover rate because they work a good amount of traffic and once you check out there you can pretty much work anywhere. I guess it's already a good thing that the guy in charge of organizing the tour is ex-ATC and one of my coworkers? I figured getting SLC straight out of the academy would be too good to be true but I'd be fine with working a nearby Class D like OGD or PVU. Also, any recommendations on resume format? I was thinking of sending one formatted like the ones I use for pilot gigs but I'm guessing the FAA would be more interested in work/school experience than flight hours...
|
|
#
?
Feb 19, 2014 05:04
|
|
|
Butt Reactor posted:I guess it's already a good thing that the guy in charge of organizing the tour is ex-ATC and one of my coworkers? I figured getting SLC straight out of the academy would be too good to be true but I'd be fine with working a nearby Class D like OGD or PVU. Also, any recommendations on resume format? I was thinking of sending one formatted like the ones I use for pilot gigs but I'm guessing the FAA would be more interested in work/school experience than flight hours... I don't think it will hurt. As far as resumes are concerned, I'd just use the resume builder on the usajobs site. It has all the information they want to see and formats it nicely for you. I've heard that on previous bids all the various resumes people submitted would just be transferred over to the resume builder format anyways for uniformity. If you end up touring let me know what you think, the TRACON has an opening right now for a few current controllers and I'm interested in applying. Never been to the Salt Lake area but I want to get out west and it looks gorgeous.
|
|
#
?
Feb 19, 2014 06:14
|
|
|
When I was a controller in Germany, the German guard police would absolutely lose their poo poo. People would gently caress with them too, playing soundboard poo poo and funny sound effects. Hearing an exasperated guard policeman screaming on the frequency in a thick German accent is great fun.
Iucounu fucked around with this message at 09:03 on Feb 19, 2014 |
|
#
?
Feb 19, 2014 09:00
|
|
|
The Ferret King posted:Yeah when I hear airline pilots or other folks way up high calling out for help finding a frequency I always hear them call for Center and think to myself "center can't help you, buddy, they're not listening." Jesus, I loving hate Guard Nazis. I had an interesting situation last night coming back from Switzerland to the US. Gander Center apparently forgot all about us and we flew out of their sector way beyond VHF range. We found a random Montreal Center sector on JeppView and contacted them for a good freq. Before he let us go, the Montreal controller wanted to know how we got that freq and why we were calling (it seemed pretty obvious and we initially told him what happened). It was almost like he wanted to stick it to the Gander controller for losing us. Is this a thing?
|
|
#
?
Feb 19, 2014 16:32
|
|
|
ausgezeichnet posted:Jesus, I loving hate Guard Nazis. Yeah some controllers are straight dick heads who want to always throw anyone under the bus. Regardless if it was a big thing or no thing.
|
|
#
?
Feb 19, 2014 17:19
|
|
|
Could have been slightly less vindictive, and he just wanted to give the other controller crap in a friendly way. But that's almost certainly why he wanted to know, yes.
|
|
#
?
Feb 19, 2014 18:17
|
|
|
ausgezeichnet posted:Jesus, I loving hate Guard Nazis. Canada scrambled F18s back in 2012 for a plane over Quebec that lost comms on coast in, so I assume they are far more vigilant these days. http://avherald.com/h?article=452cd443
|
|
#
?
Feb 19, 2014 20:18
|
|
|
Zochness posted:I don't think it will hurt. Update: just submitted my app to the FAA through their website, now for the waiting game  I did get to tour Tower/TRACON with our little group, and it was pretty freakin cool. First stop was Tower (which has the cab 300 feet off the ground) which gives you an amazing vista of the SLC valley and surrounding mountains. Even with the lovely weather today you could at least see 10-15sm, and you would see triple that on a good day. TRACON, although pretty nifty, convinced me that I would want to stay in visual contact with the outside world. Dark room, low lighting with a bunch of LCD screens, ehh no. The rest of the facility (mostly offices and the like) was pretty modern and nice looking, and most of the staff pretty chill and personable. If you want to get out here, do it. The Mormons kinda suck but the rest of the state doesn't.
|
|
#
?
Feb 20, 2014 00:12
|
|
|
I've heard that Salt Lake City TRACON is deceptively difficult to work because of the lack of options. Those planes get down into the valley and they pretty much need to be set at their proper interval way ahead of time, because you can't turn them hardly anywhere due to the mountains. If you botch the sequence, there's no way out. I've heard stories of folks coming from other large TRACONs and having difficulty certifying at SLC.
|
|
#
?
Feb 20, 2014 00:42
|
|
|
I got stuck listening to ATC recordings due to this thread. This video has me stumped https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwLTOYKOVFU What is he asking the pilots in the beginning? I'm pretty sure it's non-sensical but I'm not getting it.
|
|
#
?
Feb 20, 2014 01:13
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 20, 2024 00:37 |
|
|
Sounds like NY Center is swamped and put a stop on a lot of departures entering their airspace. The offer of 10,000ft to destinations as far away as California is a joke because no air carrier is going to stay level at 10,000ft for transcontinental flights, but NY Approach doesn't own the airspace above that so that's all they could presumably offer. EDIT: This may not be obvious to everyone so I should clarify. Jet engines are very inefficient at low altitudes. 10,000ft is an unreasonably low altitude for a jet making a long flight. They tend to cruise between 30,000 and 45,000ft. It's unlikely you could even make it from coast to coast at 10,000ft without running out of gas midway. The Ferret King fucked around with this message at 01:56 on Feb 20, 2014 |
|
#
?
Feb 20, 2014 01:18
|
|