Kudos to the Langley Airport Tower

[sidestick stirrer]

As I gradually morph from my real job driving the Triple with a seniority number in the teens, to folding my six-plus-foot frame into a Cessna 152 attempting to give ab-initio instruction as a retirement activity, the occasion arose a couple of days ago that prompted me to declare an emergency a few seconds after crossing the departure end of Langley's runway.

What ATC did after my rushed transmission was truly remarkable. The young lady working the frequency-who, incidentally, is every-bit as cute as she sounds-instantly relinquished her position to her instructor, who-all in one breath-told everyone moving on the ground to stop, the airplane on the runway to get off, the airplane on approach to overshoot, everyone else in the air to clear the zone and stay off the frequency. Then he took a quick breath and told me( I'm paraphrasing): Sir, the airport is yours, you may land anywhere you wish.
He didn't pester me with radio calls or distract me with information: he knew exactly what to do and he did it extremely rapidly and very well.
I can't begin to tell you how much of a difference a quiet frequency made to the rapid decision making that followed.

Our little formation team has given the Tower fits in the past, culminating in an on-air argument with this particular controller last summer. He used to have a penchant for yanking pilots' chains on the air, always justified of course, but sometimes we got the feeling that perhaps he was yanking a little harder than the transgression or oversight warranted, and we had another ZBB in the making:) Sorry, Barney...

A face-to-face meeting last summer went a long way to smoothing the waters over our diverse interests, and I am now very glad that was done.

Should you ever need to declare an emergency, don't hesitate to do it near Langley. They will rapidly take as much of the workload off your shoulders as they can and leave you to deal with your problems without distractions.

They are definitely the "A-Team" and worth every penny our Nav Canada fees buy.

[iflyforpie]

I wonder if that was SkyWolfe in the tower?

Regardless, excellent job! Nice to hear something positive for a change!

[200hr Wonder]

Could quite likely be there pie. None the less Good job team YNJ!

[Invertago]

Skywolfe! Are you the radio cutie in question here?

<break break>

Great post side stick, great story hear about, great to see credit given where due and very interesting to read how ATC handles this kinda thing.

BTW, what was the emergency?

[Old Dog Flying]

Nice work Scott! Wolfie probably had no choice but to relinquish the mic 'cause the guy likes to sound off at every chance. He probably has the record for number of CADORS including one on me for flying the circuit at 600' after he pulled me up for no good reason. The guy is a dick-head.

Snowflake 1

[SkyWolfe]

Yes, it is me in ynj tower

My trainer did a great job and I'm very happy he is training me

[cntrctr]

Similar experience in yyc last fall. I'm an AME and hobby pilot. I Popped the top off of a brand new cylinder while flying by yyc in the dark in a single. I asked for immediate vectors to the nearest runway and got nothing other than competence and calm. Have to hand it to those guys, they are well trained and very capable. It impressed me how they can instill confidence over the radio.

[Invertago]

They talk calm, reassuring and clear the way for you, but between keying the mike I'm sure they've already got a pool going and are placing their bets

j/k all, I love you ATC

[GottaFly]

Kudos to you Scott! All i can say is I'm glad it was you in that airplane! Keep up the top notch work!

[Foolsmaster39]

Hi all,

It's an all post that I reopen, but yes, I can confirm, CYNJ ATC people are great !

I am just about to finish my CPL training at LFS and I don't really have any bad souvenirs of anyone of the guys working there, after nine months of daily flying. And they're getting busy at times, very busy. The airport circuit is crammed with foreign students, which implies :
- very basic knowledge of the air rules at the beginning of their training
- accents from all over the world which must not really help ATC in stressing moments (sorry folks, I ll try to eliminate my french accent for my IFR training, even if I can't promise that ).
- slowly reacting pilots

and they always deal with us nicely.

Thank you guys, you made me a better pilot, even if at first my radio calls were pure catastrophe. Radio calls used to scare me like HELL, which drove my former instructor crazy !
Now it's fine, in part, thanks to these guys.

John

[Hedley]

try to eliminate my french accent

Don't do that. On long flights, you can amuse yourself by changing your accent periodically.

I might suggest that you start with a southern twang, then move to a spanish accent, then to british, then french, then australian.

I don't think the above is a CARs offence - perhaps merely against the advice of the AIM?

[200hr Wonder]

What about Spanish? No one ever expects the Spanish inquisition!

[sidestick stirrer]

Hedley, you devil: I never saw that follow-on post of yours.
Made me laugh so hard that-at my advanced age-I had to leap off the couch and dash to the washroom lest I...oh, never mind.
You'll be this old some day, too.