Lexington

[gumbofats]

Terrible tragedy,

And my sympathies to all.

I have no interest in debating any aspect of what happened. It will all wash out someday and Godspeed to those involved before any of the rest of us dare speak an unkind word.

Some of the debate on the "GEN" forum, however, is turning sour on the ATC side. (I'll quickly comment that this is premature and stupid), and I qualified myself earlier by stating my position on these type of comments.

Perhaps, some "nip it in the bud" comments could be useful over there.

What responsibility during ground operations does a tower controller have?

In Canada, I have always appreciated the "CLEARED TO" communication.

In the U.S. "CLEARED TO" means nothing.

You can be number 4 on approach...."CLEARED TO LAND" is almost always the response to checking in, no matter the condition of the runway or line up.

I don't mean to cloud my question by bringing up a "landing" point versus a "take-off" one, but more simply.....

On another thread there are media types saying that the controller had some responsibility to ensure the aircraft wasn't departing from the wrong runway.

Can that be?

Also, what can I learn from asking about my perceived discrepancy in policy between landing clearances in Canada and the U.S.????

Thanks in advance,

Gumbo

[squibbler]

From a Canadian ATC perspective, we are bound by some NAVCAN mantra which goes by the name of Functional Goal #1.

Functional Goal # 1

In the provision of air traffic control and flight information service, all Air Traffic Services units shall provide:

A. uniform application of approved standards and procedures;

B. professional communications; and

C. full-time attentive fight monitoring and flight information services.

All other assignments are secondary. Full and active individual support is essential.


If the Lexington incident had happened in Canada the controller would be toast for not providing "C".

Kind of sharpens the focus up here wouldn't you say?[/i]

[FamilyGuy]

Gumbofat I don't see all that much "souring" towards ATC on the other post - just the usual armchair quaterbacks with unqualified opinions .

As to US pro's vs ours, I think you have to take a whole system wide approach when comparing them - and even then that is a comparison best left to an expert in both feilds. We don't have TRACON's yet they do and they are a completely different beast. The duties associated with that vs the various shifts vs consolidation etc are entirely dependant upon what their rules are - apparently 2 on mids.

Squib gave the textbook answer.......

[twice_banned]

On another thread there are media types saying that the controller had some responsibility to ensure the aircraft wasn't departing from the wrong runway.

Apparently this is not part of a tower controller's responsibility in the US, which I find baffling. If the centre is basing IFR separation on the departure runway (as we do in Canada), then it would be nice to know there is some monitoring going on. What is the point of a tower controller if they are not exercising positive control over the runways? Might as well run it with FSS if you're not going to ensure pilots are following clearances and isntructions.

What if another a/c had been cleared to land on 26 at the same time the RJ decided to use it instead of 22?

[lilfssister]

On another thread there are media types saying that the controller had some responsibility to ensure the aircraft wasn't departing from the wrong runway.

Apparently this is not part of a tower controller's responsibility in the US, which I find baffling. If the centre is basing IFR separation on the departure runway (as we do in Canada), then it would be nice to know there is some monitoring going on. What is the point of a tower controller if they are not exercising positive control over the runways? Might as well run it with FSS if you're not going to ensure pilots are following clearances and isntructions.

Glad to hear you know FSS MANOPS inside and out. Guess you missed that part about monitoring aircraft in the air and on the ground to ensure they are doing what you expect?

[grimey]

Might as well run it with FSS if you're not going to ensure pilots are following clearances and isntructions.

FYI, I catch pilots turning the wrong way entering the runway roughly once a week. I assume the captain of the aircraft notices as well, and (provided weather and traffic arn't factors) simply lets his FO make the mistake for training reasons. This isn't a major problem, as it's caught quickly provided I'm actually doing my job. Shockingly, I actually do my job. If you're going to take the position that you'd never make a mistake of this sort or magnitude, @#$! the hell off and stop lying, or take a closer look at your work. This isn't a controlled vs. uncontrolled situation, it's a monitored vs. unmonitored situation. Pilots (provided they're VFR) can depart whatever runway they want at the airport I work at. That doesn't mean I don't check to see they're actually doing what they said they're going to do, and call them on it if I catch them doing something different.

[twice_banned]

Glad to hear you know FSS MANOPS inside and out. Guess you missed that part about monitoring aircraft in the air and on the ground to ensure they are doing what you expect?

Pretty hard to catch someone turning onto the wrong runway, or the wrong way on a runway when you're running RAAS, as so many sites do today. That's more what I meant.

However, take YQK for example, and they can barely see the runway from their current building (soon to be replaced with a new one with a cab).

[lilfssister]

Glad to hear you know FSS MANOPS inside and out. Guess you missed that part about monitoring aircraft in the air and on the ground to ensure they are doing what you expect?

Pretty hard to catch someone turning onto the wrong runway, or the wrong way on a runway when you're running RAAS, as so many sites do today. That's more what I meant.

However, take YQK for example, and they can barely see the runway from their current building (soon to be replaced with a new one with a cab).

Pretty big difference there. You should be more specific. Generalisations are rarely correct. And in reality, RAAS is sort of like working in a perpetual state of 0 -1/8 Vis without ASDE. You have to trust people are doing what they say they will, and not doing things they haven't told you about.

A lot of older sites were built long ago. Standards have changed, as the job has changed. Older FSS are gradually being replaced with 360 degree visibility (tower-like) structures. Unfortunately not quite as fast as the job has evolved from what it was when those were built. I used to work at one of those, and with the little bit of the runways I could see: I still stopped people from using the wrong runway.

[bij]

I can't even imagine how the controller would be able to sleep at night, knowing that if he hadn't turned his back he may have prevented this. Not a positon I ever want to find myself in. Incidents like this remind us of why we do as much as we can, even with the limited tools and resources we have. Even with the limited view in YQK, I bet they are still scanning as much of the rwy as possible before each take off and landing. It is all too common to become complacent, but incidents like this are a harsh reminder of why we do what we do.

[twice_banned]

Glad to hear you know FSS MANOPS inside and out. Guess you missed that part about monitoring aircraft in the air and on the ground to ensure they are doing what you expect?

Pretty hard to catch someone turning onto the wrong runway, or the wrong way on a runway when you're running RAAS, as so many sites do today. That's more what I meant.

However, take YQK for example, and they can barely see the runway from their current building (soon to be replaced with a new one with a cab).

Pretty big difference there. You should be more specific. Generalisations are rarely correct. And in reality, RAAS is sort of like working in a perpetual state of 0 -1/8 Vis without ASDE. You have to trust people are doing what they say they will, and not doing things they haven't told you about.

A lot of older sites were built long ago. Standards have changed, as the job has changed. Older FSS are gradually being replaced with 360 degree visibility (tower-like) structures. Unfortunately not quite as fast as the job has evolved from what it was when those were built. I used to work at one of those, and with the little bit of the runways I could see: I still stopped people from using the wrong runway.

You can see about 150' of YQK's 5000' runway from the apron area where the FSS bldg is located. The runway has a large hump in the middle, and the west end is obscured by trees. A/C on final for 26 disappear from view short final, and then reappear as they are about to turn off the runway 3500' later. No generalization there.

And regarding RAAS, trusting people are going to do what they say is exactly my point. There's no difference in positive control (or the lack thereof) between a tower controller with their back to the runways and an FSS sitting 1000 km away in a room.

[gumbofats]

Quote from Grimey...




FYI, I catch pilots turning the wrong way entering the runway roughly once a week. I assume the captain of the aircraft notices as well, and (provided weather and traffic arn't factors) simply lets his FO make the mistake for training reasons. This isn't a major problem, as it's caught quickly provided I'm actually doing my job. Shockingly, I actually do my job. If you're going to take the position that you'd never make a mistake of this sort or magnitude, @#$! the hell off and stop lying, or take a closer look at your work. This isn't a controlled vs. uncontrolled situation, it's a monitored vs. unmonitored situation. Pilots (provided they're VFR) can depart whatever runway they want at the airport I work at. That doesn't mean I don't check to see they're actually doing what they said they're going to do, and call them on it if I catch them doing something different.







If you actually know of a single incidence of said events, and I trust you to be truthful.....

I would very truthfully encourage you to end said events.

No avition company should engage in negative training of this sort. I have worked as a pilot for most (not all) types of operators and I know that bad examlpes serve as a training event that will not be forgotten.

That being said,....there is no place in our industry for unprofessional clowns who play that game.

If any training Captain out there thinks that letting their FO transgress so badly is a good trianing event then they need to re-evaluate their own self.

Do a better job!

Training is important and if your skills require mistakes then maybe you should go back to the line......

Gumbo,

Fly well

[tower controller]

I've been following this since it happened because it could be me tomorrow.....and I just have to make a couple of comments..

FYI, I catch pilots turning the wrong way entering the runway roughly once a week.

You must be working a pretty busy place or have some pretty stunned pilots, mistakes do happen but if it's happening with that frequency at your airport then you have a system problem and you need somebody to figure out what it is.

Comparing a RAAS operation to a Lexington is like comparing apples to oranges. The controller in Lexington was working his 17th flight for that shift according to the FAA, that's busy enough to keep you awake, if there's RAAS places doing that much traffic on a midnight, I've never heard of them. I've worked at some places with RAAS, never again.

There has been a lot of questions about why the controller didn't see that they were on the wrong runway. There's a lot of factors there, how far away from the tower they were, how high the tower is, how close the two thresholds are, color of the airplane, what lights were on, etc. There are lots of controlled airports where a threshold of a runway is a mile or more away from the tower.

Color and contrast plays a much bigger role in runway scanning than people think, we had some Nav Canada managers on a tour a while ago when they were doing the runway incursion study. one of em asked me "what can we do", I told him for one thing stop buying Navy blue vehicles....

I feel for the controller in the situation. A big deal is going to be made of the two hours sleep thing, and we've all done it, how many midnights have you worked on no sleep, anybody who says they haven't are full of shit. They are also going to be quesitons asked about his back being turned, unfortunately that's a fact of life in our job, we work alone so much and have so many other things to do that we have our backs turned to whats going on probably 20 to 40 % of the time, and before somebody tells me about Functional Goal #1, we have one threshold behind us, so if were using two runways, which we do all the time, which one do we watch?

It was a terrible event, and we are probably going to see some changes to our jobs because of this event, hopefully they'll be meaningful changes instead of a change for change's sake.

In the meantime let's be careful out there.

[mellow_pilot]

I'm a lowly little pilot, and I admit that I don't know all that much about the ins and outs of ATS ops, but...

Isn't this case a simple runway incursion that lead to a horrible accident? What ever happend to the huge stink that the FAA and TC were making about trying to reduce runway incursions? Obviously and accident chain, many invloved, no single person to blame (except ofcourse the PIC, always gets the bill).

I'd also like to send out my sympathies to all those who work in ATS and are being terribly mis-represented in the news lately. You'd think they would screen thier 'experts' better. Thanks for all you do.

[grimey]

If you actually know of a single incidence of said events, and I trust you to be truthful.....

I would very truthfully encourage you to end said events.

No avition company should engage in negative training of this sort. I have worked as a pilot for most (not all) types of operators and I know that bad examlpes serve as a training event that will not be forgotten.

That being said,....there is no place in our industry for unprofessional clowns who play that game.

If any training Captain out there thinks that letting their FO transgress so badly is a good trianing event then they need to re-evaluate their own self.

When I said that I assume that the captain is using it as a training exercise, I'm just giving him the benefit of the doubt as far as their reasoning goes. I didn't mean that I don't call them on it each time I see it. If they turn the wrong way, I ask them again what runway they intend to depart, and update them as far as the winds and traffic go if it's required.

[gumbofats]

yep,

Didn't mean to bite anyone's head off there.

My point is in line with yours, and I am very glad to hear that you bark at the clowns who try to bring the bush out.

Gumbo

[grimey]

yep,

Didn't mean to bite anyone's head off there.

My point is in line with yours, and I am very glad to hear that you bark at the clowns who try to bring the bush out.

Gumbo

No problem, my first post wasn't totally clear.

Like I said, I think it's a really minor thing provided people are paying attention. If people don't, it has the potential to be a major one. I don't think of it as a runway incursion if the guy is on the runway 10 seconds longer than he originally intended, because they go 50 feet in the wrong direction to start. If I can't get the guy on the radio after he does something I don't expect, that's totally different. I think most of this occurs because of the relative inexperience of alot of pilots here, not because of any systematic problem. We get a new guy on the line, and he makes plenty of mistakes for the first month or two, then it mostly stops. The staff at the FSS realizes this, and if they're uncomfortable with a certain pilot, they watch more closely. If they're working with a pilot they're familiar with, they still watch. With a fairly large 703/704 community at the airport, you regularly end up with alot of new pilots at the airport. Which means you end up with alot of minor mistakes related to both low time in the cockpit, and unfamiliarity with the area. This isn't meant as an insult to those pilots, just a recognition of that reality. If I get transferred to a new FSS, you can bet your ass I'll probably say the wrong station ident at least once (probably more) on the radio, and screw up geography too. This is why there's a station checkout after a transfer. It's also why people shouldn't be put in the left seat immediately after moving to a new base, unless the FO has some experience in the area. So long everyone realizes these problems, and looks for mistakes that result from them, it's not a problem.

[Doc]

Okay, I'm probably the guy who got the thing started over on "general". But I wasn't laying any blaame on the tower dude. I simply stated, he could have saved the day if he HAD noticed the aircraft lining up on the wrong runway. He became just one more "link in the chain" of possible causes to this disaster? A big flashing light at the threshold warining "CAUTION RUNWAY ONLY 3500 FEET LONG" could also have prevented it?

[gr8gazu]

Maybe Flight ID will eventually help but will also be limited in scope and application.

Unfortunately, for now, humans are lousy monitors especially where multi-tasking is involved.

Complacency is tough to avoid but should be emphasized in human factors training.

[bij]

You can see about 150' of YQK's 5000' runway from the apron area where the FSS bldg is located. The runway has a large hump in the middle, and the west end is obscured by trees. A/C on final for 26 disappear from view short final, and then reappear as they are about to turn off the runway 3500' later. No generalization there.

You have actually painted a more optimistic picture than I would have. That new cab is sooo overdue and almost ready? Do you know how many times you hold your breath watching someone land rwy26 with a strong x wind, just waiting for them to roll up that hill again?