March ATC Update

Published: March 2017

In addition to an update to my Aviation Story that I published today, I’ve also provided a much overdue update on my ATC life.

My last update ended with me in Local Control (“Tower”) classroom having just recently certified on ground control. I don’t remember the exact dates, but shortly after finishing the classroom portion I was upstairs again training on local control.

Since November, I’ve been training on local control. Since local control is much more complicated than ground control, it naturally takes longer to get proficient on and subsequently certify on. Some of the hardest parts of our training here occur during our busy times – which is typically our outbound “package push” – when anywhere from 15-40 of UPS’s and FedEx’s regional airplanes leave with their morning loads of packages to the smaller cities surrounding the area. This time of the day is typically complex just based on the volume of traffic in the short amount of time.

Our airport is co-located with an Air National Guard base, and they have fighter aircraft based here on the field. A few times a day the fighters depart and eventually return, and those times are typically complex because of some of the maneuvers and fast speed the fighter jets fly, along with the conflicts of having other aircraft either in the traffic pattern or waiting to depart.

Mastering these two busy times typically leads to a successful certification on local control at our facility. We do have other busy times, occasionally, especially if we have VFR aircraft in the pattern, or bad weather (snow – I’m looking at you!). Overall, my local training is going pretty well, but certification is really dependent on having good traffic and having the right people see you working that traffic in a way they want you to. So, we will see how much longer training will take on local, it could be soon, it could be a while.

After I complete local control, I’ll head back down to OKC for radar training (RTF class, for those of you who know what that means). In a few weeks, a group of us will also be going offsite for a week of OJTI (On-the-Job Training Instructor) class. It’s a mix of trainees and fully certified controllers going, but we are all less than a few years in the agency. This is the class to become certified to be an instructor, so after certification (and a 12 month wait) we can start training trainees. Yay!

I’ll be sure to update once I’ve achieved certification on local control (or I guess if you don’t see any update, you can put the pieces together…).

In other news, last month I moved from my apartment into a townhouse. I love having a little more space, a garage, and an area to work on projects again! I’ve got my bicycle out here with me now, so I try to go out for some rides a few times a week, when I’m not working on these websites or planning travel (yes, you heard correctly – stay tuned!).

That’s all for now, so until next time…