munkey_boi

Basically I know the same as the press releases. A problem came up in a line of code in one of the programs the en-route controllers use to help them manage more traffic than they could do manually. Controllers are always trying to give the airlines the most efficient routings, continuous climbs to cruising level etc. From what I understand the program had an error and restarted. In order to keep things safe, flow management was implemented. Thats designed to reduce the load of a sector to prevent bunching of aircraft or there just being too many to handle. Normally with all the management programs running, controllers are able to handle a huge amount of traffic based on predictions about its path, and identify conflictions. When those programs dont work, the controller has to make manual judgements and spend more time checking them for safety, hence the safest place for aircraft that havent yet departed is still on the ground. Granted it did cause a lot of delays, especially at airports like Heathrow. Heathrow operates at like 99.5% capacity, so those delays have knock on effects meaning some flights had no option but to be cancelled.

Believe it or not, working in a control tower is pretty mundane. Once you get over the excitement of planes being everywhere you look, its just like any other job :')

You'd be surprised how many people that live near airports phone directly through to the controllers to complain about the noise that arriving and departing aircraft make. I didnt build the airport where it is, and in all likelyhood the airport has been there longer than they have! I find the most interesting times to be when we get cockpit crews come to visit us. Its really vital that we maintain a good understanding of each other's thought processes. I dont want to be issuing instructions to a crew at a particularly intense phase of flight to prevent from distracting them, but equally they might want to know why we issue an instruction in a certain way, what the thought processes are behind it etc.

Scariest is without a "piggy-back go-around". Thats where one aircraft is coming down final approach to land, but ahead of it an aircraft is lined up to depart. As long as we can see aircraft from the window we can separate them visually, as opposed to radar controllers who usually have to provide 3 or 5 miles or 1000ft between aircraft. Sometimes we'll issue a take-off clearance with plenty of time to spare, but the air crew will get an indication in the cockpit and sit for a few moments to let it settle before rolling. Sometimes this can make it too tight to give a landing clearance to the aircraft behind (as you can only legally land something once the departing aircraft has lifted from the runway) and the landing aircraft carries out a missed approach. In this scenario you have one aircraft on climb out with another aircraft slightly above and behind it also climbing out. In that situation we'll often turn one by 90 degrees and let the other climb straight ahead so we get plenty of distance between them before sorting it out.

I cant remember exactly what happened on that day. Was that when a large amount of flights got delayed etc due to the problem at the en-route centre in Swanwick?

Sadly not, Im too busy having ACTUAL sex.

Quite a few - best thing you can do is stay calm, let the pilot fly the plane and assist in any way you can. Im sat in a nice warm tower, I'm not going to be dead if it goes wrong. The pilot doesnt want me constantly chatting in their ear when they need to concentrate.