Who Says ATC Can’t Be Fun?

In basic training a drill sergeant displayed an M16 rifle and warned, “It’s plastic, but it’s not a toy!” Took some of the fun out of it. Weeks later, after proving myself a crappy shot, we hit the M60 machine gun range where a bull-necked master sergeant with a cigar clamped in his teeth hoisted the belt-fed weapon onto his hip and unleashed a fusillade on rusted deuce-and-a-half’s in a fetid marsh down range. Spent rounds surrounded him and smoke curled from the weapon’s muzzle as he turned to us wide-eyed kids with: “Who wants to play?” Sergeant Willy Wonka had made it fun.

Same applied to air traffic control (ATC) when management wasn’t present. But first let’s clarify terms. I’m often asked if I’d been an “air controller.” No, air controllers kept control towers’ HVAC working so air traffic controllers wouldn’t sweat when fudging FAA-approved separation minima, leading to un-fun investigations. I’ve witnessed a few and decades later still dream about them, but let’s leave that for future group therapy and exam ATC fun stuff with warbirds.

Transferring from Monterey, California’s tower/approach in 1984 to the green acres of Iowa uncorked cultural and professional shock. Des Moines’ airspace (ARSA, now class C) had more airline and freight dog traffic than I’d experienced out West, plus every four years, presidential wannabes swarmed the state in chartered jets seeking pigs to kiss, because of Iowa’s first in the nation caucus status … until someone asked, “What the hell’s a caucus?” and since no one knows, that traffic has diminished. Gentle riddance and back to our story.

Controllers are aerial goatherds who operate under FAA Order 7110.65, but traffic varies widely, leading to creative interpretations. With fog common along the West Coast, controllers snaked Special VFRs (SVFR) through canyons and along Pebble Beach without pranging nearby golfers or mountains. Once in the Midwest, I rarely said, “maintain Special VFR …” but routinely vectored traffic around thunderstorms. I don’t recall lightning over Monterey Bay but spent hours in the Des Moines tower while lightning flashed around the windows as though in a 1931 horror film. I loved it, including when telling a Lear arrival that recent storms had moved through, then—KaFwammo!—lighting struck the tower, blowing my transmitter and prompting the pilot to ask, “You alive down there?”

The military provided the most entertainment with mostly Army helicopters around Monterey and Air National Guard A-7s and F-16s at Des Moines. When transferring to a new facility, a controller trains and certifies much as pilots do when transitioning to unfamiliar aircraft. I struggled learning how to break up flights of four fighters doing 300 knots for individual approaches, especially with multiple flights and all declaring, “minimum fuel.” Eventually, it was routine and fun. Today, the fighters are gone, replaced by drones. Where’s the romance? Controlling vintage civilian warbirds, by contrast, was a giggle, bordering on actionable.  

Disclaimer: I can’t remember callsigns in the following examples.

It was a quiet day in the tower cab when approach handed off what I mistook to be a VFR Navion inbound to land. The post-WWII Navion is an underrated low-wing four-seater that vaguely resembles its North American P-51 progenitor. Not nearly as fast, so I was surprised at the target’s excessive groundspeed. When the pilot called himself “Mustang,” I knew it was a P-51. 

I’d seen gaggles of Mustangs at airshows, but a single warbird headed for my runway (controllers are possessive) was special, so I asked the pilot, “Do you need to, maybe, fly by the tower for a gear check?” After a conspiratorial pause he answered, “Why, I believe I do,” and I said the tower was on his right and “cleared for lowwww approach.” Just then the supervisor entered the tower cab and seeing a Mustang, gear up, making a banana pass by the window, he retreated down the stairs, muttering, “I see nothing …”

For punishment, I was confined to the radar room, wishing I was outside flying or at least upstairs in the tower cab watching others fly, when one day a B-24 pilot called. This WWII four-engine, heavy bomber was VFR cruising through at 3500 feet MSL (2500 feet AGL). I assigned a transponder code and mentioned that he would be passing near the airfield where I kept my airplane. He offered to deviate over it and requested frequency change to CTAF (Common Traffic Advisory Frequency). 

“Approved.”

The bomber approached the little airport, and I watched its altitude readout descend as it entered the traffic pattern for the 2000-foot grass runway. I rolled my chair to the supervisor’s desk, grabbed the phone and called Gary, who lived at the airport. “Look west!” I hissed and hung up. The supervisor—same one who’d seen my P-51 display—regained his suspicious dad expression.

The Liberator descended so low on final its target dropped from radar then reappeared in a getaway climb as the pilot reported, “Think we rattled some windows.” They had, because the supe’s phone rang, and before answering, he asked, “Paul, what did you do?”

The halo glowing atop my head said it all: ATC is not a toy, but it sure can be fun.