Shift Change At the World's Busiest Control Tower

The control tower at Wittman Field in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, becomes the World's Busiest Control Tower for the duration of AirVenture, every year. Chicago O'Hare and Atlanta have nothing on this field for operations. The FAA surges into town with a small army of controllers -- selected from a pool of volunteers.

A taxiway is pressed into service as a parallel runway and aircraft are landed closer together than normal -- pilots are expected to hit a given landing spot.

To an observer who doesn't know how the FAA prepares for AirVenture, it looks mad, chaotic, maybe even unsafe. Numerous extra special measures are taken to make sure things are safe; many of you have seen the special NOTAM the FAA publishes with AirVenture arrival procedures (interesting reading even if you're not going there).

The controllers manage, with considerable sang-froid, to keep any of the aircraft from making contact and reverting to kit form in the air above the field. And in their off time, they can enjoy the show.

You can recognize the controllers around the show grounds by their shocking pink shirts. So if you see one wandering around, you might want to thank him or her for their efforts on behalf of safety -- here and at home.

But if you see a whole bunch of them all together, heading for the tower, it's better not to delay them: it's shift change.

FMI: www.faa.gov, www.airventure.org