Birmingham Controllers Latest To Be Left In The Dark | Aero-News Network
Aero-News Network
RSS icon RSS feed
podcast icon MP3 podcast
Subscribe Aero-News e-mail Newsletter Subscribe

Airborne Unlimited -- Most Recent Daily Episodes

Episode Date

Airborne-Monday

Airborne-Tuesday

Airborne-Wednesday Airborne-Thursday

Airborne-Friday

Airborne On YouTube

Airborne-Unlimited-06.03.24

Airborne-NextGen-06.04.24

Airborne-Unlimited-06.05.24 Airborne-AffordableFlyers-06.06.24

Airborne-Unlimited-05.24.24

Sat, Feb 17, 2007

Birmingham Controllers Latest To Be Left In The Dark

January 17 Radar Outage Delayed Flights More Than Five Hours

Air traffic controllers in Birmingham, AL continue to butt heads with the FAA over the severity of a radar outage last month, that snarled flights for over five hours.

Local NATCA president Scott Pressley told the Birmingham News "safety was definitely compromised" when radar scopes at the Birmingham TRACON went blank at 4:45 pm January 17. The outage, which the paper states also affected the tower at BHM, delayed 15 departing flights and many arrivals.

FAA spokeswoman Kathleen Bergen disputes Pressley's assertions. "Controllers are trained for any contingency," she said. "They do an outstanding job at Birmingham and throughout the system."

"When FAA says that safety wasn't compromised, it trivializes what we do as their traffic controllers," Pressley replied. "And safety was definitely compromised and it was the air traffic controllers and the compliance of the pilots that ensured the safety that day, not the FAA."

Pressley also states there is no true "backup" radar available... because controllers have used that secondary system since the airport's primary radar went down last month. That backup system only covers 50 miles; once the area's two long-range antennas are returned to operation, they will cover a 200-mile radius.

Bergen states Birmingham's primary system will be up and running later this month.

Making matters worse that night, Pressley says, is an apparent discrepancy between backup operations for Birmingham, and Atlanta Center -- which is supposed to "take over our air space and we just run the tower."

"They wouldn't take the air space," Pressley said, speaking of en route controllers, "so we had to continue running that air space without the radar when they could see it perfectly well. The controllers in Atlanta knew how unsafe the situation was and they were trying to help us ... and their managers wouldn't allow them to help us. We kind of had to make up the rules as we went."

Bergen replies the agreement requires Atlanta Center to handle airspace above 7,000 feet in the event of a failure at Birmingham. She says controllers in Alabama are well-versed with nonradar procedures in the area, so "the decision was made that they could implement the nonradar procedures for flights below 7,000 feet. The controllers in Atlanta could not work nonradar at those low altitudes."

A rash of radar system failures affected flights recently in such areas as Southern California, Chicago, and south Florida.

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

Advertisement

More News

ALTO NG Sees Increased Payload

Improvement Brings LSA to Poland, Germany, & Hungary Czech LSA manufacturer Direct Fly has given its low-wing, tricycle geared LSA an upgrade, with a bump to a max takeoff weig>[...]

Airborne 05.30.24: High Time B29 Pilot, KLAL Teams With ACE, CHOPPER COPS

Also: Midnight eVTOL Certification, Falcon 9 Record, Pro Line Fusion, Europa Clipper The warbird community celebrated Mark Novak, Chief Pilot of their B-29 'Doc', and his accomplis>[...]

Classic Aero-TV: Ralph Maloof Revs Up - Innovations For Homebuilt A/C Engines

From 2016 (YouTube Version): A VW Bug Engine Conversion Has Matured Into an Engine for the Airplane Homebuilder… While at EAA AirVenture 2016, ANN News Editor, Tom Patton, v>[...]

NTSB Final Report: Powrachute Pegasus

Large Heavy-Duty Deer Feed Bag Obstructed The Radiator Inlet And Restricted Its Designed Cooling Capability Analysis: Before departing on the local area flight in the experimental >[...]

Mesa Invests in TriFan 600

The Project Looks Promising Enough for Procurement Already, but the Order isn't Firm Yet XTI Aerospace announced that Mesa Airlines has placed an investment-cum-order into their co>[...]

blog comments powered by Disqus



Advertisement

Advertisement

Podcasts

Advertisement

© 2007 - 2024 Web Development & Design by Pauli Systems, LC