WA Radio Scanner Users' Group

Got linked to the clip a while ago, will see if i can find it again:

http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/of ... s-inquiry/

Two young children were allowed to direct air traffic, apparently under adult supervision, at John F. Kennedy International Airport last month, the Federal Aviation Authority said on Wednesday.

An airport supervisor and an air traffic controller have been placed on administrative leave pending the outcome of an investigation into the incidents, the FAA said.

In an incident on February 16, revealed in transmissions broadcast by local media, a boy believed to be 7 years old can be heard directing pilots for departure.

"JetBlue 171 contact departure," he can be heard saying. The pilot replied: "Over to departure JetBlue 171, awesome job."

An adult can be heard telling a pilot: "This is what you guys get when the kids are out of school."

The FAA investigation turned up a second incident on February 17, involving a younger girl. Both were believed to be the children of the tower controller.

The girl spoke to pilots of a JetBlue flight and an American Airlines flight.

"This lapse in judgement not only violated FAA's own policies, but common sense standards for professional conduct. These kinds of distractions are totally unacceptable," FAA administrator Randy Babbitt said in a statement.

All unofficial visits to FAA air traffic control areas including towers and radar rooms will be suspended during the investigation, and a full review of policies and procedures regarding visitors will be made, the FAA said.

Nearly 48 million passengers pass through Kennedy airport annually.
(Reporting by Michelle Nichols and Ellen Wulfhorst in New York and John Crawley in Washington; editing by Todd Eastham)

Found the clip:

http://nafenn.com/New%20KJFK%20Controller.mp3

It wasn't the smartest thing to do, but the media has blown it out of proportion (as usual) - its not like the controller would have put his kid there while he went off and made a coffee!

Sounds like the controller picked a fine time to stop sniffing glue.

robbage wrote:Sounds like the controller picked a fine time to stop sniffing glue.

Flying High??

Crazy. It was all over the news tonight, Ch7 and ABC that I saw. I'm sure it was on the rest.

Cute and stuff, but seriously? That dude no longer has a job, healthcare, income to support his family... Things are a lot tougher in the US than they are here

Bonez wrote:Crazy. It was all over the news tonight, Ch7 and ABC that I saw. I'm sure it was on the rest.

Cute and stuff, but seriously? That dude no longer has a job, healthcare, income to support his family... Things are a lot tougher in the US than they are here

yeah, if i had a dollar for every time i heard a kid on the radio... i would have a few dollars

usually everyone goes "Nawwwwww how cute"... but take the Americans to screw up the fun

usually everyone goes "Nawwwwww how cute"... but take the Americans to screw up the fun

I wouldn't put it down as 'Fun"

written_ficton wrote:

usually everyone goes "Nawwwwww how cute"... but take the Americans to screw up the fun

I wouldn't put it down as 'Fun"

No? Why not?

I can understand it if the controller left the kid there to run the show by himself, but if the controller is still in control, does it *really* matter who's voice it is on the radio providing it can be clearly heard and understood?

I think this is a case of wowserism personally and people looking to be morally outraged just for the sake of it

I think the biggest danger is loss of concentration. Imagine the amount of people - pilots, ground staff, other controllers in the room that would have heard the transmissions and laughed. Immediately what follows would be a loss in concentration briefly. That's enough to cause major harm to other people if somebody presses the wrong button or forgets what it was they were trying to do (eg, landing a plane!)

Zebedee wrote:

written_ficton wrote:

usually everyone goes "Nawwwwww how cute"... but take the Americans to screw up the fun

I wouldn't put it down as 'Fun"

No? Why not?

I can understand it if the controller left the kid there to run the show by himself, but if the controller is still in control, does it *really* matter who's voice it is on the radio providing it can be clearly heard and understood?

I think this is a case of wowserism personally and people looking to be morally outraged just for the sake of it

Your kidding? I struggle to see how any part of this whole episode could be remotely seen as acceptable.

Firstly I would imagine that air traffic controllers would require to give their job 100% concentration. This can not be done with your child present. Even though you would be able to concetrate on your job, there will some of your focus checking up on the child, making sure he is doing the right thing, not touching something he isn't supposed to doing (etc). All of this is distracting you from you primary role. Something could happen during that moment you are not concentrating on the job, you could miss some small vital piece of information

What would happen if the child threw in his own words? What if the child said the wrong thing? Does that really matter? What would happen if an emergency suddenly happened? The child would have to be firstly removed from the control position and possibly from the control tower? Who would look after the child if an emergency happened? All of this is time consuming and an unnecessary distraction?

It is easy and simple to look at this as a once off and say no real harm had been done. The issue is what happens if their was an incident? I'm sure you would be looking at it from a different perspective if their had have been a major incident at this time, regardless of if the child was or was not responsible.

Zebedee wrote:I can understand it if the controller left the kid there to run the show by himself, but if the controller is still in control, does it *really* matter who's voice it is on the radio providing it can be clearly heard and understood?

I think this is a case of wowserism personally and people looking to be morally outraged just for the sake of it

That was my impression listening to the audio. Everything was under control. The pilots thought it was pretty cool. Nobody was running around in circles panicking (or making pterodactyls from weather reports)

The distraction caused by the children wouldn't be much more than that caused if they had something emotional going on with their life. And on the contrary, some people have higher concentration when they're supervising someone else doing their job with their job on the line. But yes, his concentration would most likely have slipped because of the kids. Although I assume his experience and knowledge would have significantly dampened any associated risk. The fact that he did it twice on two separate days nearly a month ago, indicates that the pilots and rest of the ATC seemed OK with it. It appears that only when the FAA heard of it, action was taken.

Most of the article and comments are about the children talking on the radio, rather than them being in the tower itself. Thats a whole different ballgame. As for if the kids saying something wrong, the pilot(s) would probably pick up on it if it was obvious and the qualified father would correct them within moments. Even a fully qualified person makes mistakes. In an emergency, the father would (obviously) take over, and yes there would probably be a few seconds delay.

There was a time when we weren't all so paranoid. When the cockpit doors weren't bulletproof & always locked and you could sit with the pilot crew of a 747 during your international flight. A time where we'd bring out kids to work with us to show us what you do when your away, and let them do a small supervised portion of our work to make them feel like they're really helping. Today, it makes news headlines across the world.

Yes, it was a bad idea with todays society. Yes, he disobeyed the FAA and airlines official policies. But no, he did not endanger any lives, or place any noteworthy risk upon the aeroplanes and occupants. But as stated a few times before me, the qualified controller was still in full control the entire time. He does deserve to be disciplined for disobeying the official policies, but not to the extend of being fired or all this negative media coverage.

observer wrote:Your kidding? I struggle to see how any part of this whole episode could be remotely seen as acceptable.

Firstly I would imagine that air traffic controllers would require to give their job 100% concentration. This can not be done with your child present. Even though you would be able to concetrate on your job, there will some of your focus checking up on the child, making sure he is doing the right thing, not touching something he isn't supposed to doing (etc). All of this is distracting you from you primary role. Something could happen during that moment you are not concentrating on the job, you could miss some small vital piece of information

What would happen if the child threw in his own words? What if the child said the wrong thing? Does that really matter? What would happen if an emergency suddenly happened? The child would have to be firstly removed from the control position and possibly from the control tower? Who would look after the child if an emergency happened? All of this is time consuming and an unnecessary distraction?

It is easy and simple to look at this as a once off and say no real harm had been done. The issue is what happens if their was an incident? I'm sure you would be looking at it from a different perspective if their had have been a major incident at this time, regardless of if the child was or was not responsible.

So, can i ask you a question in relation to your comment:

At the Aero Club, the instructors take young children up for flights where they get to have a look around, and have a feel of the controls, sometimes even speak on the radio.

Are you against this? - same questions as you aked: 1. what if they threw in their own words? 2. what if they said the wrong thing? 3. What if an emergency happened?

1. Who cares, the instructor would jump in and say anything that needed to be said/that was missed.
2. see 1
3. the instructor would take over immediatley and sort everything out

From the recording, you can clearly hear the controller stepping in at times, so he clearly has access to the consol, and is able to transmit at any time. In the event of an emergency, he is already connected to the consol and can communicate with pilots at any time, he would most likely tell the kids to sit there, and shut up.

I probably would have been a bit concerned earlier but as I have not flown for a while and will probably not be flying for a couple of months I'm not going to panic. My initial cause for concern was if I can tell an adult exactly what to say on the radio in 8 words or less and within 5 seconds they're transmitting an essay then what about the kids. However I cast my mind back to a documentry which said kids love playing by rules it's a big thing when you're young if you break the rules in a game etc. so they're actually more likely to transmit exactly what you tell them than an adult would. I'm not particularly keen on having kids directing air traffic (no problems with them up there) but if the ATC lets them do it, then as has been said it is their job on the line.

Nafenn wrote:So, can i ask you a question in relation to your comment:

At the Aero Club, the instructors take young children up for flights where they get to have a look around, and have a feel of the controls, sometimes even speak on the radio.

Are you against this? - same questions as you aked: 1. what if they threw in their own words? 2. what if they said the wrong thing? 3. What if an emergency happened?

1. Who cares, the instructor would jump in and say anything that needed to be said/that was missed.
2. see 1
3. the instructor would take over immediatley and sort everything out

From the recording, you can clearly hear the controller stepping in at times, so he clearly has access to the consol, and is able to transmit at any time. In the event of an emergency, he is already connected to the consol and can communicate with pilots at any time, he would most likely tell the kids to sit there, and shut up.

Naffen. You are now looking at different scenarios. The scenario you have posted is the person in control of the child is responsible for one resource (the plane that they are in only), where as the situation been discussed, the person was resonsible for a far greater number of resources and persons. In the situation you have described, the outcome would be totally different if an accident had occured (in terms of potential damaged and potetional lives at risk), so we are not comparing apples with apples.

If we are going to look at different scenarios I could post plenty of where it isn't acceptable to bring a child to work, where you could post plenty of where it is acceptable. All that it does is muddy the waters. Is it accpetable to have a child to communicate for an air traffic controller over the radio? If so where does it stop? Who can or can not then talk over the radio?