August 2, 1998 "Keep It in Tight, Cherokee — Put It Down on the Green Dot"

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by	Rick Durden

About the Author ... Rick Durden is a practicing aviation attorney who holds an ATP Certificate, with a type rating in the Cessna Citation, and Commercial privileges for gliders, free balloons and single-engine seaplanes. He is also an instrument and multi-engine flight instructor. Rick started flying when he was fifteen and became a flight instructor during his freshman year of college. He did a little of everything in aviation to help pay for college and law school including flight instruction, aerial application, and hauling freight. In the process of trying to fly every old and interesting airplane he could, Rick has accumulated over 5,400 hours of flying time. In his law practice, Rick regularly represents pilots, fixed base operators, overhaulers, and manufacturers. Prior to starting his private practice, he was an attorney for Cessna in Wichita for seven years. He is a regular contributor to Aviation Consumer and AOPA Pilot and teaches aerobatics in a 7KCAB Citabria in his spare time. Rick makes it clear he is part owner of a corporation which owns a Piper Aztec — because, having flown virtually every type of piston-engine airplane Cessna manufactured from 1933 on, as well as all the turboprops and some of the jets, he cannot bring himself to admit to actually owning a Piper.

You have heard them in your headphones or on the scanner or on AVweb's live RealAudio feed. Those men and women who work with pilots to funnel more airplanes into Wittman Regional Airport at Oshkosh, Wisconsin for EAA's AirVenture than fly into any other airport in the world at any time are a fascinating set of human beings there up in the tower, in the eye of the tiger. They do an incredible job of sorting out the most diverse mix of airplanes found at any airport, anywhere, anytime, and do so with remarkable good humor.

If you have ever heard the controllers at EAA Oshkosh you know that they manage to coordinate the arrivals and departures of two to three airplanes per minute, airplanes, for the most part, being flown by pilots who fly for pleasure, not for a living. The controllers work with the men and women in the airplanes, a few seconds for each airplane, to create an atmosphere of teamwork and trust in an environment rife with potential risk. They coax and cajole the overly cautious pilot to fly down the runway two thousand feet before touching down to allow another airplane to land behind him, they sort out the pilot who gets left and right confused and they seem to rapidly evaluate the ability of a pilot and issue a clearance to that pilot which will not exceed his ability to handle. They do this day in and out for the entire AirVenture. They praise and prod, they offer compliments to pilots who do a good job, and many do, and they deal firmly but politely with the guys who do remarkably boneheaded things. This is not New York Center.

Preparation

It all starts to come together for the controllers for the annual EAA convention in October of each year. Within the Great Lakes region, bids are put out by controllers who want to work the AirVenture. In November supervisors at the individual tower facilities look at the qualifications of the bidders, the seniority of the bidders and make recommendations as to whom from their tower should be given a recommendation to go play in the biggest league of all, Oshkosh during the convention. "Put me in, Coach, I'm ready."

The next step is for the individual facility managers to look at how many controllers they can release to OSH without using overtime for the remaining controllers. This tends to be the limiting factor.

Last year there were 168 bidders. Twelve teams of four controllers were formed around the first of this year, so 48 got the phone call with the "you made it, kid." In a nutshell, allowing for some controllers who did not get selected because of staffing needs at home towers, EAA AirVenture Oshkosh gets the best of the best controllers. It shows.

How It Works

Arthur Hilmer, working ATC quality control at OSH and ordinarily of the Milwaukee control tower spent some time talking to AVweb and explained that the folks who get to come to OSH and deal with the challenges of the frenzy which ensues are a mix of veterans, "limiteds" or those with one previous visit to OSH and rookies. There are six Ops supervisors and an additional nine controllers at the temporary control tower at Fond Du Lac. Appleton controllers continue to handle the influx on their own, generally, but one of the normal OSH controllers goes up to help out. The behind the scenes administration work involved with setting up the tower and mobile towers for EAA is handled by personnel from Milwaukee and Green Bay.

Oshkosh tower is a contract tower, with non-FAA controllers, who, however, go through the same training as FAA controllers, so they stay on the job and fill in along with the controllers from other facilities.

Each team of four controllers will work each possible spot at least once during the convention. This means the mobile unit outside the town of Fisk, Wisconsin, handling the Ripon arrival. At Oshkosh it is north local, south local, ground, clearance, fly-by and itinerant. Fly-by and itinerant operate out of mobile control towers, affectionately referred to as Moo Cows. They position as needed to handle the fly-by circuit on runway 18-36 and departures on 9-27. After the airshow when there is a mass of departures the fly-by tower repositions and handles departures on 18-36. The folks in the control tower on the local frequencies, the folks we call "tower" on the radio, usually handle only arrivals. The controllers in the mobile towers also wear radios they can use to talk directly with the controllers in the tower.

As one who suffered a four hour delay trying to get an instrument clearance out of OSH in 1982, the addition of a position to the tower for a controller from Chicago Center to coordinate instrument departures is a stroke of genius.

Who's The Boss?

The person who is responsible for managing these teams of superior controllers is William Kribble. He talked with AVweb about the entire process and was good enough to let us spend time in the tower cab watching these folks in action. He explained that the teams start working together right after the first of the year. Decisions are made as to whom is to be on the mike when. For each four person team, one person is on the mike while the other three act as spotters. To see it in action is to see a well-choreographed dance. Men and women apply body English as they ask a "twin on downwind" to lose altitude and start the base leg right now. Mr. Kribble commented that the controllers have discussed how they are going to work their positions and that the positive comments and compliments from the controllers is conscious. They recognize it creates a better environment for everyone. The happy family metaphor is too trite to describe the situation, it is more a matter of dedicated professionals in the tower working with dedicated, devoted pilots in a way to bring out the best in both groups of people. It seems to work. The controllers were able to count the incidents thus far, on the fingers of one hand. Two ground loops, one Cherokee who landed downwind and one guy who landed what he called an "ultralight," (which was the size of a Cherokee 140) on runway 27 rather than the ultralight runway, after ignoring virtually everyone. When the FAA and EAA talked to him it turned out he had no pilot's certificate, no driver's license, he had built the airplane but had no paperwork on it an simply kept repeating, "it's an ultralight." It left on a truck.

Such few incidents are not enough to affect the positive atmosphere in the tower cab. The local controller is talking to the arrivals as three spotters assist discreetly. A call is made to a Siai Marchetti to drop its gear. One spots a Mooney on a long final to 27 and the others double check to see if it is an instrument arrival. It isn't so a call goes to the Mooney to find out just where it came from. A couple of radio calls allow the Mooney to be sequenced onto the runway. The atmosphere is low key and positive. There is some quiet banter between some controllers who are experiencing a temporary lull. The Center controller is in the corner working to get some IFR departures out without a delay.

The controllers have an interesting sense of humor, a Ronald Reagan mask lies on a window sill.

The Ford Trimotor gives rides off of runway 36, starting its takeoff roll well north of midfield, yet each time it lifts off and turns east, well away from the arrivals on runway 27. This has been worked out in advance, his presence is a matter of course. He is not taken for granted, despite the dozens of flights each day, if he wanders off course the controllers will take action.

A twin curves around the terminal toward runway 27, setting up perfectly for the green dot painted on the runway as an aiming point. An orange dot is about 1500 feet away, providing another such point so two airplanes can arrive simultaneously. Behind the twin, five yellow homebuilts in formation are sequenced to an in-trail position for landing. It just keeps going, and going smoothly. From time to time a pilot messes something up, yet while some remarks are made by the spotters, no critical remark escapes the controller with the mike. Yep, they do talk about you if you mess up, but, a moment later they are concentrating on something and someone else.

Just before I left I noticed the light signal gun hanging from the ceiling. It was covered with dust, but it was still within easy reach should anyone need it.

As a twin smoothly turns final, two spotters take a brief moment to watch in appreciation and one comments, "that guy knows what he is doing." True enough. By the same token exactly the same comments are being made in dozens of airplanes about the women and men up in that cab.