Tower tour round 2

My dad and I had quite a bit of discussion leading up to the tower tour about the first tower tour I went on, now more than half my life ago (yikes!). A lot has happened since then and it was kind of fun to review. The tower tour was really a turning point. While I mentioned it in my previous entry, it’s probably hard to calculate just how important it was.

I had ‘liked’ airplanes since I was a little kid. I used to ride my bike to the airport when I was growing up. At the time, we lived about 10 miles away, so that was quite a ride. There was a parking lot where I could go to at the approach end of the runway that was perfect for watching the landing airplanes and the start of the takeoff roll for the departures. I often sat there for quite a long time watching planes come and go.

During the very earliest of my years there, the guard had F106’s. When they traded those in for F4’s I thought that was pretty cool. In fact, I still do. In some respects, I enjoyed watching the F4’s more than the F16s that replaced them when I was in high school (or so). I didn’t pay a whole lot of attention to the airliners and in retrospect I wish I had. But the fighters were just cool, so that’s what I liked to watch.

When we’d go on vacations, my dad would usually encourage me to sit by the window and he’d talk about some of the things the airplane was doing while we flew along. Though he never flew airliners, he did get his private pilot certificate before I was born (actually, my mom did, too). So he knew what all those sticky uppy and downy things were all over the wings (flaps, ailerons, spoilers, slats, etc.).

I had never really seriously thought about flying, though, until that tour of the tower. He recalled asking me that day after we visited the tracon (terminal radar control) if I thought I’d like to do that. I said I’d rather fly the planes. Even then, I was thinking just for fun, but the bug had bit me. The career idea came very shortly thereafter and was perfectly timed with my ruling out of every music school I looked into for one reason or another.

Hendrick, unlike me, has already figured out what he wants to do (fly for Lufthansa). He is spending this year here on a foreign exchange program from Germany and is doing very well in our American schools. At this point, I’ll resist the temptation to elaborate much more than that. 😉

We (my mom, dad, and I) picked him up and went to lunch. At lunch, we talked quite a bit about the lifestyle part of being an airline pilot. He asked questions about how long the trips were, how we are paid, and so on. I told him a little bit about the various airplanes I had flown.

Then we went to the tower and met up with our tour guide, Joe Troph. His title is “Front Line Manager” and he has been at the Fresno ATC facility for something like 17 years. Jan and his wife Tanya joined us for the tour. The compliment was thus: my dad (inactive private pilot), my mom (inactive private pilot), Hendrick (wants to be a pilot), Jan (freshly minted and active private pilot), Tanya (doesn’t have the bug yet), and me (active airline pilot). It should go without saying that most air traffic controllers dig airplanes, too.

We started out by going up to the cab. It’s definitely the best view at the airport. Joe explained the positions (Local = Tower, and ground / clearance) and we got to listen in on the speaker a bit. He also showed us a little bit about the radar which is at each station.

While we were up there, a flight of 4 F16’s got clearances so he said we should stay up there to watch them takeoff. In the mean time, we watched several other airplanes come and go. There were general aviation airplanes, including a Malibu (which I’ve flown before). There were some helicopters (both civilian and guard). And there were several airliners, including Brasilias (flew it), a Canadair Regional Jet (flew it), an A320 and an MD-88. Each of them presented an opportunity to share a story or two with Hendrick (and the rest of the gang).

Of course, in what seemed like a flashback to my youth, the grand finale was the departure of the 4 F16’s. As fun as all the other stuff was, it was still ‘extra’ cool to watch those guys light the afterburners and tear off like a bunch of manic 8 year-olds after a six pack of jolt cola. We watched as the last guy’s tag popped up on the radar. By the time he first appeared, he was already doing 320 knots just past the departure end of the runway. Cool stuff…

The next stop on the tour was the tracon (Terminal Radar Control). There is an extra scope at one end of the room and Joe sat down in front of it and showed us a whole bunch of neat stuff about it. I remember doing that on the first tour, but I didn’t know a whole lot about flying at that point. Now, I understood quite a bit about what was going on and had a whole new perspective on their operation.

We spent quite a bit of time in the radar room and I enjoyed my time there. But again, just like 16 or so, I concluded I wouldn’t want to do that job for a whole career. Rotating through the tower would be more fun, but I think I chose wisely. Of course, there are definite differences between a career in ATC and a career flying. Controllers are home every night (or day, as the case may be). While they may have some work related risks (driving to work more often?), they don’t have all the health and other risks that come from flying. But I’m glad I took the changing scenery and free tour of the world over a dark room staring at a scope.

And it sounds like Hendrick continues to head in that direction, too. After the tour, we decided to keep him (originally we had planned to take him back to Marshall’s house). There was a Reasons To Believe meeting later in the evening (more on that in a separate entry), and he was interested in going to that.

Before dinner, we spent about an hour going through some math oriented things that were really somewhat advanced (as flying goes), but enabled us both to determine that he could handle the job with no difficulties at all. At some point, if he continues to be interested and we have another opportunity, I’d love to teach him some of the things Ralph (my pilot turned high school teacher) taught me on flight simulator. I think it’d be good for him and fun for me.

V-