An investigation is underway after a child was heard giving instructions to a pilot from the air-traffic control tower at one of America's busiest airports.While I doubt any aircraft were in danger, it's still a remarkable breach of procedures to allow anyone on the air who is not trained to give air traffic control instructions. You have to wonder what these people were thinking?
In a recording that has been confirmed as genuine by the Federal Aviation Administration, the child makes five transmissions from John F Kennedy International Airport — with the pilots in each case all responding enthusiastically to him.
One conversation between the tower at JFK Airport in New York and a pilot goes as follows:
JFK TOWER: Jet Blue 171 contact departure.
PILOT: Over to departure jet blue 171, awesome job.
The child appears to be supervised, with a controller explaining the reason for the young voice to the pilot.
JFK TOWER: That's what you get guys when the kids are out of school. (laugh)
The airport is the sixth busiest in the country with thousands of planes taking off and landing every day.
The control tower is a highly secure area and the FAA says only licensed controllers are supposed to communicate with planes.
"I have never ever heard a small kid in the tower giving instructions for an airplane to take off or cross a runway or any kind of instructions," Jim Baker, a retired chief pilot at Delta airlines, told MyFoxBoston.
"Pending the outcome of our investigation, the employees involved in this incident are not controlling air traffic, the FAA said in a statement. "This behavior is not acceptable and does not demonstrate the kind of professionalism expected from all FAA employees."
Wednesday, March 03, 2010
It Must Have Been "Take Your Child to the Control Tower Day"
How else do you explain this?
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1 comment:
When I heard this story my first thought was as you say, what WERE these people thinking?? Bad judgement. And at a well-known airport at one end of the state who just recognized a horrible human error one year anniversary crash at the other end of the state. People don't seem to think beyond their nose.
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