Newsletter for the Rotary Club of Western Endeavour - Issue No.: 1117 Issue Date: 28 Apr, 2024

This week's meeting was held at the Perth Airport control tower where Geoff Ross introduced us to the latest in air traffic control.

Currently radar is used for monitoring planes within close proximity to the major city airports around the country. Satellite communication is used for monitoring aircraft between cities.

The allowable separation distance between planes is in the order of 15 nautical miles when in controlled air space for commercial planes. This reduces to 3-4 nautical miles when approaching an airport and further reduces when under the control of the tower. Any closer than this and it is considered a near miss. I quote these figures loosely, because CASA's rules are pretty voluminous and would take some hours to digest...So if you want the good oil speak to Geoff or John.

We learned that just about every unit of measurement is used for air navigation. The use of ft for height, and nautical miles or metres and kilometres for distance. So one doesn't have to go to the USA to run into trouble with measurement units.

Most of the air traffic controllers have in the order of 25 to 30 years of experience and there are very few young trained operators. This is only now being addressed and consequently placing quite a strain on the new employees to come up to speed and handle the responsibility in a short time span. Approximately one year of training is required prior to live work at the tower. Minimum requirement is TEE with Physics, Maths and English.

The control tower is quite a buzz at around 5:30am in the morning when all the mining related flights are taking off. When we were watching there was only about 3 planes that came in on the runway. So part of the job description involves maintaining concentration during those times when not a lot is happening and waking up to the task when it is.

Thanks to Geoff and John Boxall for an interesting night out. Jane provided some wonderful food to keep the wolves away. The wine was well appreciated as well.

So now the real question is...with today's cam-media, satellite and radar communication systems...How long will the tower be the tower?...and... Is there someone really in the tower?