Most unprofessional tower controllers

[Chicken Taco]

KOSU, Ohio State Airport in Columbus. It's a Midwest, Inc. contract tower, adn most of the guys are pretty good, but there's one that toally sucks. For departures he demands on-course heading in degrees, a reply like "northwest" or "north to Delaware County" isn't good enough for him.

Arrivals are even better. A lot of the VFR population is local, so they use landmarks like resivoirs and highway intersecations for arrival reporting to separate traffic. If he calls out a fix and the arrival isn't familiar, he just gets bitchy and repeats himself, won't usually offer an explanation of what he wants. This results in a confused inbound transient who is to worried about finding a waypoint to look for traffic. What a genius..

..CT

 

[Metro752]

He's HARDCORE.

Space Coast Regional has a crazy old guy

 

[SkyBoy1981]

Have to speak for yourself skykiddie... Not everyone has the limits you put on yourself.

Who said anything about me? I've worked air traffic before (mostly on a sim and once in a real non fed tower while an instructor was present)...how about you? It just irritates me to see people complain about something when they sure as hell couldn't do the job any better.

 

[Captain X]

3 hours (or longer) on postion at a time.
Understaffing, greater workload.
CONTROLLERS who don't listen and need everything repeated.

Hmm....seens we share some things in common.

And I have to agree with captjim....lately some of the IAH controllers have simply become outright rude and unprofessional. Particulary the one guy who always sounds like he hates his job and it gets even worse when he is assigned to work Ground.

I understand how the staffing situation can create stress but the second it begans to affect safety ALL of us are obligated to step aside and be relieved by someone else.

 

[PastFastMover]

I've worked air traffic before

Who would have ever guessed.

 

[jbDC9]

Particulary the one guy who always sounds like he hates his job and it gets even worse when he is assigned to work Ground.

I've heard this guy... he's an ass. I heard him chew out a guy, an XJet mechanic doing a re-position, for not monitoring the ground freq. The mech doesn't do this every day, so he called for taxi clearance. No big deal. The controller really took it too far... then I hear an anonymous "Lighten up dude!" from another a/c. The controller let it go after that. He once corrected me several times, sounding kinda snotty, for not using his exact words on a readback. A real class act... not.

 

[ISaidRightTurns]

Hmm....seens we share some things in common.

Controllers and pilots? Is that the parallel that is being drawn?
3 hours on a scope is not 3 hours in a plane.
Introduce WX and scheduling pressure, maybe a fraction of a controller.

I understand how the staffing situation can create stress but the second it begans to affect safety ALL of us are obligated to step aside and be relieved by someone else.

Come see me try to run a/c outta a holding pattern after doing it for 3 hours.

 

[Captain X]

Controllers and pilots? Is that the parallel that is being drawn?
3 hours on a scope is not 3 hours in a plane.
Introduce WX and scheduling pressure, maybe a fraction of a controller.

Come see me try to run a/c outta a holding pattern after doing it for 3 hours.

There's a saying that goes...."If you can't take the heat....."

 

[ISaidRightTurns]

Please. You haven't the faintest idea.

 

[Flying Illini]

Has this seriously turned into a "my job is harder than your job" discussion?
My opinion, the guy flying IFR on the east coast has a harder job than the guy working the class D tower in bufu IL. Vice versa, the controller working somewhere on the east coast has it harder than some pilot going for the hundred dollar hamburger on a beautiful day.

Both are jobs that require high levels of concentration and training. Both jobs need to be conducted professionally at all times. Has ATC been unprofessional before? Yes. Have pilots been unprofessional before? Yes. Keep in mind, maybe the other person is having a bad day. On the other hand, there are those (on both sides of the radio) who are just a pain in the arse because they don't enjoy their job. It's a fact of any job. And everybody's job is more pleasant when the other people you talk to are pleasant. We don't have to like each other but we do have to work together.