Flyover Country

Came across an article today about a cell tower built too high near the end of a runway.  This is a big deal, especially when the obstruction isn’t lit.  Radio towers might seem unsightly from the ground, but they’re fairly small in terms of being able to see them from the air.  Even moreso at night.  The tower in question was built too high, so the light installed was activated so that pilots wouldn’t run into the damn thing and kill themselves trying to land.  Apparently there are some real idiots who want the cell service, but don’t understand what it means to have an obstruction that cannot be seen.

The FAA offered an alternative – paint the tower orange and white.

The FAA would prefer a flashing white strobe during the day and red beacon at night, but a possible alternative would be to paint the tower bright orange and white in 8-foot stripes from top to bottom, Papenfuss said. He asked the FAA to wait on its recommendation until town planners state their preference. His preference was clear: “You don’t want that god-awful orange and white paint you see for miles.”

Actually, dumbass, yes you do.  An airplane traveling at 200mph covers 2 miles in about 30 seconds.  That isn’t much time to see the obstruction while busy preparing to land, and avoid it.  Apparently some residents objected to the tower being lit, and after just a day or so complained, referring to it as a “tower of terror” – because of the light.

The article then takes a very SimCity like turn, with these gems:

“I’m totally confused. … I’m moving.”

“It really smells as far as I’m concerned”

the light is “pretty bad. You could get sunburn from it.”

“My house is lit up like a disco. I am inflicted with ocular migraines. … You need to drop their cell tower to where there’s no light, or tear it down.”

This is the type of nonsense you get from an uninformed citizenry crying NIMBY!

Dear Mr. President:

Please stay the hell away from Columbus. Especially when we’re trying to train and prepare for a real disaster. You knew we were running an all-day exercise that hard-working folks have been planning for over a year. You knew your visit would mean sucking away resources from our exercise and leaving us short-handed on first responders. You gave us barely two days notice (based on the publication of the initial TFR), and wanted us to cancel our plans – for you.

I don’t think you give a sh*t. We’re just flyover country. We’re mostly just typical white people who cling to our God and our guns, and what we’re doing doesn’t really matter. You’re the king, and if you want to come to give a 10 minute speech on the one day we need you to not be here screwing things up, we’ll just have to suffer. You have no respect for the American people, let alone the good citizens of Columbus.

How many of our first responders were not able to participate because you had to come to town? They had to line your parade route to make sure they were available if anything happened to YOU. It is always about YOU. How many of our firefighters and police missed out on valuable, irreplaceable training? How much less prepared are we now, and how much benefit in emergency services have the tax payers of central Ohio lost because of you?

Let me be clear Mr. President. This wasn’t some little mom-and-pop operation in a rural firehouse in the sticks. We’re a major city, and this involved the entire Columbus metro area, including a major airport, 9 major local hospitals, and more fire-rescue departments than I can count. Two hospitals bailed at the last minute – one because you were going to be in their way. Many agencies were only able to send EMTs. There were only a couple of fire trucks and almost no police. Does that make sense in a major disaster? Of course not. Because I suspect they were all pulled off the exercise to come babysit you for your 58 minutes on the ground here in town.

You couldn’t pick another day on YOUR busy schedule. You just had to fly in, spend 10 whole minutes talking about jobs – while the workers on the site you chose for your theatre had to go home without pay. Your 10 minutes pretty much ruined months and months of careful planning and coordination from multiple agencies, and a whole day for all of the unpaid volunteers. Go back to Washington and stay the hell out of my city.

Sincerely,
Me

Update: Found a CBS article saying the 10 minute speech cost the tax payers somewhere between $500,000 and $1,000,000. Salt in the wound.

I’m always suspicious of people who have things to say to the media, claim to be “aviation [security] experts” and who work(ed) for the TSA.  Employment by the aforementioned agency certainly does not automatically grant “expert” status.

The simple fact is this: Sometimes there’s nothing you can do. Once in a while, lone maniacs decide to kill as many people as they can. All the name checks and technology in the world couldn’t have kept Stack from flying his plane into the IRS building. But perhaps this tragedy will cause the TSA to reconsider its ill-conceived plan to roll back general aviation security. (Boston Herald)

What we’re saying is that nothing would have stopped this guy, but we should use this as an excuse to burden GA with draconian security theatre measures anyway?

The columnist is right.  Very little, if anything could have stopped this maniac.  However, @NYCAviation made a very insightful statement

Hey Joe Stack! Having money problems? $10k money hole? MAYBE YOU SHOULD HAVE SOLD YOUR 6-FIGURE AIRPLANE!

Stack smashed the Piper he owned into a building in downtown Austin, killing himself and one other who was in the building at the time.  The 90 second ATC tape (Stack is identified as “Dakota” or “8-9-Delta”) is completely routine chatter.  Chilling in retrospect, but no clues that I or the controller on duty could discern as to what Stack was about to do.

In my best impression of how I imagine John Stossel might sum it up: Before we give the TSA more of our tax dollars, more authority over GA, allow them to impose more nonsense on the aviation community and the public at large, they should explain.  Because so-called TSA security “experts” are citing this situation for an expansion of TSA powers, they have the burden to make the case in great detail how having all of these added tools and resources at our expense, financial and otherwise, would have stopped this attack.  The reality is that it would not have.

Recently, Southwest Airlines came under attack from one individual who was asked to take a later flight because of his size and that there weren’t two seats available for him.  It seemed kind of obvious as things unfolded that this quickly turned into, primarily, a publicity stunt by this individual after a situation that maybe could have been handled a little bit better by SWA employees on the scene.  I don’t know, I wasn’t there.  I trust the flight crews to make decisions about safety.

All of that said, I fly Southwest almost exclusively.  I will continue to fly Southwest.  They have the best fares for my money, don’t charge me to bring my clothes with me, and don’t hassle me with exorbitant fees if I need to cancel or change a flight.  Southwest consistently has one of the best on-time records of all the airlines, and one of the best customer satisfaction ratings.  Southwest is consistently recognized for being an outstanding business.  But none of those things are why Southwest is my airline of choice.

I choose Southwest because of their people.  They are one of those rare companies that doesn’t just pretend to treat customers well in tv ads and CEO speeches.  One small example: Recently, I had a 70-80 minute connection layover at MDW on my way home.  As I stepped off the flight inbound to MDW, I noticed that there was an earlier flight leaving for Columbus in about 15 minutes.  I stopped and asked the gate agent if it would be possible to go home early, but that it was no big deal I was already booked on a later flight.  A quick “let me check on that for you” and two minutes later I was heading home.  No change fees, no rebooking charges, no having to buy a new ticket, no sighs of frustration from an overworked airline employee.  Just, “here you go, have a great flight!”  I got home early, and was able to pick up my dog from the kennel that day instead of waiting until the next day. She got home early and I saved a day’s worth of boarding fees.

Southwest didn’t get to be where they are today by treating “normal” people badly.  That is part of what has gotten other airlines into their current mess, and why Southwest is so popular – actually making money while other carriers hemorrhage capital.  There are no “frills” on a Southwest flight, but I’ve never once had a ticket agent, gate agent, F/A or flight deck crew get snippy with me.  They go beyond that, they’re pleasant people to be around.  After playing security theatre games with the TSA, I would rather be stuck on a plane with people who love their jobs, and love their customers.

Thank you, folks of Southwest, for all that you do for us.