USA Air Traffic Controllers - Still safe to travel to the USA?

[p--and--t]

A bit off topic, but will Renato also no longer fly with those major airlines that allegedly use pilots with only 200 hours of simulator experience and never been tested in a true emergency situation?

Getting in to an aeroplane places your life in the hands of hundreds of different people. Risk is risk. Each person makes their own choice on their own experiences, biases and exposure to information (notice I didn't say FACTS)

 

[opusman]

DrRon - anyone who reads your posts here know that you are one of the sharpest and most focused minds around

Now I'm convinced this whole thread was one big troll.

 

[drron]

Now I'm convinced this whole thread was one big troll.

Now that's not nice.

 

[kookaburra75]

Journalism is becoming ever so partisan, I just don't know what to believe any more. Even today, reading a Washington Post puff piece (re posted in The Age) examining Trumps' propensity to pardon people. My first question was how many did Obama and George W Bush pardon in their tenure, and how did they choose to pardon people? But that is simply not addressed, I would have though an obvious question, which led me to conclude the article was more anti-trump propaganda, in the way Carson Tucker's usual stories seem to be anti-liberal propaganda.

I think that is a good point (even if we have drifted off the original thread - plus I had run out of popcorn anyway), in that you have to get a spread of media to get a grasp of the whole picture. After all, commercial media is just there to keep you engaged between the ads. If the papers didn't put up click-bait headlines, or Fox/Sunday/60 Minutes/Sky etc didn't draw viewers or listeners through lurid trailers, they would be off the air as they don't draw in the advertising revenue. That's why you get teams of bloggers pumping up various media outlets and threads in social media - to feed the ad money machine.

 

[Renato1]

Hi again Everyone,

Here is the third instalment Tucker Carlson Tonight has made on the FAA biographical data selection criteria. He interviews a Congressman Frank Lobiondo who chairs the House Sub-Committee on Aviation.

The main points I took from it were,
a. The Congressman thanks Fox News for having raised the matter both in the past and now, and encourages Fox News to keep doing so
b. The Congressman appears to agree with eveything previously reported by Carlson.
c. The Congessman does note that useless people selected via the new process do get subsequently weeded out (though the issue of the people excluded from selection, in favour of those useless people, was not directly addressed).
d. And that prior to Congress stepping on on the matter, the FAA was excluding Military Air Traffic Contollers from the process of becoming Civilian Air Traffic Controllers via use of the biographical data.

Question for the "Fox News is Sh#t/right wing garbage" brigade - Are you of the opinion that the Congressional House Sub-Committee on Aviation is also "Sh#t/right wing garbage"?

Question for the "Starbucks employee may be a better ATC than an ex-pilot" brigade - Are you of the opinion that the Starbucks employee may be a better ATC than a former Military ATC?
Regards,
Renato

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Hi again Everyone,

Here is the third instalment Tucker Carlson Tonight has made on the FAA biographical data selection criteria. He interviews a Congressman Frank Lobiondo who chairs the House Sub-Committee on Aviation.

The main points I took from it were,
a. The Congressman thanks Fox News for having raised the matter both in the past and now, and encourages Fox News to keep doing so
b. The Congressman appears to agree with eveything previously reported by Carlson.
c. The Congessman does note that useless people selected via the new process do get subsequently weeded out (though the issue of the people excluded from selection, in favour of those useless people, was not directly addressed).
d. And that prior to Congress stepping on on the matter, the FAA was excluding Military Air Traffic Contollers from the process of becoming Civilian Air Traffic Controllers via use of the biographical data.

Question for the "Fox News is Sh#t/right wing garbage" brigade - Are you of the opinion that the Congressional House Sub-Committee on Aviation is also "Sh#t/right wing garbage"?

Question for the "Starbucks employee may be a better ATC than an ex-pilot" brigade - Are you of the opinion that the Starbucks employee may be a better ATC than a former Military ATC?
Regards,
Renato

To a. and b. - the congressman is a Republican. In that context his support for Fox is expected, and little weight can be placed on it.
c. is the crux of the issue. Those not able to perform the role are not progressed to doing the job of air traffic controller. I disagree with the use of the term 'useless people'.
d. I'm not sure what your point is. Those currently performing the role are doing so in a manner which is facilitating safe transportation. Whether the person conducting that is ex military or ex Starbucks is irrelevant. If you disagree on the concept of diversity, that is a completely different matter. But if every air traffic controller is trained to the same standard, it doesn't matter where they came from.

 

[drron]

To a. and b. - the congressman is a Republican. In that context his support for Fox is expected, and little weight can be placed on it.
c. is the crux of the issue. Those not able to perform the role are not progressed to doing the job of air traffic controller. I disagree with the use of the term 'useless people'.
d. I'm not sure what your point is. Those currently performing the role are doing so in a manner which is facilitating safe transportation. Whether the person conducting that is ex military or ex Starbucks is irrelevant. If you disagree on the concept of diversity, that is a completely different matter. But if every air traffic controller is trained to the same standard, it doesn't matter where they came from.

Not all Republican congressmen or senators support fox News.There are many who dont support Trump.Not nearly as simple as you seem to think.
And according to the congressman some "useless"people did get appointed and weeded out.Probably why the selection process was changed again in 2016.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Not all Republican congressmen or senators support fox News.There are many who dont support Trump.Not nearly as simple as you seem to think.
And according to the congressman some "useless"people did get appointed and weeded out.Probably why the selection process was changed again in 2016.

I've watched it twice now but I can't find the term 'useless' being used. Was this in another clip somewhere?

I'm sure there will be Republicans that don't support Fox. But i can't remember ever seeing one on air on Fox!

 

[harvyk]

Only problem is - the American Thinker article that I linked to and then the Forbes 2016 article that dajop linked to, supports the substance of the Fox News story. Reality doesn't really care whether you think facts are garbage, based solely on your unsupported assertion in relation to who presented those facts.
Regards,
Renato.

You are correct, facts are facts. If a news organisation did not tell the truth they would get into trouble, and there is no such thing as alternative facts. That said the news organisation's have a lot of wiggle room in how they present their facts as news. They don't have to present the full story, they can cherry pick what they want to tell and they can present it in any way they like, including with misleading headlines provided they don't flat out lie.

This isn't a left vs right thing, both sides of the media does this. It's just Fox news is notorious for doing so. Based on that fact alone I do not trust anything that Fox News says, even if they are correct from time to time. So when Fox News says "x" I will ask for additional sources as I know that they may not be telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

 

[TomVexille]

Yes, an ex-Starbucks employee MAY be a better civilian ATC then an ex-military one who will need to be completely retrained into the civilian procedures, and they will have to forget their military training. It certainly wouldn’t surprise me if the FAA finds that it’s easier to train a blank slate than break someone’s habits.

 

[davidj]

Tucker Carlson and Fox 'News'?

I'd want a better source

Yet most people here are happy to quote AUSbt and many commercial 'news' sources that are probably as credible as cough on a bull.

Just saying.

 

[drron]

And I'm guessing most of those who don't trust fox news don't watch fox news.
I also watch CNN and a lot of content there is useless and often wrong.

 

[UP4014]

You are correct, facts are facts. If a news organisation did not tell the truth they would get into trouble, and there is no such thing as alternative fact sources as I know that they may not be telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but tth misleading headlines provided they don't flat out lie.

.

I think that is the point others are making, news organisation don't get into trouble or very little.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

And I'm guessing most of those who don't trust fox news don't watch fox news.
I also watch CNN and a lot of content there is useless and often wrong.

Agree both sides have their issues. But Fox is usually the more unforgiving of alternative views when they have debates or get a panel of experts involved. I spend about a month each year in the states and where i stay there are usually two or three simultaneous feeds during the day, Fox, local news, and CNN. Fox often tries to appeal to a sense of injustice rather than using facts. The whole Obamacare situation was a good example... fox went on for days (months) how extending Obamacare would fill hospitals with people needing treatment. Like they genuinely believed it was a bad thing to treat ‘the poor’.

 

[drron]

Well in my humble opinion it is even rarer for CNN,Fairfax and the ABC to have a contrary opinion.
Recently CNN had a panel of 8 discussing whether Trump had yelled at a gardner.All but 1 thought it was a hispanic gardner and 6 thought it racially motivated despite the fact that it was from an ubsubstantiated puff piece in a newspaper.One person supported Trump.he was a convicted felon.Now why did they use him?Wink,wink say no more.
A little later they had a panel discussing whether Russia was colluding with Roseanne to make her show in Syria.Seriously are these the guys and gals you trust?

 

[harvyk]

I think that is the point others are making, news organisation don't get into trouble or very little.

AFAIK they do get into trouble from time to time. But It's that whole balancing act. Too much government intervention and you have accusations of media censorship. Too little oversight and you have issues with the media getting away with anything.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Seriously are these the guys and gals you trust?

Of course not. But each of those channels has a target audience. For students and specialists in strategy, communications, or public relations, the interesting part is how each of those channels manipulates their audience.

The Fox ATC story is a good example of running a story without any factual evidence that the outcomes of ATC have suffered under the diversity program (outcomes being the safe guiadance of air traffic). Viewers are being asked to pass judgement purely based on a question in an aptitude test.

Sure, an ex pilot may have been refused a job, but has that actually made any difference to ATC? If there is evidence, they should lead it.

The way channels present stories can give an interesting insight to the creation and dissemination of propaganda.

 

[dajop]

c. The Congessman does note that useless people selected via the new process do get subsequently weeded out (though the issue of the people excluded from selection, in favour of those useless people, was not directly addressed).

Does this allay your safety concerns now, that incompetent people don't make it through to actually operating in live scenarios?

cre you of the opinion that the Starbucks employee may be a better ATC than a former Military ATC?[/MEDIA]

Maybe, maybe not. The first question I would want to know ... what caused them to be a "former" military ATC? I know there are plenty of reasons why but if it was ineptitude, or inability to cope with the pressure of the job, then the potential remains for the starbucks employee to be a better option.

 

[drron]

Does this allay your safety concerns now, that incompetent people don't make it through to actually operating in live scenarios?



Maybe, maybe not. The first question I would want to know ... what caused them to be a "former" military ATC? I know there are plenty of reasons why but if it was ineptitude, or inability to cope with the pressure of the job, then the potential remains for the starbucks employee to be a better option.

So the fox news story was correct that there had been a change in selection criteria.
The 2014 decision was criticised at the time-
Critics fear that FAA's new recruitment strategy will not produce adequate air traffic controllers | JDA Journal
There was evidence from the house Aviation subcommittee that in 2016 the selection process was changed.That change involved forcing the FAA to have at least 50% of candidates that had experience or some training in ATC.
FAA ATC Hiring Fast—Selection Criteria & #s for future OK?
As with the 2014 selection process the FAA fell 24% short of it's hiring goals.

So the public should be made aware of these problems IMHO.

 

[dajop]

So the fox news story was correct that there had been a change in selection criteria.
The 2014 decision was criticised at the time-
Critics fear that FAA's new recruitment strategy will not produce adequate air traffic controllers | JDA Journal
There was evidence from the house Aviation subcommittee that in 2016 the selection process was changed.That change involved forcing the FAA to have at least 50% of candidates that had experience or some training in ATC.
FAA ATC Hiring Fast—Selection Criteria & #s for future OK?
As with the 2014 selection process the FAA fell 24% short of it's hiring goals.

So the public should be made aware of these problems IMHO.

Now we're finally getting to the bottom of this! It seems to be "diversity" in the broad sense - bringing in people which think about things differently rather than diversity in the "narrow sense" (sex, colour of your skin). The broader sense of diversity is something that increasingly HR of many organisations are looking at - bringing in people that tackle things differently and think about things differently actually improve team performance. Whether that works or not in ATC setting - I don't know - I don't have the expertise. But the theory is if you just have people from the same background it can easily lead to "groupthink", also seems to be linked to developing "nextgen" controllers, where technology will have a greater role. In other words, the issue is more complicated than a simple cable news rant!

If you look at the start of the second posted Carson Tucker video, this was shamelessly political. It made out this was about Obama administration to force more diversity on the FAA (and in the US context "diversity" is code word for employing more black people and/or women). Plays to prejudices very well. But looking at your linked posts it seems to be more an FAA decision, made based on current HR theory to bring in people with a different backgrounds.

I agree public should be made aware of the problems,. but the fear-mongering and political narrative behind it don't help.