Sequester and the Human Impact

Sequestration Consequences-  Loss of contract tower controllers.

If you are a pilot flying in and around Connecticut you had better brush up on your class E airport operations. With the budget sequestration currently taking hold across our nation every towered airport in the state except for Bradley international will be shuttered.

Bridgeport, Danbury, Groton, Hartford, New Haven and Oxford airports will become class echo full time.  I wasn’t flying when Danbury got our tower, but I do remember when Waterbury Oxford was non-towered and frankly it was a free for all with pilots jockeying into and out of the traffic pattern with all of the politeness of drivers vying for empty parking spots at the mall during the holidays.

Instructing seven days a week for the past three years, I can tell you that most weekdays, nine months of the year, closing every contract tower in CT will have very little impact on VFR operations except for on weekends and at key periods during the day. Sitting at my desk on a nice Friday morning with my handheld tuned into Danbury tower the last two transmissions I have heard were clearing ground vehicles and advising that the ATIS had changed. IFR operations are a different story and I am sure that picking up a clearance, and a release with a void time on the phone or a RCO will be a major inconvenience to anyone trying to leave town when the weather is less than VFR.  

I like the controllers at Oxford and Danbury, which are the airports I work out of regularly. I know their voices, and they know mine. Most are friendly, a few are short tempered, and one in particular is completely burned out, his mood swings matched only by the wide spectrum of aircraft performance and pilot skill levels they have to deal with on a day to day basis.  

Having lost numerous positions to budget cuts in my earlier life I understand how they will feel should they get furloughed. I was a 1099 consultant in the financial services and pharmaceutical industry for the better part of my adult life and know how indiscriminate a budget axe can be. But cutting a consultant never compromised any of these organizations safety a bit. What I find scary is once these facilities close down it isn’t too hard to imagine what type of catastrophic event will be necessary to open them up again.

Call your senators and congressman and let them know how disappointed you are with them for letting this happen. Hell, call everybody you can who will listen and tell them this is a steaming pile of pooh. No one ever got hit by the truck they saw coming, and the knowledge of this has been on the horizon for a long time.

April 1^st is the day these fine people who sequence us in and out of our airports and into the enroute system are due to get laid off. They deserve our support and we need their services.  Call your congressman and senator today. Right now.