Damn Good Controller

The full url is:
Code: 
http://www.natca.org/ULWSiteResources/natcaweb/Resources/media/ArchieLeague2013Audio/CentralT75.wav
 
bbchien said:
1800 lbs in a Hornet? My X.O. will be calling you shortly....
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Help me out here- he had to climb to ten because of URL consumption at lower, right?
 
This is a condensed, edited version of what happened. Yes, the controlled did a great job.

I'd be buying him prime rib along with Chivas Regal. :lol:
 
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I don't know how the pilot got himself into that situation but I will say he also did a good job of staying cool and communicated very clearly and professionally.
 
Kelvin said:
I would bventure to guess there is minimal and then there is optimal...

You pick. :hairraise:
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:lol:


I would prefer something other than 100' agl! There was a British pilot that ejected -15' under the sea!

But, I would not pick 10,000' over a residential area. :no:

IMHO, listening to the incident, he grabbed altitude to collect his thoughts on the way to KSTL.
 
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Certainly the feel-good story of the day. You have to love controllers like that.
 
I had thought that all ejection seats were 0/0 now...thought that was the norm since the 70s at least?

Some info on Martin Baker and Ejection seat wikis but no dates on 0/0.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ejection_seat

The minimal ejection altitude for ACES II seat in inverted flight is about 140 feet (43 m) above ground level at 150 KIAS. While the Russian counterpart - K-36DM has the minimal ejection altitude from inverted flight of 100 feet (30 m) AGL. When an aircraft is equipped with the Zvezda K-36DM ejection seat and the pilot is wearing the КО-15 protective gear, he is able to eject at airspeeds from 0 to 1,400 kilometres per hour (870 mph) and altitudes of 0 to 25 km (16 mi or about 82,000 ft). The K-36DM ejection seat features drag chutes and a small shield that rises between the pilot's legs to deflect air around the pilot.[11]

Pilots have successfully ejected from underwater in a handful of instances, after being forced to ditch in water. Documented evidence exists that pilots of the US and Indian Navies have performed this feat. [12][13]

Zero-zero ejection seat

A zero-zero ejection seat is designed to safely extract upward and land its occupant from a grounded stationary position (i.e., zero altitude and zero airspeed), specifically from aircraft cockpits. The zero-zero capability was developed to help aircrews escape upward from unrecoverable emergencies during low-altitude and/or low-speed flight, as well as ground mishaps. Before this capability, ejections could only be performed above minimum altitudes and airspeeds.

Zero-zero technology uses small rockets to propel the seat upward to an adequate altitude and a small explosive charge to open the parachute canopy quickly for a successful parachute descent, so that proper deployment of the parachute no longer relies on airspeed and altitude.
 
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AdamZ said:
Oh didn't realize it was military. I looked for the call sign "empire" and found a cargo airline. Why would a military aircraft no be able to get a VORTAC?
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I also thought it was Empire Airlines, a company who flies contract freight for companies like FedEx. I was wondering why he couldn't use a VORTAC, makes sense now. :mad2:
 
Geico266 said:
:lol:


I would prefer something other than 100' agl! There was a British pilot that ejected -15' under the sea!

But, I would not pick 10,000' over a residential area. :no:

IMHO, listening to the incident, he grabbed altitude to collect his thoughts on the way to KSTL.
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But how much extra fuel would you burn going from 3,000 to 10,000? Unless it was a last ditch attempt to increase his gliding distance?
 
Lambert has a TACAN approach to 30L. The chart shows both the freq for the VORTAC and the TACAN channel. The approach is good down to 500AGL (and the ceiling was 800 from the tape).

Lambert has a lot of military stuff because it was where the old McD plant that did the F15 and F18 was located. I interviewed there when I graduated from college back in 1981 (ended up at Martin out in Denver however).
 
"Empire" is a VFA-106 (Gladiators) Super Hornet call sign. The legacy guys use "Roman." Yes, they have 0/0 ejection seats.

Interesting quasi ASR approach while using the minimums for the ILS RWY 30L. Gutsy, but that's what you do when it's hitting the fan. I'd say we averaged at least one emergency fuel per month at NBC with Hornets. Maybe more.
 
Good thing sequestration hadn't gotten that controller!

Thanks for posting this. We don't hear much about the good things the government employees are contributing and it is nice to see this. It wasn't in the news in the Memphis area that I saw.
 
Re the climb to 10000', look up bingo fuel procedures, e.g. this paper. As I understand it, it generally begins with a zoom climb to some predetermined altitude which depends on the aircraft weight and distance to the diversion field.
 
AdamZ said:
There is a pilot out there who wants to buy this controller a beer or 10
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A bit of instruction on NAVAIDs would be more useful. The controller should have provided the TACAN channel for the approach, not the VOR frequency. The pilot should have asked for it when it wasn't provided. A TACAN receiver works just fine for a TACAN approach based on a VORTAC.
 
roncachamp said:
A bit of instruction on NAVAIDs would be more useful. The controller should have provided the TACAN channel for the approach, not the VOR frequency. The pilot should have asked for it when it wasn't provided. A TACAN receiver works just fine for a TACAN approach based on a VORTAC.
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Having zero military aviation experience,..... I learned this from playing Falcon 3.0 & DCS A10C :yes:.
God I miss playing those sims!
 
This may have been a case where the pilot was busy ****ing himself with the emergency at hand and additional cycles to ask for the TACAN channel were too much to ask.
 
I'm just glad he made it on the ground. None of the alternatives were good. Besides, those are MY tax $$ if he crashes it. :mad::lol:

I sure hope the fuel at KSTL was cheaper than his original airport. ;)
 
bbchien said:
No. 10K is the punchout altitude.
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No he climbed for the bingo profile. No minimum altitude on the NACES, at least in normal controlled level-ish flight. a 1.8 in any Hornet is no place to be when you aren't breaking out. This is a good example of why we need a civilian ILS, since it's a TACAN only unless the field has PAR or ASR.
 
nddons said:
But how much extra fuel would you burn going from 3,000 to 10,000? Unless it was a last ditch attempt to increase his gliding distance?
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You burn all the gas in the climb, pretty much level, and then start an idle descent. Granted those emergency bingo numbers are designed to get you ON DECK with 1500 lbs, which obviously wasn't going to be the case with this guy at a 1.8
 
Velocity173 said:
"Empire" is a VFA-106 (Gladiators) Super Hornet call sign. The legacy guys use "Roman." Yes, they have 0/0 ejection seats.

Interesting quasi ASR approach while using the minimums for the ILS RWY 30L. Gutsy, but that's what you do when it's hitting the fan. I'd say we averaged at least one emergency fuel per month at NBC with Hornets. Maybe more.
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-106 uses "Roman" for both SH and Legacy now. Empire is an old callsign that isn't used anymore.
 
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airheadpenguin said:
This may have been a case where the pilot was busy ****ing himself with the emergency at hand and additional cycles to ask for the TACAN channel were too much to ask.
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Asking for the TACAN channel would have taken about as long as saying unable VOR.
 
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