Day 8: Better Start the Shower...

...things are about to get dirty! We're ramping up towards the move into the labs. The next few days will see us bouncing back and forth from classroom to labs, so everyone's getting excited.

Today's Lessons

• Block Test #2
• General Control
• Position Relief Briefings
• Ground Control

We started the day off with Block Test #2. I scored a 91% on it. Not bad - I missed three, and one of them was a stupid mistake. Oh well.

General control covered broad subjects like duty priorities, traffic advisories, safety alerts, military operations, and TCAS resolution advisories. It was just a lot of procedural stuff, not really anything specific.

One of the most important things it did cover was the format for reporting traffic alerts. That is absolutely key to success in the Academy airport environment, since you've got two parallel runways with simultaneous aircraft operations.

For instance, let's say you have United 482, a Boeing 767, on a four mile final for 28R and a Beechcraft Baron N30144 turning base for 28L. Your traffic calls would go something like:

• "UNITED 482, ACADEMY TOWER, RUNWAY TWO-EIGHT RIGHT, CLEARED TO LAND. TRAFFIC, BEECHCRAFT BARON AHEAD AND TO YOUR LEFT, ON BASE FOR RUNWAY TWO-EIGHT LEFT."
• Then... "BARON ONE-FOUR-FOUR, ACADEMY TOWER, RUNWAY TWO-EIGHT LEFT, CLEARED TO LAND. TRAFFIC, AHEAD AND TO YOUR RIGHT, BOEING 767 ON FOUR MILE FINAL FOR RUNWAY TWO-EIGHT RIGHT."
  

To put it simply, if there's any chance that two aircraft will become a factor for each other, make the traffic call and make sure they know where they are in relation to each other.

For Position Relief Briefings, we went over the four-step procedure for a controller to relieve another controller. Basically, it's 1) Preview, 2) Verbal Briefing, 3), Assumption of Responsibility and 4) Review the Position. To summarize the entire lesson, do not rush and do not leave anything out. Be clear, concise, patient, and ask/answer questions. Both parties share responsibility, so both need to do it right. There is a checklist for it - USE IT.

Ground Control is looking pretty fun and challenging. Taxi the airplanes, ensure they have the weather, mark the strips with the runway they're heading towards, and - above all else - maintain coordination with Local. That is the whole key to it: coordination. The Academy airport is setup to force you to coordinate, since all of the east/west taxiways cross the diagonal active runway (16/34). I really need to start working hard on the phraseology for it, such as "CROSS RUNWAY 16 AT BRAVO" and "RUNWAY CROSSING COMPLETED". Exciting stuff - at Miami Dade I only worked Local and supervisor, so this will be the first time I touch Ground.

On another note, our instructor kept reporting on another class who was PV-ing. Apparently 5 or 6 out of the 24 failed and had to retake. He said that their instructor was going to come by tomorrow to give us the low-down on what they did wrong.

Plans for the weekend are already in the works. I might go shooting with Kelly, so I picked up a few odds and ends so I can clean the ol' Mak. (It hasn't been cleaned since, wow, last year? Meh, it's Russian. It'll work fine, LOL.) I'm also trying to get a group together to go see the third Pirates of the Caribbean movie.

Today's Note: Man, as much as I hate Walmart, it is quite funny the collection of crap you can walk out of there with. I went in there today to get some odds and ends, and walked out with:

• New spatula (to replace the one I annihilated a few posts ago)
• Gun cleaning kit
• Pistol targets
• Chicken nuggets
• Shaun of the Dead DVD
  
• Mexican cheese mix
• Refried beans