Day 22-23: IFR Labs

Friday and Monday we did our IFR lab session using the Tower3D system. This kind of threw us all out of whack for a bit, since it's a totally different type of operation than the VFR tower. It's different not in what you're doing (moving airplanes from point A to point B and keeping them separated) but how you're doing it.

There are certain rules that need to be followed:

• In the IFR scenarios, you can't see anything at all out of the tower windows, so you have to visualize everything in your head. As a result, both Local and Ground rely heavily on position reports from the aircraft. You also need to know the airport layout like the back of your hand.
• All aircraft are radar-separated, meaning you can use either minutes or miles to separate them. If you have a smaller aircraft taking off behind a heavy, for instance, you have to have either four or five miles or 2 minutes.
  
• You can not position and hold an aircraft on the main arrival runway (28R in this instance, since it has the ILS). However, you can do it on 28L.
• You need to protect for your missed approach course. Therefore, if you have an aircraft landing on 28R and you want to bang someone out on 28L, you have to give the aircraft on 28L a divergence of 30 degrees. So in this case, you'd give the 28L departure heading 250. This steers him clear of the missed approach course.
• Aircraft characteristics play a huge role in these scenarios. There is no "maintain visual separation" obviously, so if you're going to bang out a Falcon jet 30 seconds after a lowly Cessna 172 takes off from the same runway, you'd better be sure to give him a divergence heading of 15-30 degrees. Otherwise, he'll fly right up the Cessna's tail and give him an aluminum backrub.
• We also worked a couple VFR-on-top and Special VFR aircraft.

I actually had a lot of fun with this, especially on Ground. It reminded me of some kind of chess game, where you have to imagine everything in your mind and visualize what your aircraft/opponent is doing. All you need to work the aircraft are your imagination, your radio, and your strips. I even asked at one point if we could turn off the monitors (they were basically white anyway).

Ground Control Examples:

For the sake of example, let's say we've got a C172 that's at Spartan Aviation. We want to taxi him to Runway 28R, which is at the opposite end of the airport. We'll taxi him there via the main parallel taxiway, Bravo, and along the way he'll have to cross Runway 16.
"CESSNA 172PT, ACADEMY GROUND, RUNWAY 28R, TAXI VIA GOLF, BRAVO, HOLD SHORT RUNWAY 16. REPORT ON BRAVO."
^ The Cessna will taxi out to Bravo via Golf.
^ When he reports he's on Bravo, that's our cue to coordinate the Runway 16 crossing with Local.

Ok, we've got our permission to cross from Local:
"CESSNA 2PT, CROSS RUNWAY 16. REPORT ACROSS TAXIWAY ECHO."
^ He will cross Runway 16 and continue taxiing to Runway 28R.
^ Taxiway Echo parallels Runway 16 on the opposite/far side from where he's coming. Therefore, when he reports that he's across Echo, we know for a fact that he's also clear of Runway 16.
^ Also, when he reports that he's across Taxiway Echo, we know that the intersection of 28R and Echo is now clear. 28R/E is a major runway exit point for the larger twins, corporate jets, and smaller airliners, so it's important that we know it's clear in case we have any arrivals.

So we've got our Cessna plugging along on Bravo. Before he reaches the end of Runway 28R, he'll have to cross Taxiway Delta followed by Taxiway Charlie.
"CESSNA 2PT, REPORT ACROSS TAXIWAY CHARLIE."
^ Once he reports that he's past Charlie, we know that both intersections 28R/C and 28R/D are clear for arriving traffic.
^ Once he's past Taxiway Charlie, the only thing in front of him is the intersection of Runway 28R and Taxiway Alpha, which is where he's going to takeoff. We can go ahead and switch him to Local at that point.

Local Control Examples:

"UNITED 67 HEAVY, ACADEMY TOWER, RUNWAY TWO-EIGHT RIGHT, CLEARED FOR TAKEOFF. REPORT ROLLING, REPORT AIRBORNE."
^ He reports rolling, so you can start the 2-minute mandatory wake turbulence timer.
^ He reports airborne, so you can start the 3-minute mandatory intersection departure wake turbulence timer.

"AMERICAN 865, RUNWAY TWO-EIGHT RIGHT, CLEARED TO LAND. REPORT TOUCHDOWN."
^ He reports touchdown, so that way you can taxi someone behind him across to 28L.

"AMERICAN 865, TURN RIGHT WHEN ABLE. REPORT OFF RUNWAY WITH POSITION."
^ He will turn off the runway when he can and report that he is off the runway (so you can now use it for aircraft behind him)
^ He will report on which taxiway he is located.
^ This satisfies the 7110.65 requirement that the Local controller must advise the Ground controller of the aircraft's position when the runway is not visible from the tower. In this case, if the aircraft is off of 28R on Echo, you'd just write "28R/E" on the strip and slide it on over to Ground.