AbleToControl?
21st Oct 2003, 22:18
Dear Folks !
After having passed ATC aptitude testing I am now at a point where I wonder whether
an ATC training or later on even an ATC job is what I want or respectively something
that I am likely not to be a risk doing it...
I'd love to do the job - but not at any cost ....
Having read in various threads about different ATC simulators I've meanwhile 'purchased'
a bunch of them just to get a feeling for what ATC might be like. Since some ATC-
simulations are considered pretty "decent" or close to the real thing by controllers
posting here on pprune I thought I'd give some of them at least at try.
During the last days I've mainly played around with ATCC v. 1.0 - a freeware (center) simulator
available at www.xavius.com, that seems to get recommended quite often on pprune
and is described 'as real as it gets'.
Now that I've spent some time with the simulator and seem to cope with its
user interface I actually seem to do pretty well with the task to create/maintain separation
at a certain level although every now and then - mostly after more than 4-6 hrs playing
(pretty addictive this stuff )I still do get a 'deal' - but that seems
to be mainly caused by overlapping datablocks and weird display: I can
hardly recognize single aircraft move when all of the 'blips' and data overlap
eachother-a pretty disturbing thing.
I wonder whether real controllers also have to face such seemingly trivial problems...
I am quite sure I could keep traffic apart if I could just see each aircraft's
data at one glance - without any overlapping data.
Another issue I'd like to discuss is the spatial awareness, I am often reading that controllers
keep a spatial image for each and every aircraft's route: Do you guys really create kind of a
'3D-image' in your head ? I am simply constantly scanning each aircraft's
datablock (if easily visible!) and thereby determine possible conflicts with other aircraft:
when I control 10 simulated aircraft I really don't make use of any "three-dimensional projection"
- I am rather 'only' RE-acting.
And being aware of the fact that 10 aircraft is certainly not that
much for a real center controller I have to admit that I would certainly fail to over and over again
memorize a dozen and more new aircraft's routes, callsigns, altitudes etc.
Also, when you are sitting in front of your scope and have to control for example 15
aircraft (probably not that much for you - is it ?): can you immediatley tell the
area within your sector where the aircraft is at that moment ? I find it personally
pretty hard to remember each aircraft's callsign and associate it with a certain
route and exact position - particularly if there are plenty of planes in that area.
It seems only to get easier when you get more familiar with the sector and you get to
know what handoffs need to be routed to what sector.
But as I wrote above: despite from the occassional deal every 5hrs or so I do get the job
done - mostly by simply not assigning altitudes that I've assigned to other aircraft, or
vectoring them around other traffic respectively adjusting groundspeeds to maintain the 5 miles
- yet without an immense use of spatial thinking or previous planning or
even complex mental arithmetics - there's rather some kind of "approximate guessing" involved
finding the right decision - so the multitasking itself doesn't seem to be a problem
either: although I guess a dozens of aircarft was the most I handled so far - how many
do you guys handle, on an average basis ? Maybe per hour or even on one day ?
Also: do you really plan in advance (before the aircraft enters your sector ?)
what needs to be done ? As I said: I am right now just reacting to possible
conflict accordingly...there's not any previous thinking involved.
So I really wonder if I lack the skills and should rather not accept the training offer,
even with the said training I am sure that I would still not possess the ability for
such "mind juggling stuff" like remembering 20 aircraft's callsigns, routes, headings
and assigned altitudes.
I would really love to get some input from real life controllers and their experience,
particularly the way they perceive their thinking and dealing with their task - I would
certainly not want to train for - or do - a job where I obviously lack qualifications
and eventually cause significant trouble. So I'd really appreciate to see some qualified
people address the issues I've pointed out here - for example what was it like for you
when you started training/ojt/ the actual job - did you feel safe about the way you
are dealing with traffic ?
Sorry for the rather long posting - but I thought you could certainly be of help in this matter ;-)
Thank you in advance for any comments !
best regards
(Un)AbleToControl? ;-)
After having passed ATC aptitude testing I am now at a point where I wonder whether
an ATC training or later on even an ATC job is what I want or respectively something
that I am likely not to be a risk doing it...
I'd love to do the job - but not at any cost ....
Having read in various threads about different ATC simulators I've meanwhile 'purchased'
a bunch of them just to get a feeling for what ATC might be like. Since some ATC-
simulations are considered pretty "decent" or close to the real thing by controllers
posting here on pprune I thought I'd give some of them at least at try.
During the last days I've mainly played around with ATCC v. 1.0 - a freeware (center) simulator
available at www.xavius.com, that seems to get recommended quite often on pprune
and is described 'as real as it gets'.
Now that I've spent some time with the simulator and seem to cope with its
user interface I actually seem to do pretty well with the task to create/maintain separation
at a certain level although every now and then - mostly after more than 4-6 hrs playing
(pretty addictive this stuff )I still do get a 'deal' - but that seems
to be mainly caused by overlapping datablocks and weird display: I can
hardly recognize single aircraft move when all of the 'blips' and data overlap
eachother-a pretty disturbing thing.
I wonder whether real controllers also have to face such seemingly trivial problems...
I am quite sure I could keep traffic apart if I could just see each aircraft's
data at one glance - without any overlapping data.
Another issue I'd like to discuss is the spatial awareness, I am often reading that controllers
keep a spatial image for each and every aircraft's route: Do you guys really create kind of a
'3D-image' in your head ? I am simply constantly scanning each aircraft's
datablock (if easily visible!) and thereby determine possible conflicts with other aircraft:
when I control 10 simulated aircraft I really don't make use of any "three-dimensional projection"
- I am rather 'only' RE-acting.
And being aware of the fact that 10 aircraft is certainly not that
much for a real center controller I have to admit that I would certainly fail to over and over again
memorize a dozen and more new aircraft's routes, callsigns, altitudes etc.
Also, when you are sitting in front of your scope and have to control for example 15
aircraft (probably not that much for you - is it ?): can you immediatley tell the
area within your sector where the aircraft is at that moment ? I find it personally
pretty hard to remember each aircraft's callsign and associate it with a certain
route and exact position - particularly if there are plenty of planes in that area.
It seems only to get easier when you get more familiar with the sector and you get to
know what handoffs need to be routed to what sector.
But as I wrote above: despite from the occassional deal every 5hrs or so I do get the job
done - mostly by simply not assigning altitudes that I've assigned to other aircraft, or
vectoring them around other traffic respectively adjusting groundspeeds to maintain the 5 miles
- yet without an immense use of spatial thinking or previous planning or
even complex mental arithmetics - there's rather some kind of "approximate guessing" involved
finding the right decision - so the multitasking itself doesn't seem to be a problem
either: although I guess a dozens of aircarft was the most I handled so far - how many
do you guys handle, on an average basis ? Maybe per hour or even on one day ?
Also: do you really plan in advance (before the aircraft enters your sector ?)
what needs to be done ? As I said: I am right now just reacting to possible
conflict accordingly...there's not any previous thinking involved.
So I really wonder if I lack the skills and should rather not accept the training offer,
even with the said training I am sure that I would still not possess the ability for
such "mind juggling stuff" like remembering 20 aircraft's callsigns, routes, headings
and assigned altitudes.
I would really love to get some input from real life controllers and their experience,
particularly the way they perceive their thinking and dealing with their task - I would
certainly not want to train for - or do - a job where I obviously lack qualifications
and eventually cause significant trouble. So I'd really appreciate to see some qualified
people address the issues I've pointed out here - for example what was it like for you
when you started training/ojt/ the actual job - did you feel safe about the way you
are dealing with traffic ?
Sorry for the rather long posting - but I thought you could certainly be of help in this matter ;-)
Thank you in advance for any comments !
best regards
(Un)AbleToControl? ;-)