I guess a question that needs to be asked here is "Even if the US has enough people applying to be ATCOs to fill the gaps, would it be cheaper and more effective to poach some already qualified controllers from other countries who have suitable experience?". I don't know but if you factor in the wash out rates maybe it would make sense to import some guys.
Also for Rusty Nail, you may want to add the UK to that list of closed shop ANSPs. This has been discussed before on here and the response from the Brits was that they have extremely exacting standards and as such they can't take ATCOs from other places like Australia, NZ and Seffrica.
Not wanting to get knee deep in the handbags at thirty paces confrontation between Battler39 and the rest, but the initial post by Ferris made complete sense to me. That is there is a real (not percieved) shortage of controllers in Australia, resulting in sectors being without any Air Traffic Control service for whole shifts (take note that this is forced to be without, not without due to any choice made by controllers). He also says this has come about from the managers only caring about their next bonus objective and not about the troops they were supposed to be managing. He then says that the thread originator (an American working in America not the Gulf) needs to do the right thing if they are so short staffed that safety is compromised.
Clear to me, and I really don't understand the venom in the reponses.
