'With the advent of electronic displays many ATSA tasks are now obsolete'
The ATSAs may be obsolete, but many of the tasks are not - they've simply been given to somebody else to deal with - the ATCOs. We've always been told that 'the system will not fail'. Well, you'd better hope it doesn't, because with no ATSAs alongside to help with the more mundane (and I use that word carefully) but still necessary tasks, when the !!!!! hits the fan (and one day it will) its going to be 'all stop' at the coalface. Ahh, I can see the fines bill running up now..
ATCOs can definitely shift traffic
safely, but to do it with a system outage, in an unplanned and extra-pressure situation, and whilst effectively doing somebody else's tasks at the same time??
In certain instances and situations, there is NO substitute for an extra pair of ears, eyes and hands alongside. Shame that the 'new NATS' can't see that, but then there wouldn't be any bonus cash for the wan*.., er, senior Management, would there?
