Having done The Job for over 25 yrs (albeit not recently) I’ll try to answer some of the points raised on this thread in an effort to provide the OP with some reasoned explanations as to some of the ways of military controlling:
Background. Individuals perform like they are trained and how they practice. UK Mil ATC – specifically RAF in this case – is based on providing ATC services to predominantly high-workload, single-seat, short-endurance, fast jets* that may have been engaged on operations and may have suffered battle damage. Airframes are unlikely to be in their prime and the complexity – together with the relative lack of redundancy in systems - of many military aircraft means that failures are far more commonplace than in the civvie world; crews’ stress levels are likely to be high even as a routine. Therefore, the role of the RAF ATCO is to be the pilot’s mentor and guardian and to assist him/her to the maximum extent practical. In my time one sold one’s self dear to ensure that Bloggs got airborne and on the ground as SAFELY and as quickly as possible. If that meant a plethora of coordination with other controllers to get a direct track and an optimum descent profile, (we were doing that years before “CDA” became a civvie buzz-word) then “don’t think about it – get on and DO IT”!
*pattern speed 250 kts or thereabouts.
To answer specifics. The single-seat – without much room in it for Approach plates or pilots’ notes etc – fast-jet scenario is the basis for most of the “Drivel” and “superfluous mouth music” that military ATCOs have to contend with too; rest assured that we don’t want to be spouting this either when there’s other, usually higher priority tasks (eg coordination) to be undertaken. It’s as a result of aircraft still landing or attempting to land with their gear up, that there’s the (before Glidepath intercept) “Check gear down and locked” and at about 2½NM “Final Cockpit checks, acknowledge” phraseology still in use.
Quote: “All the rubbish arse covering regarding reduced radar performance for the zzzz time and that I am responsible for that big hill they are pointing me at” is also as a direct result of people in the past getting - shall we say ‘ever so slightly intrigued’ - by the sudden appearance of another aeroplane in their piece of sky having loomed out of the rain clutter/overhead/area of shadow. Yes, it is arse covering, I wholly agree. You tell me why it’s considered necessary? Because, after the Captain (if he’s still alive), the ATCO is usually the second ‘Guilty Bastard’ marched to the kangaroo court. I’ll give you the Ben Macdui tragedy (again) and also when a Buccaneer ran off the end of the runway at Gib** as examples. (And let’s not forget who are the top neddy’s that hand down these requirements……..last time I looked, the RAF wasn’t run by Air Traffickers!)
** The ATCO was held partly responsible because he did not say; “you have a tailwind component” (not that there was a requirement to) when he transmitted the surface wind on talkdown, a transmission that the aircraft commander denied was made, yet was clear on the tape transcript – twice!
Remember that the vast majority of Military ATC is not conducted in a nice known traffic environment of Controlled Airspace. It’s mainly conducted in Glass G airspace where tracks are random, 7000 squawks are everywhere and, if you are providing a radar service, HAVE to be avoided by 5NM or 3,000 ft and you HAVE to coordinate – or take 5NM - if your track is going to pass within 3,000 ft of someone else’s radar track. Coordination is the touchstone of military ATC; 80% of a Mil ATCO’s workload is landline coordination with other ATCOs; the frequency may be quiet but the ATCO is probably talking constantly to his team-mates or other units to arrange your safe passage.
Military units usually only have 122.1 available between them as a dual-purpose VHF Approach and Tower frequency; this is probably why the OP thought he was handled by Approach the whole way. This is also why there is much use of full callsigns to ensure that the right message is addressed from a specific unit to a specific aircraft. They also usually only have 123.3 as a dual-purpose VHF Director and Talkdown frequency, but if an adjacent unit is doing a talkdown on it, well, it is virtually unusable for anything else.
It sounds as though the OP was doing an ILS monitored on PAR. In the past (not so dim and distant) it would appear that MoD was incapable of introducing an aircraft with a reliable ILS fit into RAF Service. All it needed was for Boscombe Down to note a slight reluctance for the GP not to capture during trials and ALL that type were then deemed – for ever and a day - to suffer from ‘Sticking ILS Glidepath needles’. The JP 3A/5A, F4 and Lightning (that was supposed to have been capable of autoland at one point in its career) were all tarnished with this accolade for their entire Service lives; and I’m not sure about the Jaguar either; memory might be failing on types here! Consequently, it was decreed from their Airships that these types were not able to conduct an ILS approach without PAR monitoring. As the approach was therefore under the jurisdiction of the talkdown controller, he/she was responsible for discharging their responsibilities as laid down in sundry regulations eg checking, gear, transmitting surface wind, getting landing clearances (with cable and barrier state no doubt) which accounts for the higher-than-civvie-level of RT for a military ILS procedure.
Human Factors. As ever, there’s another side to the story too. On arrival for my 2nd tour at Leuchars I noticed that the powerful area coverage Craigowl Hill TACAN (located in the mountains to the north of Leuchars) radiated on channel 24X, was not to be confused with the aerodrome’s TACAN – that supported non-precision approaches - that radiated on – yes - Channel 42X. Hmmmm I thought, accident waiting to happen. And so it proved. However, what I wasn’t prepared for was the insistence that I had to resort to over the RT to get an F4 that was descending to 1,500’ on a TACAN approach towards 1800+ ’ mountains, to turn off his track, reselect the numbers on his TACAN receiver THE OTHER WAY AROUND, and intercept a FAT that wasn’t going to end up in Cumulo-granite.
Sorry about the long post but I did want to try to get some explanations across to the OP.
PS for Newt: Yes, we used to enjoy the nil RT launch/Internal Aids recoveries too! Especially those back into Honington that lined up and flew an approach to the old USAAF base at Shipdham. Oh how we laughed and slapped our thighs!
