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An Outstanding 'Anthology' of "The Best 25 Years of ATC History"From: Jim HoltsclawDate: 1/11/2017 10:06:53 AM CommentsCopy of an email I received from Domenic Torchia.I want to thank Ron Fandrick for putting together this wonderful, and extremely accurate, history of some pretty great years. I also want to thank Frank Jones, for sharing this with us. Many of us remember Frank from his ZOA and ZLA days as the "Chief." I hired on in late 1967 so I did live many of these 25 years. I also, hung around, off and on, for the past half century. I have to say, the work/job has not changed - just the equipment and people have. When I hired on, it was like joining the military. Many of my Area B coworkers were WW II and Korean War Veterans. Then came the different breed - the Viet Nam Veterans. Times they were a changin'. Two comments: Ron's recap of the last and final offer was as accurate as I have seen since August 3, 1981. All that was offered was, "two hours of overtime pay for hours 39 and 40." You only got that pay though, if you worked the complete 40 hours each week. This meant few if any would see a nickel - no A/L, no S/L, no Admin Time - you were to be bellied up for the complete 40 hours. I do not recall the "5%" bump in night differential - probably because it was only a few bucks a week - or for my coworkers - another beer or two at Shelly's. The other - Nobody who hired on after about 1976 has any idea how tough it used to be to become a Controller. Draw and name every single airway, intersection/radials, crossing restrictions, VOR/freq., MEA, MVA, sector/freq., A/C type/performance, MRA's, radials, and so much more. Then you also had to know the 7110.65 like the back of your hand - but for Center pukes you had to know, and how to apply, manual separation standards(non radar). For terminal hacks you had to work without data tags or shrimp boats. Thanks again Ron and Frank - we sure had a lot of plane wrecks and hijackings back in those days. Domenic Torchia@mlode.com | |
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