David is now retired from air traffic control. But he continues to study its history. He reminded me of an event that I did not write about in my book, but one that should not be forgotten. It was the mid-air collision between Allegheny Airlines Flight 853 (a DC-9) and a single engine Piper PA-28 (tail number N7374J) over Indiana on September 9, 1969, resulting in 83 deaths. (The debris field of this accident is pictured above.) As a subsequent investigation showed, that event occurred in large part because the smaller plane failed to show up on controllers' radar. This inadequate equipment was one of the chief concerns of the then recently-formed Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (PATCO). David Sapadin studied that accident while a student at Ohio State in 1970 prior to his hiring at the FAA. You can read the interesting paper he wrote back then discussing this event. It is called "The Nightmare -- The MidAir" and you can find it here. My great thanks to David. If you'd like to get in touch with him, he can be reached at: dmsapadin@yahoo.com
I'll try this one more time. Your response (above) misses the point. VFR traffic rarely showed up on old broadband radar. That was nothing new. The significance of Flight 853 and the Piper was that it was NOBODY'S FAULT. Both pilots were following procedure to the letter. The FAA had no one to BLAME. Which forced it to look at itself and as a result, finally, FAA understood the need for the development of the science of Airspace and Procedures - which led to the first Terminal Control Areas (TCA's) requiring ANYBODY flying within them to have transponders and be under control of ATC....a brand new concept FAA had previously tried to avoid like the plague. It also resulted in rules changes requiring aircraft to be at 250 knots or less before descending through 10,000, and the same while climbing until out of 11,000 ft. FINALLY, FAA understood the nature of the mix of high and low speed aircraft trying to occupy the same areas, especially around terminals. And THAT is why this particular midair was the MOST SIGNIFICANT during the time frame of your book. - Dave
ReplyDeleteNot sure why the above is using the name of my High School's Website Blog! But anyway, it is from David M Sapadin I was at the Newberry. Contended then, and especially now after the Chicago Center fire, an "ATC ZERO until further advised" - a huge blow to the ATC System (numeous articles available on line about that fire), that Automation was indeed the elephant in the air traffic control system of 1981, and its far-reaching capabilities, that was unfortunately not taken into account by PATCO and allowed Reagan to be as cavalier as he wanted to be.
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