Marc Scribner and Ginger Evans have a new report on remote air traffic control towers, looking at why the U.S. won’t adopt them even as they’re being used successfully around the world.
Remote towers would help a lot with the air traffic control shortage. They’re in use around the world, Congress has told the FAA to start using them, but the agency’s intransigence has blocked efforts for years.
These are facilities where controllers are not physically on-site at the airport. They use high-definition cameras, sensors, and communication links to transmit a real-time 360° view of the airport environment to controllers sitting at a n air traffic control center in another location. //
Sweden launched the world’s first remote tower at Örnsköldsvik Airport in 2015 and has built centers in Sundsvall and Stockholm that control eight airports. Norway operates 11 airports from a single center at Bodø. A single controller will handle multiple low volume airports from that center. //
Franz Stappen says:
May 24, 2025 at 4:05 pm
Foreign countries don’t have the amount of VFR traffic we do. That’s why everyone comes here to train. //
Regnad Radzinovic says:
May 24, 2025 at 7:45 pm
I worked in FAA air traffic control for nearly 40 years. I was also the second Terminal ATC rep from FAA headquarters assigned to the Leesburg (SAAB) project. This author and the people commenting have no idea what’s involved with providing sir traffic control service. Remote towers, given their current level of technology and capability will only work at small, low traffic-density airports. (Like the airports in Europe mentioned here. One of those airports, is so slow. The log only about five take off and landing operations per day.) Any comparison to Newark or any other large place like that, is ridiculous. //
SayAgain says:
May 24, 2025 at 7:48 pm
The real issue is folks that have never been a cpc are making decisions for us and junk articles like this just prove that most don’t fully understand the atc system.
The EWR CPC’s didn’t walk off the job, additionally the staffing shortage is with the radar controllers who work the EWR sector from Philly. So your remote tower idea is a bust there.
Having remote towers Co located in the same building is a great idea but it wouldn’t help with staffing. CPC’s are specialists in their respective airspace and airports. If one remote tower is short a body they just can’t grab Steve that works COS and plug him in to work APA. So womp womp that point is out.
PHX is not the only airport that the tower and TRACON are co-located. It’s called an Up/Down and the faa has quite a few. Pit / phl / sat / las / har just to name a handful. Smaller up/downs are great for newer controllers to cut their teeth and get both tower and radar experience before going to a busier facility where you don’t have time to learn the basics, you need to learn how to work the volume of traffic.
You want to fix atc, put one of us in charge. And by one of us I mean someone that has worked traffic the last 15 years. Not some manager ladder climber that has dodged working traffic the last 15 years.SayAgain says:
May 24, 2025 at 7:48 pm
The real issue is folks that have never been a cpc are making decisions for us and junk articles like this just prove that most don’t fully understand the atc system.
The EWR CPC’s didn’t walk off the job, additionally the staffing shortage is with the radar controllers who work the EWR sector from Philly. So your remote tower idea is a bust there.
Having remote towers Co located in the same building is a great idea but it wouldn’t help with staffing. CPC’s are specialists in their respective airspace and airports. If one remote tower is short a body they just can’t grab Steve that works COS and plug him in to work APA. So womp womp that point is out.
PHX is not the only airport that the tower and TRACON are co-located. It’s called an Up/Down and the faa has quite a few. Pit / phl / sat / las / har just to name a handful. Smaller up/downs are great for newer controllers to cut their teeth and get both tower and radar experience before going to a busier facility where you don’t have time to learn the basics, you need to learn how to work the volume of traffic.
You want to fix atc, put one of us in charge. And by one of us I mean someone that has worked traffic the last 15 years. Not some manager ladder climber that has dodged working traffic the last 15 years.
You could feel the tension—passengers staring at their watches, refreshing airline apps, sighing loudly, and shifting uncomfortably in their seats.
After we had all boarded and settled into the growing frustration of the unknown, the pilot stepped out of the cockpit, walked into the cabin, stood where we could all see him, and addressed the entire plane face-to-face.
“I want to start with an apology,” he said.
Just one sentence—seven words, to be precise—is all it took to make a huge difference in the overall experience for everyone on board. Nothing about the delay was his fault. Pilots don’t schedule thunderstorms or control air traffic flow. He hadn’t caused the delay, and he certainly wasn’t to blame for the chain reaction it was causing in all of our carefully planned travel itineraries. But he still began with an apology.
In that moment, the mood on the plane shifted. The pilot didn’t magically make the delay go away, and it didn’t guarantee that everyone would make their connection, but it did something almost as powerful—it made everyone feel seen. It made everyone on the plane feel like someone understood how frustrating the situation was and cared enough to acknowledge it. //
What the captain did at that moment offers three lessons every leader should remember:
He came to us
He started with empathy
He made it clear he was on our side
1 Hour of the world's most iconic airport KAI TAK filmed 30 years ago!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-pa-AHMZUw
The tax code encourages airlines to charge separately for checked bags, and Southwest Airlines was easily leaving $75 million in tax savings on the table each year by refusing to do so. //
The airline’s CEO Bob Jordan has essentially capitulated to activist investor Elliott in order to save his job, but at the expense of the airline’s culture and product differentiation. These changes won’t make Southwest Airlines better. Southwest had problems – Elliott and everyone else in the world observing them were not wrong – but there are no solutions to bring Southwest back to its earlier growth days because the model has simply run its course.
They have maxed out the ability to grow with a single fleet type, distributing tickets through their own channels, going it alone with a simplified product. So any future will be a lower growth, lower stock multiple, less valuable one. But that doesn’t have to mean doubling down on the race to the bottom, which is why it’s sad to see today’s change. //
Ultimately what this underscores is that there is no returning to the differentiated airline business model that gave Southwest significantly higher earnings multiples, catapulting their stock beyond peers, and generating decades of consistent profits.
Nobody had solutions, so they gave up and did what everyone else does which is what company executives do to protect their jobs. They stopped sticking their necks out, because they might get chopped off. Southwest is now just like everyone else, but a bit less (they don’t even plan to sell blocked middle seats, let alone first class; they have less valuable miles; they don’t have lounges; their wifi lags the industry). A moment of silence for this once great company. //
In the meantime, as checked bag fees roll out to tickets purchased May 28 onward, over the next few months we’ll begin to see everyone trying to carry all their bags on board. That’ll mean more gate checking of bags, which has meant Southwest needed to retrofit gate equipment. This will slow down boarding and delay flights. Good luck out there to Southwest customers!
F22 Raptor filmed with a camera so fancy, you can see the vertical stabilizers get all wobbly
More power, no moving parts: the quest to fly a rotating detonation engine
After decades of research, tests advance innovative engine for improved military effectors //
Rotating detonation engines have no moving parts and a unique design that makes them both lighter and more powerful than traditional engines. Here’s how they work.
Prior to 1960, no maximum retirement age existed. Although it’s a colorful story, ripe with questionable political ethics, the maximum retirement age for U.S. pilots operating in a Part 121 environment was arbitrarily established at 60 and remained so for 47 years until it was changed to 65 in 2007. //
In 1959, the CEO of American Airlines, C.R. Smith, publicly convinced the first FAA administrator, Elwood Quesada, that after age 60, pilots begin to suffer disqualifying medical issues, notwithstanding being significantly challenged in the transition from props to jets. No substantive studies, medically or otherwise, were presented for such arguments. Privately, Smith was simply attempting to reduce the number of higher-paid older and more senior pilots.
It would seem that the same strategy of a medical argument is repeating itself in the current environment. Although some truth exists as to aging pilots succumbing to more ailments and requiring the use of more sick time leave, past studies indicate that sudden incapacitation, such as a cardiac arrest causing an accident, is highly unlikely. Because of initial screening and continued FAA medical exam scrutiny, the airline pilot population trends healthier than the general population. As for cognitive skills, the argument has often been made that pilots who demonstrate successful performance during recurrent training cycles in a classroom and in a simulator are definitive proof of mental capabilities. //
One of the larger hurdles is the fact that ICAO rules still restrict pilots over 65 to fly internationally. But based on recent ICAO agendas, it would seem the organization is seriously considering lifting the ceiling. If ICAO’s research studies bear out that airline pilots’ above-average health does not pose a risk to the flying public even in cases of sudden incapacitation, why have a ceiling at all? Why establish another arbitrary age? //
Pilots flying under Part 91 and Part 135 operations have no age restrictions. They fly in the same environment as airline pilots, so the only justification seems to be that those operations put less people at risk per flight. With some exceptions, air traffic controllers still must retire at age 56. Why would a healthy controller be any different than a healthy airline pilot to continue on the job?
If airline pilot mandatory retirement age has no ceiling, recovery from sudden pilot incapacitation should be a training requirement. Recognition is key, especially during critical phases of flight like takeoff or landing. Perhaps as was initially instituted for age 65, a restriction for pairing pilots in the same cockpit at certain ages should be considered. Can the public, let alone airline pilots, embrace two 75-year-olds on the same flight deck? //
My argument for mandatory airline pilot age is simple. If no substantive study with accurate data quantifies a particular age whereupon medical and cognitive issues indicate enough of a decline to create a risk to the flying public, then why define another arbitrary age?
A group of lawmakers in Congress is putting forward a bill that would undo much of the more than 50-year-old rule banning most supersonic flight over U.S. land.
The Supersonic Aviation Modernization Act, introduced Wednesday by Senator Ted Budd of North Carolina and Representative Troy Nehls of Texas, would instruct the FAA to revise a 1973 statute prohibiting nonmilitary air travel that exceeds Mach 1 over land. The rule was introduced to limit sonic booms, which are not only loud but capable of damaging property on the ground below.
The proposed bill would allow civilian aircraft to travel at Mach 1 and faster provided no sonic booms reach the ground. Its supporters said American companies have already developed “quiet supersonic” technology that makes the current ban irrelevant. //
The Supersonic Aviation Modernization Act is cosponsored by Senators Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Mike Lee of Utah, and Tim Sheehy of Montana, together with Representative Sharice Davids of Kansas.
Duffy said during Monday’s press conference. “In July of 2024, the Biden [and] Buttigieg FAA moved control of the New York Newark airspace from New York [N90] to the Philadelphia Tower [Philadelphia TRACON].”
He said that as part of the move, the Standard Terminal Automation Replacement System (STARS) system which processes radar data for Newark stayed based in New York. Telecommunication lines would feed this data from New York to Philadelphia TRACON, where controllers would then handle New York arrivals and departures.
“The Biden [and] Buttigieg FAA bungled this move without properly hardening the telecom lines feeding the data which was already well known to be error-prone,” he said. “Without addressing the underlying infrastructure, they added more risk to the system.”
The safety nightmare continues at Newark Liberty International Airport, where all air traffic control will be manned by just one fully qualified person during its busiest time tonight, The Post can exclusively reveal.
One air traffic controller (ATC) and a trainee will operate every flight in and out of Newark between 6.30pm-9.30pm — despite 15 staffers being the standard requirement for a shift.
A New York-based ATC, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, described the situation as “pure insanity” and warned that the schedule shows the control tower for the airport will operate “at bare bones” while between 168 and 180 planes are usually scheduled to take off and land.
On a typical day, the global 787 fleet conducts approximately 2,100 flights, transporting roughly 480,000 passengers daily – about 14.5 million people monthly. //
Boeing announced that its pioneering 787 Dreamliner fleet has transported over one billion passengers faster than any widebody commercial airplane in history, achieving this milestone in under 14 years since entering service.
The global fleet of more than 1,175 Dreamliners has completed nearly 5 million flights covering over 30 million flight hours. //
The 787 Dreamliner has fundamentally transformed the aviation landscape by enabling airlines to efficiently operate previously unprofitable long-haul routes.
With its exceptional fuel efficiency and extended range capabilities, carriers have established more than 425 new nonstop routes, connecting cities that previously required multiple stops or weren’t served at all. //
The aircraft’s operational capabilities have made it particularly valuable for airlines like Qantas Airways (QF), which operates the longest nonstop 787 route from London to Perth spanning 7,829 nautical miles.
At the other extreme, TUI Airways (BY) utilizes the Dreamliner for shorter high-demand routes including the 65 nautical mile hop between Aruba and Curaçao. //
The Dreamliner’s commercial success is reflected in its position as the bestselling passenger widebody in aviation history, with more than 2,000 orders from 89 airlines, operators, and lessors. The aircraft operates across more than 85 countries and serves over 520 airports worldwide.
In the case of MEL 32-12-01 covering missing gear door seals, the prescribed remedy involves maintaining the extended gear position temporarily after takeoff. //
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During normal operations, gear retraction typically occurs within 10 seconds after takeoff
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The system applies automatic braking to wheels during retraction to prevent gyroscopic forces from spinning wheels from entering the gear bay
For aircraft operating with deactivated brake units (another MEL condition), extended gear position becomes especially important.
The spinning mass of wheels (exceeding 100kg each) creates substantial gyroscopic forces that could stress the landing gear system if retracted while still spinning rapidly. Natural deceleration time prevents potential damage.
Between October and December 2024, the airline did not have a single passenger involuntarily denied boarding, according to statistics published by the Department of Transportation.
In comparison, Ameican Airlines involuntarily bumped more than 3,200 people from its flights during the same period.
Why do shockwaves extend past the body that created them? As seen in this photo, the shock doesn’t stop in the air the plane is effecting, but continues on. I always assumed it was high pressure air from the shock extending out, but now I’m not too sure. //
Shocks are not because of the pressure. Shocks happen because of the turning -- the pressure jump is a result of the shock. – Rob McDonald Mar 14, 2024 at 17:27
A shock wave generated at 30,000 feet at Mach 1 cannot be heard on the ground for precisely the reason you surmise in your comment.
The US Air Force has conducted tests with supersonic aircraft and has this to say:
Under standard atmospheric conditions, air temperature decreases with increased altitude. For example, when sea-level temperature is 58 degrees Fahrenheit, the temperature at 30,000 feet drops to minus 49 degrees Fahrenheit. This temperature gradient helps bend the sound waves upward. Therefore, for a boom to reach the ground, the aircraft speed relative to the ground must be greater than the speed of sound at the ground. For example, the speed of sound at 30,000 feet is about 670 miles per hour, but an aircraft must travel at least 750 miles per hour (Mach 1.12, where Mach 1 equals the speed of sound) for a boom to be heard on the ground.
Spoiler alert – no. Concorde did not return to the skies on April 1st, 2025. Instead, we paid tribute to the legendary supersonic jet by recreating two Concorde flights on Flightradar24. Here’s a look at what happened. //
We thought it would be fun to use April Fool’s Day as an opportunity to recreate two of Concorde’s most iconic flights, giving these beautiful aeroplanes one last chance to cross the Atlantic (albeit virtually).
The Air France (AF/AFR) Concorde F-BTSD departed Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport (CDG) at 08:00 local time, and arrived at New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport (JFK) after a 3 hour and 50 minute flight. Later at 11am UK local time, British Airways (BA/BAW)‘s Concorde G-BOAG left London Heathrow Airport (LHR) for JFK, landing 3 hours and 33 minutes later.
It has been about a year since we reported on the major revelation that many thousand original North American Aviation manufacturing drawings survived destruction during the 1980s because one of their employees, Ken Jungeberg, saved them from incineration. Furthermore, as we also discussed last year, AirCorps Aviation worked out a deal with Jungeberg in 2019 to secure these historic artifacts for their longterm preservation. Ever since their arrival at AirCorps last winter, Ester Aube, the company’s manager for their technical documentation division, AirCorps Library, has been working diligently to preserve and catalogue this massive archive. With so many drawings to review, this would be a daunting task for anyone to undertake successfully, but Ester has applied her keen intellect, professional training and substantial skillset to systematically document and collate these drawings into a practical and valuable resource for aircraft restorers, historians, and the aviation-minded public at large. Additionally, Aube has delved deeper into the process, tracing personal details for several NAA technicians who originally drafted these drawings, because their stories are no less important to the narrative than the documents themselves; this aspect of aviation history has received little prior attention from the wider world …until now.
AirCorps Aviation of Bemidji, Minnesota has just announced that they have acquired a massive trove of original manufacturing drawings for North American Aviation (NAA) covering types such as the P-51, T-6, B-25 and P-82. This is a remarkable development, and all due to a lone engineer at NAA named Ken Jungeberg who had the foresight to save these drawings when they were days away from destruction at North American’s plant in Columbus, Ohio during the late 1980s. But before we discuss this find, it is perhaps first worth reflecting upon what it represents…
Just a few of the thousands of WWII-era North American Aviation aircraft manufacturing drawings which Ken Jungeberg saved. (image via AirCorps Aviation)
The American aircraft industry produced just under 300,000 aircraft between 1940 and 1945, a staggering feat by any measure, especially considering that just 3,600 rolled off U.S. assembly lines during the entirety of 1940. While aviation companies such as Boeing, Douglas, Curtiss and their like would design the aircraft, and put them together at their factories, it was simply impossible for them to both make all of the components and subassemblies on site and keep up with production demand. They had to subcontract out the bulk of this work once a design received an order for full-scale production. Indeed, much of America’s entire manufacturing base was involved in this effort – from small ma and pa furniture shops to industrial giants like Ford and Chrysler – whether they were making map cases or wing panels. Some companies, such as Ford, even had their own aircraft assembly lines, like the one in Willow Run, Michigan which built B-24 Liberators.
But have you ever wondered how it was possible to have such a prolific output of high quality aerial machinery when each aircraft assembly line received component parts from so many different independent subcontractors? How was it possible for all of those many thousands of parts to fit together properly in such a repeatable fashion?
The answer is pretty simple; it all came down to the quality of the manufacturing drawings which the aircraft company engineers created during their design process. If you had a coherent set of accurate drawings showing how to make each part, and how to put each assembly together, then you could rely upon skilled workers at disparate factory locations to produce components whose dimensions complied with design tolerances. Of course, there were times when problems arose, but when they did, the engineers usually found solutions. But a coherent set of manufacturing drawings was key to this effort.
However, every single component, from the tiniest rivet to the entire aircraft, required drawings to properly describe them. Obviously, the more complex parts and sub-assemblies required multiple drawings, sometimes hundreds. Highly skilled draftsmen and women created all of these drawings by hand by – usually using pencil on vellum drafting paper. Drawings could sometimes be massive too, extending ten feet or more. The finished product was designed to be practical, fully describing the part and how it fit into an assembly. Drawings were often exquisitely beautiful too – more works of art than simply functional. //
But then along came AirCorps Aviation with their AirCorps Library project. For a small annual subscription of just $50, you have access to serious engineering details, including manuals, for several dozen American WWII-era aircraft designs. They have also digitized the engineering drawings for a number of these aircraft too, such as the P-51 Mustang, F4U Corsair and B-17 Flying Fortress. While they haven’t digitized everything available yet for each aircraft design – it’s a massive process – it is a fascinating resource for anyone with even a passing interest in WWII aviation. //
This is why the news about the preservation of more than 15,000 original drawings produced by North American Aviation that relate to such iconic designs as the T-6 Texan, P-51 Mustang and B-25 Mitchell is such a revelation. AirCorps Aviation has gained access to these drawings, and is presently cataloguing and copying them for their subscription library. However, the fact that these drawing still exist at all is down to the dedicated efforts of just one man, Ken Jungeberg. His name will resonate in aviation lore for generations to come due to his foresight in saving such historically important documents. For further details on this remarkable news, we will let AirCorps Aviation’s Ester Aube continue the story…
Thousands of original North American Aviation technical drawings undergo preservation and cataloguing, highlighted in museum exhibit. //
In April of 2023, Ester Aube finalized and installed an exhibit at the EAA museum using the drawings and telling the story of the draftsmen from North American and highlighting their contribution to the war efforts. When the collection was initially received from Ken Jungeberg, they had promised to do something to help get the story of the draftsmen out to the general public and get some of the drawings in public view so that people could enjoy and learn. The exhibit will be in the museum until September of 2025. “I chose some, cherry-picked some really amazing drawings to highlight in that exhibit,” says Aube. //
With so many drawings and aircraft to sort through, Aube started the project working on a specific aircraft, the P-51, because both AirCorps Aviation and the many aircraft in the warbird community would get a lot of benefit from such extensive original engineering drawings. At this point she estimates she has catalogued a little over 15,000 drawings just for the Mustang, and has also ventured into the smaller size drawings for the early B-25 models, which will be her next branch to catalogue. “The cataloging process is very labor intensive,” she says. “So I’m cataloging part number and the description, which under normal circumstances isn’t as important. But because this collection contains so many experimental and pre-production drawings, you have to catalog the description because that part number isn’t listed anywhere in a parts catalog or it’s not referenced.” North American did have a part numbering system, but all the pieces of data are needed or else the searchability is difficult. So part number, description, the date it was drawn, name of the draftsman, the material the drawing was done on, and the factory it was made in all are recorded during the cataloguing process. There are drawings from factories in Inglewood, Kansas City, Dallas, and even some from the Canadian Car Foundry in Ontario, Canada’s largest aircraft manufacturer during World War II.
Ken Jungeberg’s efforts saved a vast collection of North American Aviation’s WWII engineering drawings from being lost. In this interview, Ester Aube of AirCorps Aviation shares his story and her role in their preservation. //
During World War II, long before the advent of computer-aided design, thousands of skilled draftsmen meticulously created tens of thousands of engineering drawings for every aspect of each aircraft model produced. These drawings were not only precise and detailed—ensuring different factories could manufacture components to exact specifications—but also works of art in their own right. Without the dedication of preservationists and archivists, many of these irreplaceable documents might have been lost forever. Thanks to the vision of a select few, however, these drawings are being safeguarded—not just as historical artifacts but as invaluable resources for the warbird restoration community. In 1988, Ken Jungeberg, head of the Master Dimensions Department at North American-Rockwell’s Columbus plant, was granted permission to save a large collection of non-current engineering drawings from the company archive. //
In this video interview, Ester Aube, Manager at AirCorps Aviation, shares Ken’s story and her role in preserving these invaluable engineering drawings.
https://youtu.be/eK--vNanN_U