THANKS, ROGER
Una delle parole più
frequentemente usate nelle comunicazioni radiotelefoniche è:
ROGER!
Qualche anno fa trovammo nella pubblicazione Flight Deck dell’American
Airlines uno spunto efficace per utili riflessioni scritto da un pilota
che ha voluto esasperare il concetto utilizzando, nella conclusione, un
riferimento ad un «Runway
Incursion Accident» dovuto
al "fattore ROGER".
I sentiti ringraziamenti per il denaro guadagnato si riferiscono al fatto
che ad un maggior tempo di impiego o di volo corrispondevano dollari sonanti,
finché…
I am not sure who ROGER is, but he has made me lots of money.
A lot of you have flown with him, because you hear him a lot on
the radios.
He is the guy who answers all his clearances and frequency changes
with a simple,
ROGER, or, ROGER, WE’LL DO THAT, or, ROGER, SO LONG.
Several months ago, in Chicago, ROGER took the wrong clearance
to taxi and I picked up eight minutes.
That same months he left the frequency by mistake and I had to vector
off course to miss him. That, too, was worth a few minutes.
The big pay off was when he accepted our approach clearance. That
time we were 282, and he was 202.
Since he said TWO-OH-TWO, ROGER, GOODBYE, Air Traffic Control thought
we had answered. Perhaps if he said TWO-ZERO-TWO, the mistake would
have been discovered.
But we had to go-around, at night, in the weather, low on fuel and
at the end of a long day.
We picked up 20 minutes on that one.
Thanks to ROGER, my family is now quite well off.
They will be getting a large sum of my insurance money soon.
You see, we were approaching V1 when ROGER taxied onto our runway.
Tower said something like CROSS THE RIGHT, HOLD SHORT OF THE LEFT.
My friend only said ROGER.
We finally met at taxiway 32.
Evidentemente, stando alle dimensioni del fenomeno indicato anche dalle notizie che seguono, c'è qualcosa che non va perché o Roger è sopravvissuto all'impatto o deve aver avuto una numerosa prole.
Catastrophe Could Result
From Runway Incursions
May 15, 2001
The National Transportation Safety
Board (NTSB) warned yesterday that a catastrophic accident could result
as the number of airplanes, vehicles and people on runways continues to
grow.
Carol Carmody, NTSB acting chairwoman said she fears that two large airliners
could wind up colliding on a runway unless the problem of incursions is
reduced.
In 2000, there were 431 runway incursions, compared with 321 in 1999,
Federal Aviation Administration records show.
Incidents this year are running ahead of last year's pace, with 130 incursions
during the first four months of 2001, compared with 118 during the same
period in 2000.
Federal Aviation Administrator Jane Garvey has called reducing runway
incidents "one of the most important FAA safety initiatives." The agency
has made changes in airport operations, offered training courses on runway
safety, and worked on improving communications between pilots and air
traffic controllers.
Carmody, sworn in last year to a five-year term on the board, became acting
chairwoman in January and will direct the agency until President Bush
nominates a new chairman.
Ten Feet From Catastrophe
May 15, 2001
On the heels of a United States National
Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) warning about runway incursions,
it was reported today that two planes came within 10 feet of disaster
as one of them taxied across a runway while the other was taking off.
The pilot of an American Airlines jet, bound for Chicago with 60 people
on board, was forced to lift off at Dallas Fort Worth Airport, Texas before
he had reached his normal take-off speed, according to NBC News.
Passengers screamed in terror as the pilot wrestled with the controls
to get off the ground and clear the cargo plane. With seconds to spare,
the jet's nose lifted and cleared the cargo aircraft by a mere 10 feet,
the report said.
Experts are calling the near-miss by a jet with a wing span of nearly
100 feet a "miracle". The miss was so close that the passenger pilot actually
thought he had clipped the cargo plane and radioed back to the tower to
tell them.
Assured that he had just missed a collision, he told controllers: "We're
quite shaken, but we are going to continue to Chicago."
The reason for the near disaster on Saturday night appears to be that
the cargo plane had been given permission to taxi from a hangar across
two runways to a parking area. In the dark, it made a wrong turn, back
on to the active take-off runway directly in the path of the American
Airlines jet.
Near collisions on US runways have been increasing recently, a result
of more planes in the same restricted space.
«So, here you have a lot of food for thought»
Meditate, gente, meditate!
