5 ms·

If they are understaff (namely giga honest, super solid competent people for air traffic ground control), you have to reduce air traffic as it is way too danger

If they are understaff (namely giga honest, super solid competent people for air traffic ground control), you have to reduce air traffic as it is way too dangerous. For this kind of staff, it is not just a matter of "training", it is way more demanding.

giantg2 2y ago
Or you modernize the system (not just tech but potentially the procedures). Kind of stupid to increase air traffic and traffic density over decades and just expect the old systems to scale.
- taeric 2y ago
  Modernizing a system while it is in use is high risk. Absurdly high risk. Might still be needed, but is not a cheap or quick thing.
  - robocat 2y ago
    The implication is some sort of greenfield change-everything-at-once idea? There is no choice but to do the alternative: modify and modernise all our critical systems piecemeal over decades while they are running, covered by the business cliche "We are building the plane, while flying it." We all naively desire (especially politicians) the software concept of the big rewrite, the version 2, project phoenix, Second-System Syndrome. With development experience we learn both the psychological pull of the concept and we learn why it is so hard to do successfully. It always seems so simple how to fix societal systems we have no experience with. Successful systems slowly improve, slowly introduce and prove new ideas, slowly accrete changes: we accept the costs of vestigial path-dependent aspects and technical debt. One of the incredible learning experiences of developing software systems is that it is a huge melting pot of different techniques that are iterated quickly (fast parallel evolution and proving) and the knowledge diffuses between people and teams and organisations. The waterfall model is rarely used! I believe we are now seeing those skills and techniques be applied to other system domains - especially high growth businesses.
    - taeric 2y ago
      This sounds like an agreement?
- cogman10 2y ago
  I'm not sure this is something that is solved by tech. It sounds like they simply don't have enough staff, whether that a budget problem or hiring problem IDK. The article mentions they have a 50% reduction in new hires which either says it's hard to be competent, the job is too demanding, or both. They had 1 tower with 1 operator and no redundancy at a fairly busy airport, which is definitely concerning.
  - leeoniya 2y ago
    > I'm not sure this is something that is solved by tech in this case it seems like it could definitely have been solved by tech. both aircraft were traveling at predictable paths and opertating nominally.
    - wongarsu 2y ago
      In the leaked ATC recording, the display is showing a collision alert before the impact. It just doesn't have any capability to do anything about them, it has to rely on the air traffic controller to resolve the issue. You could argue that helicopters, being very nimble craft, should have ADS-B receivers and provide display and sound their own collision warnings to their pilots. That's perfectly possible, I just don't think it's mandated
  - jandrewrogers 2y ago
    This is a nearly perfect problem for tech. We solve and automate very similar problems in other contexts at scale but FAA is extremely conservative about tech.
  - giantg2 2y ago
    Your comment assumes the current system can be scaled indefinitely. But you also acknowledge that we can't currently fill the staffing. I also explicitly called out that the modernization might not be tech changes but procedure changes (realistically it would likely be procedure changes made possible through tech). Doing something to distribute information differently could result in redundancy such that if the commercial craft have a 1-3 mile ADS-B view around them, they can check that ATC isn't giving them bad instructions and that others are following directions.
- fzeroracer 2y ago
  Modernize the system how? Like do you have explicit steps on how to modernize it and what needs to be done?
  - giantg2 2y ago
    They're working on multiple technical upgrades already, and some airports have been upgraded. I think better information distribution is one thing. Large craft could have ADS-B (or ATC's view) tracking of a 1-3 mile bubble displayed to them. This would add a check to being blindly told what to do and blindly trusting that others are doing what they're told. You could change certain procedures such as the military having one pilot use NVG while the other not when flying in high traffic and high illumination airspace. No reason we can't add better sensors to planes when you think about all the collision detection we are adding in cars. I'm sure there are many other things that can be changed as well. Some of it's the pace. Stuff that's already been piloted and shown to be effective is still taking forever to roll out at the other airports.
    - coin 2y ago
      > Large craft could have ADS-B tracking of a 1-3 mile bubble displayed to them. This would add a check to being blindly told what to do and blindly trusting that others are doing what they're told. Already exists, it's called TCAS
      - giantg2 2y ago
        That doesn't work with all transponders, right? Many private or military craft don't work with that system.
        coin 2y ago
        TCAS works with Mode-C (same as military Mode 3).
        giantg2 2y ago
- nradov 2y ago
  It is being modernized through the Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen). This will take decades and a huge amount of funding. https://www.faa.gov/nextgen https://www.faa.gov/nextgen They accept public comments so all of the armchair aviation experts on HN should probably send them an email and explain how they can solve all the problems by connecting ChatGPT to a controller console.
  - hooo 2y ago
    Why does it have to take decades? That sounds insane
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - taeric 2y ago
      To modernize a running system, you have to duplicate everything so that you can someday do a switchover. For commerce tech, you switch, see what breaks, switch back and adjust for next try. You may have lost some sales. But probably just inconvenienced people. When doing travel systems, something breaking is likely a lot of deaths.
    - MichaelZuo 2y ago
      Have you read the various reports that are available right there on the web page?
    - wongarsu 2y ago
      A wide variety of decades-old aircraft, and even newer aircraft are often modernized versions of ancient aircraft models. All of them built and operated with the motto "if it ain't broke, don't fix it", because every change brings risk (and costs money). There was also a lot of resistance to the idea that every aircraft should broadcast its position, heading, etc. because of privacy concerns. And as long as there are holdouts the tower can't rely on the information being available
    - hkpack 2y ago
      Large infrastructure projects always take decades. Look at the railroad development in EU for example. You have to invent a lot of tech (signaling, communication between trains, interoperability with old systems), build a lot of infrastructure, train a lot of people and roll it out at scale with the goal of zero accidents. It is just impossible to do quickly.
jfengel 2y ago
They won't cut traffic for the same reason they are understaffed: money. Raise pay until you have enough staff. It's not always that simple, but sometimes it is. Not everyone could do it, but a lot of people could. You just have to pay them to attract them from more lucrative jobs (which includes training them to do it). Instead they'll pay as little as they can, and occasionally pay to replace an aircraft.
- onlyrealcuzzo 2y ago
  > They won't cut traffic for the same reason they are understaffed: money. Raise pay until you have enough staff. It's really not that simple. It's a 3-year training process. There's really nothing that's going to get you adequately staffed in the short term. Sure, that could solve the problem medium term.
  - mbreese 2y ago
    I think you’ve found the root issue. There is no short term fix. And our current governmental setup isn’t capable of handling medium to long term problems. It has been this way for quite a while, so this issue isn’t new. Long-term political will isn’t there, so if the problem can’t be fixed quickly, it’s as if there is no possible solution.
    - icegreentea2 2y ago
      This may be true, but it's not properly reflective of this particular situation. While it's true that it takes 2-3 years to fully certify, the initial academy (a few months long) still has limited spots. ATC staffing problems did not just appear this week. The FAA is limited by Congress in how to deploy its budget towards recruitment. Congress passed a bill earlier in 2024 authorizing the FAA to hire at the maximum capacity possible (https://www.govexec.com/workforce/2024/05/faa-will-soon-be-able-hire-thousands-new-staff-reauthorization-bill-heads-bidens-desk/396599/ https://www.govexec.com/workforce/2024/05/faa-will-soon-be-a...). Action is possible. We've known since the initial post-COVID travel bump that the FAA was short on controllers - these could have been addressed potentially as early as late 2022. Infact a 2-3 year timeframe is absolutely short enough to count as "short term". Thats within an election cycle.
BurningFrog 2y ago
Seems like a job for computers, or at least heavily aided by computers. Though this crash was probably just the helicopter flying the wrong altitude.
repiret 2y ago
> as it is way too dangerous. What led you to that belief? Air travel is one of the safest ways to get from here to there, and it’s widely enough used that clearly not very many people think it is too dangerous to use.

giantg2 2y ago

Or you modernize the system (not just tech but potentially the procedures). Kind of stupid to increase air traffic and traffic density over decades and just expect the old systems to scale.

taeric 2y ago
Modernizing a system while it is in use is high risk. Absurdly high risk. Might still be needed, but is not a cheap or quick thing.
- robocat 2y ago
  The implication is some sort of greenfield change-everything-at-once idea? There is no choice but to do the alternative: modify and modernise all our critical systems piecemeal over decades while they are running, covered by the business cliche "We are building the plane, while flying it." We all naively desire (especially politicians) the software concept of the big rewrite, the version 2, project phoenix, Second-System Syndrome. With development experience we learn both the psychological pull of the concept and we learn why it is so hard to do successfully. It always seems so simple how to fix societal systems we have no experience with. Successful systems slowly improve, slowly introduce and prove new ideas, slowly accrete changes: we accept the costs of vestigial path-dependent aspects and technical debt. One of the incredible learning experiences of developing software systems is that it is a huge melting pot of different techniques that are iterated quickly (fast parallel evolution and proving) and the knowledge diffuses between people and teams and organisations. The waterfall model is rarely used! I believe we are now seeing those skills and techniques be applied to other system domains - especially high growth businesses.
  - taeric 2y ago
    This sounds like an agreement?
cogman10 2y ago
I'm not sure this is something that is solved by tech. It sounds like they simply don't have enough staff, whether that a budget problem or hiring problem IDK. The article mentions they have a 50% reduction in new hires which either says it's hard to be competent, the job is too demanding, or both. They had 1 tower with 1 operator and no redundancy at a fairly busy airport, which is definitely concerning.
- leeoniya 2y ago
  > I'm not sure this is something that is solved by tech in this case it seems like it could definitely have been solved by tech. both aircraft were traveling at predictable paths and opertating nominally.
  - wongarsu 2y ago
    In the leaked ATC recording, the display is showing a collision alert before the impact. It just doesn't have any capability to do anything about them, it has to rely on the air traffic controller to resolve the issue. You could argue that helicopters, being very nimble craft, should have ADS-B receivers and provide display and sound their own collision warnings to their pilots. That's perfectly possible, I just don't think it's mandated
- jandrewrogers 2y ago
  This is a nearly perfect problem for tech. We solve and automate very similar problems in other contexts at scale but FAA is extremely conservative about tech.
- giantg2 2y ago
  Your comment assumes the current system can be scaled indefinitely. But you also acknowledge that we can't currently fill the staffing. I also explicitly called out that the modernization might not be tech changes but procedure changes (realistically it would likely be procedure changes made possible through tech). Doing something to distribute information differently could result in redundancy such that if the commercial craft have a 1-3 mile ADS-B view around them, they can check that ATC isn't giving them bad instructions and that others are following directions.
fzeroracer 2y ago
Modernize the system how? Like do you have explicit steps on how to modernize it and what needs to be done?
- giantg2 2y ago
  They're working on multiple technical upgrades already, and some airports have been upgraded. I think better information distribution is one thing. Large craft could have ADS-B (or ATC's view) tracking of a 1-3 mile bubble displayed to them. This would add a check to being blindly told what to do and blindly trusting that others are doing what they're told. You could change certain procedures such as the military having one pilot use NVG while the other not when flying in high traffic and high illumination airspace. No reason we can't add better sensors to planes when you think about all the collision detection we are adding in cars. I'm sure there are many other things that can be changed as well. Some of it's the pace. Stuff that's already been piloted and shown to be effective is still taking forever to roll out at the other airports.
  - coin 2y ago
    > Large craft could have ADS-B tracking of a 1-3 mile bubble displayed to them. This would add a check to being blindly told what to do and blindly trusting that others are doing what they're told. Already exists, it's called TCAS
    - giantg2 2y ago
      That doesn't work with all transponders, right? Many private or military craft don't work with that system.
      - coin 2y ago
        TCAS works with Mode-C (same as military Mode 3).
        giantg2 2y ago
nradov 2y ago
It is being modernized through the Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen). This will take decades and a huge amount of funding. https://www.faa.gov/nextgen https://www.faa.gov/nextgen They accept public comments so all of the armchair aviation experts on HN should probably send them an email and explain how they can solve all the problems by connecting ChatGPT to a controller console.
- hooo 2y ago
  Why does it have to take decades? That sounds insane
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - taeric 2y ago
    To modernize a running system, you have to duplicate everything so that you can someday do a switchover. For commerce tech, you switch, see what breaks, switch back and adjust for next try. You may have lost some sales. But probably just inconvenienced people. When doing travel systems, something breaking is likely a lot of deaths.
  - MichaelZuo 2y ago
    Have you read the various reports that are available right there on the web page?
  - wongarsu 2y ago
    A wide variety of decades-old aircraft, and even newer aircraft are often modernized versions of ancient aircraft models. All of them built and operated with the motto "if it ain't broke, don't fix it", because every change brings risk (and costs money). There was also a lot of resistance to the idea that every aircraft should broadcast its position, heading, etc. because of privacy concerns. And as long as there are holdouts the tower can't rely on the information being available
  - hkpack 2y ago
    Large infrastructure projects always take decades. Look at the railroad development in EU for example. You have to invent a lot of tech (signaling, communication between trains, interoperability with old systems), build a lot of infrastructure, train a lot of people and roll it out at scale with the goal of zero accidents. It is just impossible to do quickly.

jfengel 2y ago

They won't cut traffic for the same reason they are understaffed: money. Raise pay until you have enough staff. It's not always that simple, but sometimes it is. Not everyone could do it, but a lot of people could. You just have to pay them to attract them from more lucrative jobs (which includes training them to do it). Instead they'll pay as little as they can, and occasionally pay to replace an aircraft.

onlyrealcuzzo 2y ago
> They won't cut traffic for the same reason they are understaffed: money. Raise pay until you have enough staff. It's really not that simple. It's a 3-year training process. There's really nothing that's going to get you adequately staffed in the short term. Sure, that could solve the problem medium term.
- mbreese 2y ago
  I think you’ve found the root issue. There is no short term fix. And our current governmental setup isn’t capable of handling medium to long term problems. It has been this way for quite a while, so this issue isn’t new. Long-term political will isn’t there, so if the problem can’t be fixed quickly, it’s as if there is no possible solution.
  - icegreentea2 2y ago
    This may be true, but it's not properly reflective of this particular situation. While it's true that it takes 2-3 years to fully certify, the initial academy (a few months long) still has limited spots. ATC staffing problems did not just appear this week. The FAA is limited by Congress in how to deploy its budget towards recruitment. Congress passed a bill earlier in 2024 authorizing the FAA to hire at the maximum capacity possible (https://www.govexec.com/workforce/2024/05/faa-will-soon-be-able-hire-thousands-new-staff-reauthorization-bill-heads-bidens-desk/396599/ https://www.govexec.com/workforce/2024/05/faa-will-soon-be-a...). Action is possible. We've known since the initial post-COVID travel bump that the FAA was short on controllers - these could have been addressed potentially as early as late 2022. Infact a 2-3 year timeframe is absolutely short enough to count as "short term". Thats within an election cycle.

BurningFrog 2y ago

Seems like a job for computers, or at least heavily aided by computers. Though this crash was probably just the helicopter flying the wrong altitude.

repiret 2y ago

> as it is way too dangerous. What led you to that belief? Air travel is one of the safest ways to get from here to there, and it’s widely enough used that clearly not very many people think it is too dangerous to use.