Air traffic controller asleep as planes land

Photo / Thinkstock

Federal aviation officials are reviewing air traffic controller staffing at airports around the United States after two airliners landed at Reagan National Airport without clearance from the airport tower because they were unable to raise anyone there.

An aviation official said an air traffic supervisor - the lone controller on duty around midnight local time when the incident occurred - had fallen asleep.

The pilots of the two planes were in contact with controllers at a regional Federal Aviation Administration facility about 64km away in Virginia, Peter Knudson, a spokesman for the National Transportation Safety Board, said yesterday.

After pilots were unable to raise the airport tower by radio, they asked controllers in Warrenton to call the tower, Knudson said. Repeated calls from the regional facility to the tower went unanswered, he said.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, responding to the incident, said that he has directed FAA to put two air traffic controllers on the midnight shift at Reagan National.

"It is not acceptable to have just one controller in the tower managing air traffic in this critical air space," LaHood said.

Reagan National is located in Northern Virginia just across the Potomac River from Washington.

LaHood also said he has directed FAA Administrator Randy Babbitt to study tower staffing at other airports around the country.

NTSB is gathering information on the occurrence to decide whether to open a formal investigation, Knudson said.

Regional air traffic facilities handle aircraft within roughly a 80km radius of an airport, but landings, takeoffs and planes within about 5km of an airport are handled by controllers in the airport tower. The planes involved were American Airlines Flight 1012, a Boeing 737 with 91 passengers and 6 crew members on board, and United Airlines Flight 628T, an Airbus A320 with 63 passengers and five crew members.

"The NTSB is conducting an investigation and we are doing our own review," United spokesman Charles Hobart said.

FAA spokeswoman Laura Brown said the agency "is looking into staffing issues and whether existing procedures were followed appropriately".

It's unlikely the safety of the planes was at risk since the pilots would have used a radio frequency for the airport tower to advise nearby aircraft of their intention to land and to make sure that no other planes also intended to land at that time, aviation safety experts said.

Also, controllers at the regional facility, using radar, would have been able to advise the pilots of other nearby planes, experts said. The primary risk would have been if there was equipment on the runway when the planes landed, they said.

- AP