ARLINGTON, Va., - The recent arrival of Air National Guard air traffic controllers in Haiti has greatly increased the number of flights that are safely entering and leaving the country's air space.
"The test of how well we are assisting and helping with the on-going operation can be found in the numbers," said Scott Duke, chief of the Airfield Services Division for the Air National Guard. "Before our presence, the daily count for arrival aircraft was around 90 per day. This morning, the number is at 120 daily operations. That is impressive and when you add the complexity of finding parking spaces for these aircraft on an airport not designed for that many airframes, you can immediately see the benefit."
Currently, there are 12 Air Guard air traffic controllers deployed to Haiti as well as an airfield operations officer, said Duke. Additional air traffic control assets from the Air Guard are scheduled to arrive in Haiti within the next few days.
"Once they arrive at the airport, 50 percent of the Air National Guard's air traffic control squadrons will be directly supporting air traffic control operations at the airport," Duke said.
An airfield management team is also scheduled to be sent to the devastated country to help develop effective parking plans for aircraft, control vehicle traffic and manage flight plans for arriving and departing aircraft, said Duke.
But the role of the controllers is more than simply telling pilots when to take off and land.
"In the case of Port-Au-Prince, the capabilities of the air traffic controllers will be on display as they establish landing sequences to the airport, coordinate departure routes, and do all the kinds of things one would see at a typical airport," said Duke.
However, the airport at Port-au-Prince isn't a typical airport.
"Obviously, the conditions on the ground at the airport present different challenges to the controller force, as well as our airfield managers, as they both orchestrate the many moving parts of airport operations in a manner that keeps things safe and moving efficiently," said Duke.
The Air Guard controllers on the ground are trained and equipped to negotiate those challenges.
"Our air traffic control squadrons are equipped with not only deployable personnel, many of them FAA air traffic controllers in their civilian occupation, but possess the kind of tactical equipment needed to stand-up air traffic control operations at a bare base, austere landing environment, or, in the case of Port-Au-Prince … at an airport that has lost an ATC capability," Duke said.
Within the Air Force, the bulk of the air traffic control missions fall to the Air Guard.
"The Air National Guard comprises 62.5 percent of the Air Force's deployable ATC mission," said Duke. "The 'embarrassment of riches' we have in our community makes us the logical choice to turn to in time of disaster."
The Air Guard's controllers have plenty of experience running missions in a post-disaster situation such as Haiti. In 2005, they were sent to the Gulf Coast after Hurricane Katrina slammed ashore.
"We deployed our air traffic controllers and mobile control tower to the Gulfport-Biloxi International Airport and began to control traffic while the FAA worked on restoring the fixed control tower," said Duke. "These kinds of missions are exactly why the Air National Guard airfield services mission is so important to not only our wartime requirements, but support of civil authorities in time of need."
In the Katrina effort, the ATC squadrons sent to the Gulf Coast arrived on-station with mobile control towers. When they responded in Haiti, they left their own towers at home station and instead are using a Federal Aviation Administration mobile tower, which has brought on a few of its own challenges.
"This change required our controllers to get up-to-speed quickly on this new system, while at the same time learning all the local area information about the airport, arrival and departure paths, frequency assignments, and geographical lay of the airport," said Duke.
The air traffic controllers are scheduled to be on-station for up to 180 days, said Duke. Most will do a tour of 90 days and a follow-on group will rotate in for the remaining time.