AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 77

to go home and pack their bags.
They left with no idea how long
they'd be gone."
A VERY BIG MESS

Around noon, police with bombsniffing dogs cleared the Chicago
Center building, and controllers
and FAA managers went back
inside. The fire had largely been
contained to the basement, but
the damage to the communications
network was extensive.
FAA managers, technicians, and
controllers sketched out a plan for
getting air traffic moving again,
although at a vastly reduced rate.
Chicago Tracon, the approach control facility, was still at full strength.
With a redrawn air traffic map, different radio frequencies, and new
procedures, the surrounding air
route traffic control centers could
reach deeply into Chicago Center's
territory and, in some cases, coordinate arrivals and departures
directly with the tracon.
"The situation was so unusual
and so complex that, in the beginning, we didn't really know what
kind of help to ask for," Hall said
of the tracon. "Everything had to
be done manually and coordinated
by phone."
Instead of issuing published
standard instrument departures,
for example, controllers had
to manually write out individual flight plans for every aircraft
and read every clearance to all of
the controlling agencies before
releasing the aircraft. Controller
shifts were extended to 10 hours,
and most of that time was spent
on telephones.
Over the next 24 hours, about
220 Chicago Center controllers
dispersed themselves to other
centers as well as smaller ATC
facilities-such as South Bend,
Indiana; Milwaukee, Wisconsin;
and Moline and Rockford,

AN IMMENSE

91,000-square-mile
hole was torn in
the center of the
air traffic control
network by the
destruction at the
Chicago facility.

Illinois-which took over more
airspace, higher altitudes, and
quadruple their normal traffic volumes. Chicago controllers who had
previous experience at regional
facilities returned to them so that
they could be recertified quickly at
familiar locations.
"There have been tornadoes
and other events that have caused
ATC Zero situations before,"
Hauck said. "But they typically
last for minutes or a few hours.
The situation we were facing with
Chicago being out was unprecedented. We were in uncharted
territory."
DRAWING A MAP

At surrounding centers, FAA managers and air traffic controllers
struggled to answer seemingly
basic but suddenly imperative
questions. How far could their
radar see into Chicago airspace?
At what altitudes could pilots
communicate with controllers on
newly activated radio frequencies?
In Kansas City, controllers
discovered they could reach aircraft as far north as Joliet, Illinois,
and hand them off directly to
Chicago Tracon.
"We got out a map and started
hand-drawing lines on it," said
Aaron Merrick a 15-year Kansas
City Center controller. "We had
some seldom-used radio frequencies that helped extend our range."

Even though some of the 20 or
so Chicago Center controllers and
FAA managers who showed up at
Kansas City Center were assigned
to familiar airspace, many of the
procedures and frequencies had
changed. Surrounding centers
were directing a surge of highaltitude traffic that normally
would have gone over Chicago,
and ripple effects spread across
the continent. Jets coming into
Atlanta from the west, for example, were told to fly at far lower
altitudes than usual for hundreds
of miles because the airspace
above them was jammed.
Several radar positions at
Kansas City that normally are
used only at peak hours were
pressed into full-time service,
and both Chicago and Kansas City
controllers worked side by side.
"The Chicago controllers
blended right in, and the collaboration worked better than
anyone could have expected,"
Merrick said. "In fact, I've never
seen anything like it. We're constantly short of staffing, and now
we had three entirely new sectors
and an entirely new set of procedures. But the teamwork was
so phenomenal that we were
able to overcome the obstacles.
I've never been so proud to be a
controller."
At Chicago Center, technical
experts determined it would be
www.aopa.org/pilot AOPA PILOT | 77


http://www.aopa.org/pilot

AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015

Contents
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - Cover1
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - Cover2
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - Contents
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 2
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 3
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 4
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 5
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 6
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 7
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 8
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 9
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 10
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 11
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 12
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 13
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 14
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 15
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 16
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 17
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 18
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 19
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 20
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 21
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 22
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 23
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 24
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 25
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 26
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 27
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 28
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 29
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 30
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 31
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 32
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 33
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 34
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 35
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 36
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 37
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 38
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 39
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 40
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 41
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 42
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 43
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 44
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 45
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 46
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 47
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 48
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 49
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 50
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 51
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 52
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 53
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 54
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 55
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 56
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 57
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 58
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 59
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 60
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 61
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 62
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 63
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 64
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 65
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 66
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 67
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 68
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 69
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 70
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 71
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 72
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 73
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 74
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 75
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 76
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 77
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 78
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 79
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 80
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 81
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 82
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 83
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 84
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 85
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 86
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 87
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 88
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 89
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 90
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 91
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 92
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 93
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 94
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 95
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 96
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 97
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 98
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 99
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 100
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 101
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 102
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 103
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 104
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 105
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 106
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 107
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 108
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 109
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 110
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 111
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - 112
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - Cover3
AOPA Pilot Magazine - January 2015 - Cover4
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