Comparisson_Essay

Air Traffic Controlling Air traffic controlling is one of the most stressful jobs in America. This job has a lot of traits needed to succeed. You need to be able to stay focused, concentrate, and be able to take the stress. Two of the sources that were used were The Bureau of Labor Statistics and Vocational Bibliographies. These sources have good information but different viewpoints of the same topic. In the first article at The Bureau of Labor Statistics it explains a lot of information and details in the article. It also shows how the work environment is quoted here, During busy times, controllers must work rapidly and efficiently. Total concentration is required to keep track of several planes at the same time and to make certain that all pilots receive correct instructions. The mental stress of being responsible for the safety of several aircraft and their passengers can be exhausting. This shows how stressful this job is. Within this article it also talks about the education and training needed to qualify for this job. It shows how you have three main paths through the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), Department of Defense, or the general public. It also explains other qualifications needed to join quoted here “These applicants must have 3 years of progressively responsible full-time work experience, have completed a full 4 years of college, or a combination of both”. This article was very helpful in the research of this topic. In the second article from Vocational Bibliographies it explained more about a day in the life of an Air Traffic Controller. This article talked about how Air Traffic Controllers start off a day and how they feel in their work environment stated here “The stress level in the tower, especially when we’re very busy, can be very high. We’re responsible for so many lives, and we must make our decisions quickly and correctly. That’s why controllers work as a team in the tower, keeping extra eyes out for potential problems even as we make individual decisions on the movement of aircraft on the ground and in the air.”(1) They also talk about how being up in the tower can be different from being down in the radar room because up in the tower you can see out at the runway and its bright, in the radar room its dark and all you see is little blips on the radar scope. This can make the job even more stressful. Another topic they touch on is the equipment used by Air Traffic Controllers, for instance one of the pieces of equipment use is a computer that gathers weather information; they also use equipment that can tell the wind speed, locate and track planes, and that can tell the altitude and speed of planes. Air Traffic Controllers make is safe to fly stated here “Aviation in this country is extremely safe. In any 24-hour period, over 100,000 IFR [instrument flight rules] aircraft take to the skies, and the mistakes pilots and air traffic controllers make are negligible.”(1) I though this article was very helpful and educational. In the end both of these articles were extremely helpful and showed me a lot about what it’s like to be an Air Traffic Controller. The first article was very fact oriented and had a lot of information; the second article was more as if a person was talking to you about their job and was more about their feelings and work environment. These articles were both helpful but The Bureau of Labor Statistics had more information. These articles were just from two different viewpoints in the end.