=20 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- This article was sent to you by someone who found it on SF Gate. The original article can be found on SFGate.com here: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=3D/news/archive/2002/07/31/f= inancial0918EDT0041.DTL ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Wednesday, July 31, 2002 (AP) Annual air show in Oshkosh a Woodstock for pilots SCOTT MCCARTNEY, The Wall Street Journal (07-31) 06:18 PDT (AP) -- OSHKOSH, Wis. -- Air-traffic controller Michelle Wrobleski looked up in the sky and saw at least a dozen planes, bunched up like migrating geese. A few miles behind them were 15 or 20 more, all headed for the same place. "I see three Cessnas, there's a biplane on your left side. Watch out for him," she barked into her radio. "Twin Commander, you need to make a left 360. You're too fast. White Bonanza, you're converging on a Cessna. Turn left NOW! There you go. Beautiful!" To keep the airwaves free, the pilots acknowledge her rapid-fire orders solely by rocking their wings. So heavy is the traffic that three planes at a time land on the same runway. "Orange aircraft, I don't know what you are, but you're orange," another air-traffic controller snapped. "Land on the green dot. Welcome to Oshkosh." Once a year, about 12,000 small aircraft converge on Oshkosh, Wis., for one of aviation's most revered gatherings. So many prop planes, military jets, antique war birds, homemade experimental aircraft, plus the occasional 747 or Concorde, fly in for the seven-day air show that Oshkosh temporarily becomes the world's busiest airport. For this year's show, which ended Monday, the pilgrimage of pilots involved 19,000 takeoffs and landings over 10 days. To get so many planes in and out, the Federal Aviation Administration suspends its normal air-traffic rules. That makes the show the all-star game for air-traffic controllers, a chance to test their skills under some of the toughest conditions imaginable. This year, the FAA picked 73 of its Great Lakes region's best controllers for Oshkosh duty. Every year, there are minor mishaps, such as botched landings. But, miraculously, the show has never had a mid-air collision or a serious accident during the comings and goings coordinated by FAA controllers. Among performers, who fly at their own risk without FAA guidance, the last fatality was 12 years ago. Bob Richards finds Oshkosh a far bigger adrenaline rush than his regular air-traffic control job at O'Hare International Airport, typically the nation's busiest. "This has all the mayhem of O'Hare, only more," said Mr. Richards, who was working his second Oshkosh air show. "Landing three planes on a runway at the same time -- you live to do stuff like that." The show has become something of a laboratory for finding new ways of directing airplanes or communicating with pilots. Controllers can learn new skills here that could help as the FAA tries to boost capacity by reducing the separation it requires between planes around airports and at cruising altitudes. The FAA has applied some practices developed here to regular air-traffic management, such as organizing controllers into teams to more-safely manage high volumes of planes. But most of what's allowed at Oshkosh would never fly at commercial airports. "We have Oshkosh rules, and this is where they stay," says Manny Torres, the FAA's Green Bay manager, who leads its Oshkosh team. Normally, the FAA allows one plane on a runway at a time. But the longest runway at Oshkosh has three giant dots painted on it, a mere 1,500 feet apart -- one white, one bright green and one fluorescent orange. The dots become touchdown points for simultaneous landings. A taxiway is turned into a narrow runway during the show. In all, controllers can land nine planes at a time on three runways. Once on the ground, planes must immediately pull off onto the grass and get to a parking place. Controllers are too busy to use radar, or even normal call signs for airplanes. With binoculars, they pick planes out of the sky and identify them by color and aircraft type. Three spotters work with one communicator, who relays their instructions via radio. "High-wing tail-dragger, rock your wings and rock 'em hard so I can see you. V-tail Bonanza, start your turn now," one of this year's controllers said over his radio. "Malibu, left turn into the grass now. Get off the runway NOW! Have a good show." To help direct traffic, controllers, clad in bright pink shirts, are posted in teams of four at the edge of runways on mobile operations and communications wagons -- radio-equipped hay carts dubbed "Moo Cows." Another four-person team works out of a camper seven miles from Oshkosh = to space out the flow of approaching airplanes. It also assigns runways and tells pilots to follow bright-orange plywood arrows, laid alongside railroad tracks, to find their way to the airport. At least three teams man the control tower. For a small-plane pilot, flying into Oshkosh (pop. 63,000) is a pilgrima= ge to make at least once in a lifetime. The gathering, sponsored by the Experimental Aircraft Association, is a Woodstock of sorts for the flying set, with pilots camping in tents beside their planes and hanging wet towels on propellers to dry. But getting in and out can be terrifying. To avoid the crush, Sean Fulton piloted a rented Piper from New York's Long Island to nearby Appleton, Wis. On the way in, he says he saw a line of planes below him flying so close that one twin-engine aircraft looked like it was towing the single-engine behind it. On his first day at the show, Grand Rapids, Mich., air-traffic controller David Musser, an Oshkosh rookie, worked on a team that handled 100 airplanes in only 30 minutes. "I'm a pilot, too, and I'd never fly in here," he said. "For a pilot, it must be like chaos." It is. Don Kirkpatrick from Waynesboro, Va., was about seven miles from Oshkosh when landings were suddenly shut off and he was told to circle his Piper Warrior over Rush Lake. The reason: the arrival of a pack of 85 single-engine Mooney aircraft, flying in formation. Strong winds were limiting the airport to only one runway, meaning it would take 40 minutes to get the Mooneys down. Soon, Mr. Kirkpatrick found himself flying laps with about a half-dozen other planes. Farther back, more than a dozen planes were circling over the town of Ripon, a key checkpoint. "There were so many planes, I was afraid one would run into us, or I'd r= un into one," Mr. Kirkpatrick said. Out his window, his co-pilot, Keith Cooter, could see one plane stacked = on top of another, maybe 200 feet apart. "I would have been puckering up if I had been in that plane," said Mr. Cooter. The waiting pilots grew more anxious as Ms. Wrobleski, the air traffic controller, reminded them that the airport had to close at 8 p.m., leaving only 30 minutes or so to get everyone in after the Mooneys. "Once they were given the green light to land, Ms. Wrobleski had an aeri= al assault on her hands. Planes raced toward Oshkosh; she rattled off orders trying to keep them apart. "Fly at 1,800 feet. Fly at 90 knots. Find someone to follow. Come on down!" she belted out. And, three by three, they did. =20 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright 2002 AP