Military
Air Traffic Control Fully Certified
Air Traffic Control Time Certified In Pos 1 (yrs) 28
Confusion; Training / Qualification; Communication Breakdown
ATC Issue All Types; Deviation - Track / Heading All Types; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Clearance; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy
Flight Crew Returned To Clearance
Procedure
This is a known event reported to the Operations Manager by another Support Specialist within a few hours of its occurrence. The Support Specialist was in the Tower and observed the Class B overflight of Aircraft X. He also observed that Local Controller (LC) 3 was; in effect; trying to put Runway XX departures on the cleared (DP) Departure Procedure by 'not issuing a heading with the takeoff clearance.' This is not in accordance with our SOP or with the LOA. The voice file had no record of a coordination with Departure Controller to allow this. Instead of issuing a turn to Aircraft Y; LC3 appeared to rely on the departure joining the DP in order to achieve divergence from Aircraft X; flight of two overflying the airport on helicopter Route 7. When Aircraft Y failed to turn as expected; LC3 told the aircraft that he was supposed to join the DP and to turn and join the RNLDI3 departure. Traffic was not called to either aircraft. Presumably; LC3 was providing visual separation and no loss of separation occurred. LC3 Controller has not had any RTF type training. During LC3's hour-long session; of the 40 departures off Runway 30; 14 were not assigned headings or 'fly runway heading.' Of the 14 departures who were not given a heading; 8 asked questions about it or just didn't join the DP. LC3 then told the pilots they were supposed to join the DP because a heading wasn't issued at takeoff. Without coordination; local controllers are not supposed to be doing this. Pilots are not used to doing this at ZZZ. Being confused by ATC as to what heading to fly once airborne; is an unsafe situation. One Controller; who observed this in the Tower; was so upset that he came to the staff that afternoon to verify that locals are to issue headings with the takeoff clearance. We confirmed that [they are] and also cleared up some misunderstanding about how Clearance Delivery issues a clearance when a DP is in the route of flight. It is unknown why the Tower FLM did not stop LC3 from continuing these non-compliant practices. When I went to the Tower the next morning; that Controller was trying to tell LC3 (now working LC1) that putting departures on the DP is ZZZ Departure's job. LC1 was not buying it saying that 'they' consulted the publications and that it was legal. 'They' in this case might have been the Controller's spouse who is a Radar Controller at ZZZ TRACON and may have been the Departure Controller in the above scenario. I did not ask ZZZ TRACON if that was the case; however. I was so mad that this Controller still believed this - one day after the original occurrences; that I had to leave the Tower. I thought the OM would have put a stop to it. So I created a FALCON replay with voice (bookmarked) and later a Camtasia (attached) to make available to the management team. Then I advised the ATM and asked for him to intervene. As for the handling of Aircraft X; LC1 chose not to say 'radar contact;' but to provide separation in the Class B by assigning a helicopter route until visual separation could be applied. We are checking with the NCRCC to see if having a wingman stop squawking is an acceptable practice in the SFRA; the second time we have done this. LC1 also did not manually write a flight progress strip as required by the SOP.1) Remove the OM from duty. Having known about the non-compliance; he failed to act quickly to ensure that this controller would cease doing it.2) IPM for LC3 and the FLM on duty.3) Get a quick answer from NCRCC regarding having wingman to squawk or not squawk and pass the word to the facility.4) Somehow stop the trend at this facility of local controllers not making traffic calls and not properly employing visual separation. Refresher training; safety assurance alert bulletins; simulator training; whatever it takes.5) Most important; the majority of our controllers who are making these mistakes have not had RTF type training. Exchanging traffic and applying visual separation is secondnature to radar controllers. YOU MUST START GIVING CONTROLLERS AT TOWERS WITH CLASS B; RTF TYPE TRAINING.
Staff specialist describes a situation where a Local Controller is not performing by the LOA and an Operations Manager does nothing about it at the time.