Envy and other incomprehensible things
We were off to a turbulent start when the “old-timers” discovered that our starting salaries were the same as the salary of a controller after one year… we were certainly not to blame for this disparity but took all the flack nevertheless. Some of the more senior colleagues from the approach control unit had a few axes to grind also… it took a few years for me to find out why.
Flack or axes, we loved the tower work. There were four teams and I was in Team C, together with my friend ZG. This was a good arrangement, it was easier to make time pass together and we made fun out of just about everything. There were things most controllers hated to do. Like for instance having the flight progress strips torn off and inserted in their holders.
This had to be done the night before the strips would be used and the complement was for the whole day (we did not have just in time strip printing back then). So we started the night shift with attending to the strips while the “big” guys worked. Why they hated doing this so much was a mystery but for us it was a perfect opportunity for a fun competition. Who was the fastest at tearing the strips and inserting them individually into the holders? We timed everyone and we had everything from individual records to world records… Another activity apparently below the dignity of more senior colleagues was exchanging the soda bottles. The tower was supplied with a few crates of sparkling water and the empty bottles had to be taken to the terminal where they were exchanged for filled ones. This “catering” duty was just one more occasion to have some extra fun, for us anyway. Some colleagues back then would not be seen dead with one of those crates. Why I could never understand.
Work, study, work
Of course alongside all the fun we managed to find time also for work. At first under supervision and once we got checked out on all the working positions, we got our license and endorsements and we could start earning our keep on our own.
This was not the end of learning by the way. For us who had completed the ATC course in Riga, the next compulsory hurdle was obtaining a high school diploma from the Gyor Transportation College. This meant two years of correspondence courses while also working. I do not think any other group before or hence had to study so much to become an air traffic controller. Two and a half years in Riga, a one year course in Budapest and two years in Gyor. We were seriously over trained, something the older colleagues could not stomach and they made this known at every juncture, at times in rather nasty ways. Why we should be the butt of their ire was a mistery.
Taxi if you please
The runway arrangement in Budapest is the so called bayonet system and when the new runway was handed over and the old runway was closed for reconstruction, the taxi distance to Runway 31R became a cool 10 km. There was no way around this, the new terminal and apron were still being built…
Taxi times varied wildly with the speed apparently depending on national character. The slowest time was booked by a Libyan Boeing 727 which took 45 minutes to get to the holding position. The fastest is not that difficult to guess. Malev pilots, like most local airline drivers, tended to think that they could get away with anything… except that we “nasty” controllers kept interfering with their fun.
But we were on good terms with most of the Malev guys nevertheless. We attended yearly recreation stints together and that was a great opportunity to discuss all manner of issues over a glass of “soda”… For some reason next evening we usually did not remember what the subject of the discussion was the previous day and we could start all over…
It matters where you sit…
The original working position set-up in the tower was such that the runway controller and his assistant would always face the landing direction while the ground controller stayed put regardless of landing direction.
In time we found out that radio contact with the aircraft was very poor when sitting in position for landing direction 13. Why this should be so was never established… But moving from one position to the other and then back again was a hassle controllers did not much like, so for many years we handled all traffic from the working positions meant to serve landing direction 31 only. Sitting with our backs to the traffic landing on 13 was preferable to the “suffering” experienced when trying to work from the dedicated positions.
Using runway 13 was always more exciting than 31…
To be continued…