Beginnings.
I started as an air traffic controller at the international
airport Bratislava-Ivanka in October 1960. For a few months I worked at the
tower, and in January 1961, I joined the group of budding air traffic
controllers in Prague, who were there in the course that started back in
August 1960. After the course I was placed to the Area Air Traffic Control Centre
in Bratislava. The airport towers were responsible for the air traffic around
the airports (Bratislava, Piešt'any, Sliač, Poprad and Košice) to about 30
kilometres diameter, and to 3000 metres height. The Area ATC was responsible
for the air traffic over the entire territory of Slovakia, with the exception
of the airport areas.
People in the course were “from the streets”, i.e. without any
experience in aviation. The personnel at the Area Control Centre were similar;
a few of them used to work previously as telegraph operators.
Pictured below are the students at the air traffic control course at the airport Prague-Ruzyně in 1960-61:
Front row l-r: Janáč (standing with
briefcase), Hajdin, Šibík, Chlán, Múdry, Vadovič, Hurtík.
Rear row l-r: Mieszczak (with briefcase),
Krigler, ??, Mikuš, Verner, Štefáček, ??, ??, Košan, Chudomel, ??, Hatvani (hidden
behind the cap), ??, Zeman, ??, Komínek, ??, ??
Missing from this picture, as far as I remember: Drgo, Horňák, Šimurka a Vechter, all from Slovakia.
About half of us were from Slovakia (apart from one
the entire front row, plus a few in the rear). The lecturers in the course were
Czechs, and I was able to observe certain communication problem. The Slovakians
from along the border with the Czech part of the country, or those who spent
some time in the Czech environment were familiar with the Czech language. As to
me, Czech language was my mother’s tongue. The remainder of Slovakians,
especially those from central and eastern Slovakia, understood Czech language
but scantily. All the textbooks and literature provided to us were written in the
Czech language. The Slovaks were lagging in discussions, where they were viewed
as somewhat backward, especially because they were trying to speak slowly and
distinctly to make their Czech brethren to understand better.
At the time the country received new president,
Antonín Novotný, until then secretary of the ruling communist party. Being
Czech he was not kindly received by the Slovakians in our course, who were
expecting the Slovakian prime minister, Viliam Široký, to receive the (largely ceremonial)
post. Knowing about Široký enough to be sceptical about his ability I kept my
cool. When working as a land surveyor I spent half a day in the villa of Široký family in Bratislava, where I heard
many an unpleasant thing about this black sheep of the family (and also from
Gustl, my aide at the time); therefore, Novotný was to me more acceptable than Široký, although these communist apparatchiks
were all tarred by the same brush.
In the following years I heard similar complaints
about the Czech language from the new graduates of the courses in Prague, and I
began to promote the idea of organising such courses in Slovakia, and in
Slovakian language. I was experienced enough, for I was running similar courses
for pilots at the aero club of Vajnory, and in similar subjects: in about 1966
we ran one such course at the airport of Ivanka, where I lectured in about five
subjects.
I realised almost immediately that the task was a bit
beyond our ability, both professionally and organisationally – for instance, in
those days it was almost impossible to copy any written material. I tried to ask
for help elsewhere.
I tried to enlist help from my former Alma Mater: in
1961-63 I studied briefly part-time at the Transport university in Žilina. The course was called Economy and
Management of Air Transport (or similar). As it consisted of studying Soviet
methods of such management, I ceased attending; it was worthless and waste of
time. I wrote a letter to the Dean of my old faculty, outlining our efforts and
our problems, with a plea for help. Two weeks after posting the letter I asked
his secretary for an audience with him.
I did not get very far, for he chased me away from his
doorstep with loud abuses: such a poor student had the temerity to annoy Him
with something so outrageous!
As well, in my humble opinion at the time, I thought
that air traffic controllers should possess some practical experience of
flying. When I settled down in the office, I began talking some pilots from my
aero club to apply for the positions of air traffic controllers. We gained for
the ATC (and for the Ivanka Tower as well, I think) some 12 powered airplanes
pilots. I honestly tried to evaluate each and every of them for their aptitude
for the job, but some of them eventually turned out not to be up to the task,
and either dropped out, or toiled valiantly at something that was a little
beyond their ability. It seemed to me that an air traffic controller needs to
be in possession of something more, and that “something” was for me difficult
to define. After the first ten I refrained from trying to rope a few more in.
Here are some of those from the first “batch”, whom I
managed to get to my office at the Area Control Centre Bratislava. They were
excellent pilots, and they turned out to be excellent air traffic controllers
as well:
They are the third, fourth and fifth from the left: Laco Žemla, Karolko Žilinský and Ivan Weiss. First from
the left is Švancar,
a glider pilot, on the extreme right is Groh; second from left is Ivan Pucher,
a gifted and quality pilot. I was thinking of getting him as well, but for some
reasons it did not happen.
Ivan Weiss is retired after many years as professional
pilot, and still flies on occasions with his son, a captain on B737 with the
Czech Airlines. Laco and Karolko are dead: Lacko was killed during aerobatic at Očová,
Karolko during landing his air taxi L-200 at Sliač in difficult weather
conditions – may the Heaven of Airmen be kind to you, friends!
In the next article I'll make an attempt to explain the
ins and outs of the air traffic control at the time.
***
Recently I discovered my handwritten notes from 1973, which
I wrote as a preparation for my future Memoirs. I left out a few paragraphs from
those notes from some forgotten waters,
so I am attaching them here.
In 1967 I was at the airport in
Prague, where I met one of my acquaintances, Zdeněk Pohl, who worked at the State Aviation
Administration, in the corridor: "So you Slovaks finally got
it!". It turned out that it was decided to move the training of
new air traffic controllers from Slovakia to a course in Bratislava. I didn't
know anything about it
and at home in Bratislava our bosses only confirmed it to me: courses for new
intakes from Slovakia were supposed to be taught in Bratislava from 1968.
I was extremely busy at the time,
and after the
initial enthusiasm,
I forgot about it.
One day in June 1968, I came to
work and discovered that an unknown
young man was sitting next to the radar operator in my in my office. I asked
the shift manager who he was and I was told that he was a new worker and as of
today he was
in training. I went
to the bosses’ office, where it was confirmed to me, and when I asked when they
were going to start in the course, and where, and how, it was nicely explained to me in their village
dialect that "oh, you have it all here, and do it." "Even from
tomorrow?" I asked. "If you so desire then from tomorrow." This
was their formal way of appointing
me as the head of a six-month long course
for "dispatchers",
as we were then called.
I discovered that there were
about 7 or 8 of the new "dispatchers in
training", all newcomers who had signed up for an advertisement in the
newspaper; none of them were from aviation.
I went to the bosses again and
asked where we were supposed to be.
The answer was that "where you wish?" I found two empty rooms under
the airport tower, but they were cluttered with junk. I asked the bosses to have
it cleaned
up and they nodded reluctantly.
The next day I had a day off and
I invited those 7 or 8 young men there for eight
in the morning. They came, but the rooms were untouched, still cluttered. It
was a nice day in June 1968, one of the young men, by the name of Zezulka, had
an old car (Hillman Minx), we all stuffed ourselves into it and went to nearby Zlaté
piesky lake. There we sat in the grass, the young men went for a swim and I
scribbled my first lecture on a piece of paper. It was about meteorology, which
I knew almost by accident from lecturing in our Vajnory aero club courses.
And so, we spent a good four hours there, then we went to the canteen on Ivanka
for lunch and after that the new "dispatchers in training" dispersed
to their assigned offices.
On the second and third day I was
on duty, so we met again on the fourth day. The rooms were still untidy, we
were sitting (I think) in the canteen. I
don't remember what I lectured them for four hours,
unfortunately...
And unfortunately, that was the
end of our courses, because
my July and August 1968 were so busy that I barely had time to go to
the bathroom. And at the end of August of the same year, I was on my way to
Australia with my wife and two small children.
Many years
later,
it was added that
courses for new "air traffic controllers"
from Slovakia were held
every year at the airport in Poprad and the lecturers were mostly - Czechs.
A few years later, they
were finally moved to where they had belonged for the last 50 years
– to the Faculty of Aeronautics in Žilina.
When I had been abroad for many
years and was
reading my first texts written on my first computer in1985
(Apple Macintosh 128), a prosaic idea came to my mind, connected with
"remuneration for work", as salaries were then called.
"Rewards", as if a
person were only "rewarded"
for what he
does...
I was "rewarded"
as a dispatcher
of the lowest class; I worked on the improvement of our TOTALLY non-compliant
radiocommunication equipment
according to the law – without "remuneration"; I fought at
the headquarters in Prague for the relocation of courses for new
"dispatchers"
from Czech
Prague to Slovak Bratislava (for many Slovaks struggled with the
Czech language); I volunteered to be the organizer of these courses; I
proposed to the Žilina
University of Transport to take over these courses at their level (aviation
"dispatchers"
were supposed to have a university degree according to the law – NONE of us had
that)... And how was I rewarded for all this?
Only as a "dispatcher"
of the lowest class! Some of those who started with
me a few years previously and did nothing,
just went to and from work, were promoted to higher categories of
"rewards", became my managers, and made fun of me.
In the words of those
days, "why
do you struggle on your leash so much, you could have been a long way further
if you had any sense!".
Many years later,
I realized that organizations can be judged not only by the quality of their
workers, but also by the quality of those who are not promoted or denied
employment.
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