Air Traffic Controller Let Kids Do Job Twice, Pilot Defends Him

After news broke yesterday that an air traffic controller at JFK airport let his young son clear planes for takeoff five times on February 16th, it emerged that the father did it again the next day with the boy's twin sister. The controller, Glenn Duffy, 48, of Stony Brook, Long Island, has been suspended, along with one supervisor; they'll both draw full salaries during the investigation. The Post has audio of the girl clearing planes for take off—she sounds even cuter than her brother, and a pilot can be heard telling her "nicely done, see you later." Now, these shenanigans may seem reckless to the layman, but professional pilots insist it was all completely harmless.

"I can assure you that at no time was the safety of the public compromised," retired airline pilot Ross (Rusty) Aimer tells the Daily News. "This was really a non-event. It's almost like putting your child in your lap in an empty parking lot for the first time and letting him hold onto the wheel. The air-traffic controller was in command the whole time." As captive passengers in the back seat of this theoretical "car," we're not so reassured.

FAA honcho Randy Babbitt says, "This lapse in judgment not only violated FAA's own policies, but common sense standards for professional conduct. These kinds of distractions are totally unacceptable." In the wake of the incidents, the FAA has temporarily suspended "all unofficial visits to FAA air-traffic control operational areas, such as towers and radar rooms." And the Times, looking ahead to next month's "Take Your Child to Work Day," warns readers about other professions that might not be so kid-friendly. (Nothing about blogging in here, so brace for a Gothamist cuuute overload on April 22nd!)

Contact the author of this article or email tips@gothamist.com with further questions, comments or tips.

By John Del Signore in News on March 4, 2010 12:17 PM

Comments [rss]

donewithny

do any of you negative bloggers have a father?i didn't,but i wish i did and would have loved to have gone to work with him.so,when my son was old enough,i took him to work with me.i had a very dangerous job,he rode along with me on runs and sat and ate with me and my co-workers.to him it was like heaven to be there with me.his memories of those days will last a lifetime,and i know he will follow in my footsteps and i will be proud.i'm sure the air traffic controllers son was in heaven that day as he sat on his dads lap and helped dad do his job,something he will cherish forever.sad that he was made to feel that he cost his dad his job by people like some of you here that want this guy hung for making a child's dream come true.i miss the old days when it was okay to be human.

Atarigirl

The people who are making a big deal about this and want this guy fired seem frigid and....cold in bed. Just saying, I'm 99.99% sure they are bad at lovemaking and have never had a night of hot passionate amazing sex. Bring it on.....but you kinda know its true..

robingee

Dude was wrong.

PresidentSuit

What could possibly go wrong? The kid was just giving instructions to airplanes weighing thousands of pounds and carrying hundreds of passengers. Like the old saying says "Ya buys yer ticket and ya takes yer chance." They said his father was right there with him. Next we can have kids operating the heavy cranes at construction sites and ports and maybe assisting surgeon dad with open heart surgery like this: http://patrioticmobster.wordpress.com/2010/03/04/bring-your-daughter-or-son-to-work-day-gone-wrong/

moonbeam

What could go wrong? Seriously? You can't figure that out? With dad 1/2 focused on work and 1/2 focused on baby-sitting his rugrats running around the control tower, it seems that a lot of things could go very wrong, very fast.

jza1218

These morons should be fired.

If he had let an adult friend come into the control tower and start giving instructions just for kicks I'm pretty sure that this would be a no-brainer and he'd be fired immediately but simply because it's a snot-nosed little brat, we should give him a free pass?

Little kids don't belong in any of these situations...Haven't people learned from that moron who let his kid operate the subway car? Or the moron on the LIRR who let a passenger control the train?

moonbeam

Exactly. It's outrageously unprofessional.

PTG in nyc

Air traffic controllers have tough jobs. As long as they don't do something that results in death, I don't care what their means are.

With all the near misses at JFK & LaGuardia reported in the past few years (and god knows how many unreported near misses), do we really think that children in the control tower were the cause of such incidents? No, bad shit happens no matter what.

I'm not saying letting your kid do this is a wise idea, but if people are mad about it because it seemingly ups the risk factor, shouldn't we also be enraged at the federal government and the PA for still not installing the next gen radar systems that will help prevent lots of these near misses?

Best part about this story for me is that I first saw it on the news on a jetBlue redeye coming back to JFK this morning. I giggled.

sarah120

There are some places children should not be and I would say this is definitely one of them. It's a distraction and I don't want the air traffic controller in charge of my flight being distracted. Call me crazy.

ladyjane

he's lucky nothing happened. fire him. i really don't have any desire to be flying in a plane with a little kid controlling anything. it sets a terrible precedent. Also, the fact that the pilots are ok with it doesn't make it ok. ineptitude is rampant among pilots these days. Like the plane that crashed in Buffalo, NY did precicesly that because the pilots reacted incorrectly to the situation at hand.

to me, things like this are just a testament to how lax the whole airline industry is.

i'm taking the train next time.

farleft

Good luck taking the train.

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local-beat/MTA-Operator-Let-Kid-Drive-Train-Rider-Claims.html

ladyjane

SHIT!

mocanlagunas

On another note, fake pilot caught in amsterdam:

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE62334620100304?feedType=RSS&feedName=oddlyEnoughNews&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+reuters%2FoddlyEnoughNews+%28News+%2F+US+%2F+Oddly+Enough%29&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher

Dirk

I guess I'm in the minority in thinking that this guy should be fired.

It's not like this guy is a mailman and he let his son push the mailcart down the block. The guy is supposed to be making sure airplanes don't crash. To me that means no shenanigans in the control tower.

Peter

Absolutely should be fired, and his supervisor too. These people have demonstrated that they have no business in these jobs.

hecks

why stop there? they should spray paint the father candy red and slice his abdomen open so that his guts spill out onto the floor and trample them while humming old airline commercial jingles...while his son watches and televise it...yeah...televise it. That'll show them. These people have got to learn how serious it is to take their kids to work and show them how to follow instruction all while adult under supervision. Good god NO. Why, the only place these kids should feel free is in front of a pc screen or television...america's unsung babysitter.

DarkGemini

This is small potatoes compared to some of the things that go on in the tower on a regular basis. Doesn't need to cost this guy his job.

babyhitler

Yep, totally harmless. Unless of course an actual accident occurred during this then I guarantee every single person on this board would have the opposite opinion and would be all up in a lather calling for their heads.