.....HE HAD A RED FLANNEL PLAID SHIRT ON
Time: Late 1970's
Place: Indianapolis International TCA (Terminal Control Area)
Players: A captain with a plane full of people descending into the approach zone, RADAR approach controller Mike K****sky, and a hot air balloon pilot
One way to tell a smart controller from one that is not so smart is the headset. A smart controller ALWAYS uses a headset. Even if he has a ear infection and a headache. A controller that is not very cleaver and may have a slightly inflated ego will use a microphone and speaker. This is a guy that wants to impress everyone with his feats of daring and vectoring big airplanes into the airport. It is all very impressive, all those airline captains coming over the speaker repeating his instructions and acknowledging his commands. There is a catch. When something goes very wrong (and it will eventually) everyone in the room will immediately know about it. Here is an example. Imagine you are in the tower as a visitor and there are a lot of airplanes buzzing around. The macho local controller is clearing plane after plane to land with his cool sunglasses on with his microphone and speaker. The pilots one after another repeat "roger, this is airline flight 123 cleared to land". It is all very exciting. Then it gets real exciting when over the speaker you (and also everyone in the tower) hear: "JEEEZHUS CHRIST THAT WAS CLOSE!!!". At that point everyone looks out the window and around the airport to see just what was "that was close". Now the cat is out of the bag and everyone knows the super controller has really messed up. DOH.......
Now imagine he has his headset on. No one hears anything, except the very cleaver controller. The local controller on his little attached microphone then transmits: "Roger, you are cleared to taxi to the terminal" and it is like nothing happened. Unless the pilots involved file a complaint or paperwork it didn't happen. Whatever it was.
It was a quiet day shift at the airport. I opened the door to the TRACON and walked in to check on the equipment and routine operations. Sitting at the approach control RADAR position was Mike K****sky. Mike was impressing everyone by working the airliners with his microphone and speaker. I walked up behind Mike to watch a real super controller in action. He was doing great right up to the part where a voice boomed over the speaker with "JEEEEEZHUS CHRIST WE JUST MISSED A HOT AIR BALLOON". The voice was from a pilot of a DC-9 aircraft descending out of 13,000 feet into the airport approach control zone. Mike, being the cool head he always was then asked the pilot the standard question: "can you describe the balloon?". By that time everyone in the room was watching and listening. I will never forget the next comment I heard over the speaker: "DESCRIBE THE BALLOON ?!?!?! I CAN TELL YOU THE GUY IN THE BASKET HAD A #$^$%^&ing RED flannel plaid shirt on !!".
Later we discovered what had happened. A group of hot air balloon enthusiasts in the Anderson Indiana area had launched a large number of hot air balloons and one of the hot dog balloon pilots had really cranked up his burner. He was supposed to stay below 10,000 feet but once he started up he could not get the balloon under altitude control and blew through his altitude target and on up into controlled airspace (above 12,500 feet). Coming at him was a DC-9 descending out of ARTCC high altitude airspace at about 350 mph. I can confirm a hot air balloon can not be seen on RADAR, the amount of RADAR reflection is just not enough to show the balloon as a valid object. I checked the RADAR controls and even selected RADAR that would show fixed targets. I thought the metal tanks and other hardware would reflect enough signal but nothing would show.
Try to imagine the surprise of the balloon pilot. The burner is off and the air is very cold and thin. There would be absolute silence right up to the instant a huge aircraft went by at 350 mph, narrowly missing you. I wonder if anything was dripping out of the bottom of the basket right after that moment?