Okay, I've got a rant of my own. I'm a little tired about hearing the media report on airport tower controllers falling asleep. Of course it is wrong and the controller needs to be fired. The problem is I don't need to hear a news reporter describe the situation. The stories I've heard are all late night when there are very few flights. This is when the tower is staffed to minimums which adds to the level of boredom.

Pilots know how to fly airplanes. Airliners are under ATC control from push back to parking. All through the skies, the flights are coordinated through big centers across the country. The stories that I have heard on the news is on final approach when the lone tower controller is asleep. Most airliners contact the tower just a couple of minutes before landing, if not sooner.

By the time they call the tower, they are spaced out, they are in landing configuration, and well prepared for landing. They are handed off to ground control after landing and usually before the plane leaves the runway.

The tower basically keeps track of who's leaving the airport and who's coming in. Of course it is a very important job because you don't want people taking off and landing at the same time on the same runway. Pilots are trained to be aware of other takeoff and landings when they approach a runway.

The falling asleep has occurred late at night when there are very very few aircraft movements. Pilots are paid well enough to be aware and land safely in these conditions. In fact, there are times when an airliner lands at a smaller airport and the tower is officially closed. It's no different than landing at a major airport when there's not another airplane in sight for the next 30 minutes.

The biggest problems pilots have when landing late at night when the tower is asleep is their concern for dialing in the wrong frequency to call the tower and whether their radio is actually working or not. Tower controllers DO NOT guide the airplane. More often than not, the late night tower might say two things, for example…

Winds 270 at 12, cleared to land.

Contact ground point 7.

The pilot already knows the wind speed from previous reports before the tower was contacted. And he also knows the ground control frequency from his charts.

If the weather is bad or if there are multiple of movements on the airport, the man in the tower won't be bored enough to fall asleep. If he does, that falls outside the scope of this rant.

Back to basics, NO, it's not okay for the tower to be asleep. Yes, the sleeping controllers should be dealt with. OTOH, 250 passengers are not seconds from disaster just because the tower is sleeping. I don't need the media talking about the various scenarios that they dream up because the tower is not active. Again, most of what the media is reporting is BS. The basics are correct, the filler is dreamed up.

Very Good.
I also have one thing to add. The controllers are being paid to be awake. If I catch an employee sleeping on the job, he's gone! I don't look into hiring someone else to keep him company and awake! As has been suggested by some news media! Total BS!
M2C