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This past Sunday, while visiting Lawrenceville, GA (KLZU Class C just under
the outer ATL Class B), traffic was landing and departing 25. The controller was busy, coordinating with Atlanta, handling clearance delivery, ground, and tower simultaneously. He was broadcasting on all frequencies, while receiving GC/CD and Tower separately. We started engines and prepared to call for taxi instructions when I heard him blurt out "Cessna 1234 go around NOW!!! YOU ARE LINED UP WITH RUNWAY 7, YOU WERE CLEARED TO LAND RUNWAY 25, 25 IS THE ACTIVE RUNWAY, RIGHT TURN, GO AROUND NOW!!! I HAVE LANDING TRAFFIC 25!!" (this guy was rightfully ****ed and obviously rattled) Then he issued a right turn and a go around to traffic landing 25 and lit into the Cessna driver again. "What were you doing? why were you landing runway 7, I cleared you #2 on 25" The Cessna pilot must have responded with some excuse about a mistake and the controller came back "mistakes are what get people in airplanes killed, next time you make sure you know where you are! Now join a left downwind for Runway 25, that's runway 25, traffic at your 3:00 opposite direction, a Piper on an upwind leg for runway 25, I said runway 25!" Ouch! So... after hearing that, it made me wonder if the tower/only controller actually ever had or was maintaining visual contact with the Cessna before he lined up for final on the opposite runway or not. This same controller gave another pilot a lesson in courtesy when a different pilot had called for an IFR Clearance then the first pilot immediately called for taxi instructions. The taxiing pilot was chastised quite severely for not giving the IFR pilot time to copy and readback his IFR clearance. "Piper 1234, when you hear another pilot call for an IFR clearance on Ground Control (GC and CD are the same freq at KLZU) and I give that pilot his clearance, it would be nice if you'd give him time to write it down, read it back, and get confirmation before you interrupt him with your taxi request!" Although he sounded rude it was obvious he wasn't having a good day and at the very least had his hands full, I'm just curious about what standard procedures are for tower controllers maintaining visual contact with planes once they are actually in the traffic pattern. Jim |
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