Move Over Balloon Boy - Here Comes Airplane Kid

How'd the kid get past security to even get into the control room?
My husband works for the airlines and before 9/11 he was able to take the kids (and me if I had wanted to go) into the hangar where he worked to see the planes up close and talk to the other employees. After 9/11 he couldn't even take our infant past the lobby of the cargo area. Security wouldn't let him. And that's just the hangar for one airline.

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I don't see the problem, I'm sure the father was doing is job just fine and just told his son what to say. I wish everyone would lighten up!

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I'm not saying the father was right for letting his kid direct flights. but obviously his dad was telling him what to say. I couldn't listen to the audio on this site but i found it on another and the pilots seemed to have no problem with it..some were even laughing and one said he wished he could bring his kid to work so...

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It's not like the kids (there were two, on two subsequent days) were left alone in the Tower Cab, to push buttons, play with the computers, and have spitball fights. Each child stood with his/her father, and repeated EXACTLY what the father said. They simply relayed a message that each pilot expected to get, and then repeated back. It's similar to saying to your kid, "ok, push that enter key" after you put in a bunch of numbers.

Had there been ANY danger AT ALL, the controller/father was standing right there, as well as an entire staff of controllers, and the situation could/would have been rectified immediately. (you think controllers never make mistakes? Never misspeak? They have procedures for that)

All of this "what if" that people are playing is irrelevant. NOTHING HAPPENED.

This country takes great pride in "Take Your Daughter To Work Day". How many of those daughters (and now "kids") are allowed, on that day, to perform the duties that their parents perform, under their parent's direct supervision. That's the point of the program, for Pete's sake!!

The kids were not performing surgery. They were telling pilots of aircraft, which were already on the runway and expecting the confirmation, "It's ok to take off now, have a nice day". That's IT.

They didn't have their finger on the Nuclear Button. Relax.

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This is directed to the writer;
Writers like you are the ones that need to stop writing. You hide behind your desk and are the equivalent of an ambulance chaser lawyer. You find an irrelevant and small topic, and transform it so it becomes an end of the world theme. I saw that in a movie -“Chicken Little”
You should focus on issues that matter and not on issues that are trivial and will get your papers sold. I am deployed Soldier and flying helicopters is what I do. I took my sons, before I deployed to my place of work- see the helicopters. They loved it!!! They got to see where he goes and what Dad does every day. They shared my world. It made their day and still talk about it -almost 12 months later over Skype.
Throughout my 17 years of flying career I have flown in foreign countries and have received radio calls that are pretty hard to understand as we deal with foreign ATCs, but as an experience pilot I know what the radio call should be, and pretty much know what needs to be done. And, if a kid’s voice comes over there radio and tells me what I need to do and makes sense, then I do it. That is what happened here. They pretty much repeated the instructions from a certified ATC controller. WOW, what a tragedy. They were enjoying life and allowed their children to have a fun day and thanks to people like you now he might lose his job. NOBODY GOT HURT AND NOBODY DIE!!!! That is not what I see where am at.
Thanks, you are a true hero. You saved the world and hope that you can sleep well at night. If you want something worth writing about, please stop where am deployed at. I will show you real topics that are worth writing about, but I know you won’t because you will not make money doing it. Keep chasing those ambulances!

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