The Objective and Priorities of the Air Traffic Controller

What were the differing objectives and priorities of each party involved and how did this affect the situation.

The objective and priorities of the air traffic controller

The objective of the air traffic controller in JFK International airport is to ensure the responsible air region to be safe, for example keeping aircraft at a safe distance by asking Avianca52 to keep on circling in order to avoid more than one plane landing at the same time on the only runway opened. Air controllers are also responsible for giving clear landing signal and advice for airplanes after carefully assigning the landing priorities with each airplane.

In the Avianca 52 incident, the air traffic controllers were responsible for communicate with the co-pilot on the flight, then carefully access to the situation of Avianca 52 and understanding the dilemma which the flight was facing through communicate with the co-pilot on flight.  

The priority of the controller is to provide air-route and give suggestion to the captain of Avianca52 for landing as the weather are in bad condition and the visibility was low and also they should endow the landing priority to Avianca52 to land on the only one runway opened in JFK airport ahead of other thirty-three airplanes which were also waiting to land, due to the oil emergency situation of the flight.  

The objective and priorities of the flight captain

Flight captain is the person in the airplane who is making major decision for the operation and takes care of safety of the flight, also known as the “pilot in command”. He directly responsible for and is the final authority to the operation of the airplane.

In the Avianca 52 incident, the flight captain responsible for making crucial decisions on the control of the flight, for example deciding the air-route of the flight, whether choose to keep on circling in the air of New York or access to the alternate destination – Boston.

The other important duty of captain is to give clear instructions and orders to the co-pilot on operating the plane and also direct co-pilot to communicate with the control tower of sending and receiving important flight and airport information and take responsive action.

The objective and priorities of the co-pilot

Co-pilot are responsible for enforcing the order given by the captain, answering the question which asked by the captain and control tower  

The objective and priorities of the flight engineer