Unless you were on, or were supposed to be on, a flight going into, out of, or through Chicago airspace on September 26, 2014, you have largely been unaffected by the sabotage done to the Chicago Air Route Traffic Control Center (ARTCC) that day by a contract employee. For the folks who needed to go to Chicago not long after, you benefited from a phenomenal response on the part of some critical government employees. As well all know, government employees are frequent targets of criticism and the butt of many jokes. On that fateful day in September, however, and for two-and-a-half weeks afterward, the air traffic controllers of the United States demonstrated a level of dedication and professionalism that many of us will only aspire to. The bulk of the flying public who needed to fly somewhere in the upper Midwest in late September or early October were able to do so despite the complete destruction of both the primary and backup systems that control air traffic through the Chicago area.

Imagine the scenario: you and your colleagues are responsible for hundreds of flights with thousands of passengers. Suddenly, without any warning, your radar scope goes blank and, at the same time, your ability to communicate with those aircraft or with controllers at any other ATC facility, also ceases.

When Chicago controllers quickly realized that the air traffic control centers of surrounding areas would have to handle the traffic that they normally would, they didn’t wait for a crisis management team to come in, make an assessment and suggest an appropriate response. These selfless controllers took immediate action. As described in an excellent article by Dave Hirschman in the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA) website:

“Without being asked, dozens of Chicago air traffic controllers started driving to distant facilities in Minneapolis, Kansas City, Indianapolis, and Cleveland, which they knew would become inundated with redirected flights as soon as that afternoon … ‘They just got in their cars and started driving,’ Hauck said. ‘Some of them didn’t even have a chance to go home and pack their bags. They left with no idea how long they’d be gone.’ ”

Despite initial estimates that repair or replacement of the Chicago equipment would take many weeks or even months, the Chicago ARTCC equipment was fully replaced and completely up and operational in a mere 17 days. During those two and a half weeks, the Chicago controllers were working side-by-side with their colleagues throughout the region to keep the nation’s air traffic flowing smoothly and safely.

The first takeaway is simply this: United States air traffic controllers deserve our respect and admiration. When faced with a completely unprecedented situation, they adapted so quickly that most travelers flying around that time were, at best, only vaguely aware of the problems in Chicago.

The second takeaway has to do with ‘common-mode failures’ that I addressed in a post on satellite-navigation systems. The ARTCCs in the United States have primary and backup systems. However, as the Chicago incident has taught us, there is still a potential threat when both systems are physically housed in the same building. This reminds me of a story I was told many years ago: a particular personal computer user was very diligent to backup their work onto floppy disks (yes, floppies). The backups were of little use, however, when burglars broke into the house and stole both the computer and the floppies. Offsite backups are now fairly common. ATC needs to think about housing their backup systems in physically separated locations. Yes, this is expensive but it must be weighed against the many, many millions lost by the airlines on the day of the fire and for the two weeks afterward when they were forced to fly sub-optimal routes. In the opinion of this blogger, it would be a mistake to address the problem simply by ‘beefing up’ security and restricting access to the equipment in a given ARTCC. An F5 tornado, for example, will not be intimidated by extra security measures.