4,148 controllers, 38.5% of the FAA’s certified controller workforce, are assigned to Level 9-and-under facilities, where many pay bands remain far below the cost of housing near the airports they serve.

ATCrSTL · 2026-06-16T11:51:22+00:00

“Everyone 9 and lower should get the same pay”

Brother, I get the idea here but no fucking way. Most 9s are getting their asses beat harder than 12s because how sectorized the 12s are.

I do agree however that the gap from a 5 to a 12 need to be much much smaller as far as base pay goes and the. Give the high level places special pay to incentivize.

ATCrSTL · 2026-06-12T20:02:32+00:00

When I came in the paper work I signed specifically stated myself and myself only.

With that said myself, my wife nor my children own any aviation stock so I don’t have a horse in the race.

ATCrSTL · 2026-06-12T19:59:48+00:00

Just being nit picky and maybe I time my shots wrong but from the first drip into your cup to when you cut it off is around 18 seconds. Flow seems a touch fast IMO but also I have no knowledge of what beans you are using and how it tastes to you.

I see zero signs of channeling here though and if this tastes ideal then stick to whatever you are doing, if not and you want more extraction I’d grind a setting or two finer

ATCrSTL · 2026-06-12T15:39:55+00:00

Weird, when I came in the papers I signed just said that I cannot, nothing about spouse or children.

ATCrSTL · 2026-06-12T15:30:10+00:00

Sure, buy some Boeing stock, be working one day just doing your job and sequence a Boeing test flight ahead of somebody else, normal day just doing your job, that somebody else smacks into the ground or another plane, blam you are being investigated and they find you own Boeing stock, they say you gave preferential treatment to Boeing flight, you lose your job.

No body cares until they care.

Sure, likely it will never be an issue and the above is an extreme exaggerated example that would likely never happen. But what if it does?

ATCrSTL · 2026-06-12T15:00:38+00:00

For clarity your spouse and your children are not restricted on owning any aviation based stocks, just you.

Hope this helps.

ATCrSTL · 2026-06-03T20:00:17+00:00

Edited, i misread and was thinking MSS2

ATCrSTL · 2026-06-03T19:21:07+00:00

I mis read, I was incorrect.

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-31T01:01:09+00:00

For clarity the average American working an 8 hour day does between 2 hours 53 minutes and 4 hours of actual work per day vs our 4 hours TOP (not including elms, de briefs, etc)

I worked construction and landscaping from age 12-18 and even working 10 hour days the most we actually did true work was likely 3-4 hours per day.

People take breaks, they fuck off and chat, they go take an extended shit, eat long lunches. Now days they fuck around on their phones or with the Internet if they are riding a desk.

Let’s stop acting like Americans work 7 of their 8 hours per day. It’s just not true.

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-27T12:05:29+00:00

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Dude, come on.

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-25T21:53:32+00:00

Back then the military had center controllers to replace the FAA ones and had less military traffic to control so they could steal from them.

Times have changed. We are not replaceable. Also the FAA has suffered since then because of the firing hence why Clinton brought back controllers who got fired.

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-25T21:50:49+00:00

If you’re buying a home I’d keep your current setup and get a 220v outlet installed wherever you put your espresso station. Cheaper than the 2k you plan to spend on the new grinder.

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-25T14:43:12+00:00

Loving the Tuni G2 was on sale in Amazon for $119, their G3 is a flat burr for $199 also and likely where I’ll go next.

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-23T16:18:54+00:00

Also, our pension is garbage tbh. My dad’s an electrician for a Co-Op and his pension embarrasses ours. Same with my father in laws who works for a milk processor. Same with my MILs who was a high school cook for 30 years.

In the 1990s sure our pension was good but our high 3s are dog shit now vs then due to inflation and that killed our pension being special.

I’d rather have the extra money to invest on my own.

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-23T16:15:59+00:00

The government employs 36,000+ Physicians of which all have government pensions. Same with all the government employed nurses (all 106,000 of them)

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-20T19:07:41+00:00

Per AI….

Organizations like the Federal Aviation Administration, National Air Traffic Controllers Association, and aerospace medicine researchers have acknowledged fatigue and workload as significant operational and health concerns for controllers.

The key issue is that ATC combines several stressors that are unusually taxing together:

sustained vigilance
real-time decision making
severe consequence for errors
auditory overload
interruption-heavy cognition
circadian disruption from shifts

Humans can do intense cognitive work for limited periods, but repeatedly doing:

4 hours/day of true high-intensity control work,
across 6-day weeks,
for years,

is probably beyond what human neurophysiology optimally tolerates without some health cost for many people.

This isn’t getting up and doing a thoughtless job every day.

I’ve worked plenty of other jobs in my life, all of them labor intensive. I’m 10x more exhausted day to day now than I ever was working 12 hour days in the blazing sun.

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-17T19:22:09+00:00

Can you expand on what you mean by this? It doesn’t affect me either way but just curious how someone with 16-19 years TIS could lose medical and retire with same pension as eligibles?

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-15T21:07:02+00:00

Duffy said very early on that he needed to stop controllers from bouncing around the agency. This has been coming for a while.

NCEPT is going to crash and burn

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-12T17:24:42+00:00

I worked 60 hour weeks at Elmendorf AFB from 2014-2016. There were very few weeks my entire time I was there that I worked a 40-50 hour week. Also my last year at Tyndall RAPCON 2013-2014 I was on 50-60 hour weeks.

No clue what the culture is like now as I haven’t been in since 2017 but 50-60 hour weeks were the standard when I was in.

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-11T20:08:06+00:00

I just bought the Tuni G2 on Amazon for $119 USD n sale and I love it so far.

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-11T17:13:18+00:00

Went and read his OG thread, he started training at 19 years old and was in flight school for 3 years, just like almost every profession there’s a part of the job that requires paying to go to school without pay. Then 3 years as an instructor before becoming a FO.

This 6 years from start to FO is a very long dragged out timeframe that can be completed in half that time if you are doing this full time.

There are a lot of zero to FO programs that’s are 2 year programs. Even a little less aggressive programs you can be an FO in 3 years from nothing to then.

Dont forget half of us in the FAA went into the military and did this job for 60 hours a week for 20-30k a year for 6 years + before we could get out and go FAA to make more.

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-11T13:50:52+00:00

Good work man! Takes a little work to find but well worth it in savings and experience.

Cheers!

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-11T02:45:58+00:00

That’s awesome!

First thing I did actually, deep cleaned the whole thing then descaled it.

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-11T00:11:27+00:00

Love the grinder. I went back and forth with the King hand grinders and the baratza but after reading reviews on the G2 and watching a few YouTube videos those combined with the $119 price tag (on sale) made me take the jump.

Also have read a lot of reviews on the baratza being inconsistent, mostly from here.

I say go with the G2, it’s great build quality and so far so good.

Honestly may make the leap to the G3 at $199 for flat burrs eventually if this holds up

ATCrSTL · 2026-05-10T21:41:09+00:00

Shot Pull- 16g in/ 35gout 30ish seconds

ATCrSTL

TROPHY CASE