Questão 645592

Text II

President Obama to Sleepy Air Controllers:

‘Better Do Your Job’

Lisa Stark and Andrew Springer

President Obama lectured air traffic controllers

in an exclusive interview with ABC News, impressing

on them the enormous responsibility of safeguarding

flying passengers and telling them, “You better do

5 your job.”

The president spoke after several controllers

were caught asleep on the job and the man in charge

of air traffic control, Hank Krakowski, resigned on

Thursday.

10 “The individuals who are falling asleep on the job,

that’s unacceptable,” the president told ABC News’

George Stephanopoulos in an exclusive interview

on Thursday. “The fact is, when you’re responsible

for the lives and safety of people up in the air, you

15 better do your job. So, there’s an element of individual

responsibility that has to be dealt with.”

Five controllers have been suspended for

apparently napping on the job while planes were

trying to land at their airports.

20 The president said a full review of air traffic

control work shifts is under way.

“What we also have to look at is air traffic control

systems. Do we have enough back up? Do we have

enough people? Are they getting enough rest time?”

25 Obama said.

He added, however, “But it starts with individual

responsibility.”

In March, two commercial airliners were forced

to land unassisted at Washington, D.C.’s Reagan

30 National Airport after a controller apparently fell

asleep.

Just days later, two controllers at the Preston

Smith International Airport in Lubbock, Texas, did

not hand off control of a departing aircraft to another

35 control center and it took repeated attempts for them

to be reached.

On Feb. 19, an air traffic controller in Knoxville,

Tenn., slept during an overnight shift. Sources told

ABC News that the worker even took pillows and

40 cushions from a break room to build a make-shift bed

on the control room floor.

And this month, there were two more incidents.

A controller fell asleep on the job in Seattle, and

days later a controller in Reno was snoozing when a

45 plane carrying a critically ill passenger was seeking

permission to land.

The FAA and the controller’s union have been

studying the fatigue issue for over a year and their

report finds that “acute fatigue occurs on a daily basis,”

50 and “fatigue can occur at any time, on any shift.”

Sleep experts suggest midshift naps

Some sleep experts said controllers are ripe for

fatigue because they often bounce between day shifts

and night shifts. “When we’re constantly having to

55 adjust to different work schedules, our body is always

playing catch up,” said Philip Gehrman, Director of

the Behavioral Sleep Program at the University of

Pennsylvania.

Controllers on the night shift have another hurdle:

60 they often work in dim light conditions with little

stimulation between radio calls. “That’s exactly the

kind of type of task that’s hardest to maintain, when

you’re at the wrong point in your biological rhythms,”

said Gehrman.

65 One recommendation from the government study

suggests allowing controllers to take scheduled naps,

with breaks as long as two and a half hours to allow

for sleeping and waking up.

Sleep experts said a long break in the middle of

70 an eight hour overnight shift would help, but it might

be a tough sell politically. It has taken decades to try

to come up with new fatigue rules for pilots and it may

not be any easier when it comes to controllers.

Available at: <http://abcnews.go.com/Travel/obama-air-traffic-

-controllers-individual-responsibility/story?id=13382280#.UA__

XpFceSo>. Retrieved on: July 25, 2012.

Text I

Air traffic controllers asleep on the job…still

Michael J. Breus, Ph.D., in Sleepnewzzz

Here’s some news of workers sleeping on the

job that’s downright scary. A news investigation

produced a story and footage of air traffic controllers

at Westchester County Airport sleeping during their

5 shifts. The video, provided to the news outlet by an

employee in the air traffic control tower at Westchester

Airport, also shows controllers reading and using

laptops and cell phones while on duty. The Federal

Aviation Administration (FAA) bans its controllers from

10 use of cell phones, personal reading material and

electric devices while on duty. Sleeping is prohibited

anywhere in air traffic control towers.

All of these violations are alarming and

dangerous, and pose a serious public safety problem.

15 It is important, I believe, to separate the issue of air

traffic controllers sleeping on the job from their choice

to play with laptops and cell phones when they are

supposed to be working. The video images showing

air traffic controllers slumped over and sleeping

20 at their stations is truly frightening. But the issue of

sleep deprivation among air traffic controllers is a

very real one, and means that some instances of

falling asleep—however dangerous and wrong—is

not entirely the controllers’ fault, or even within their

25 control.

Unfortunately this is not a new problem. We’ve

seen several instances of air traffic controllers falling

asleep on duty in recent months.

In response to these cases, the FAA in 2011

30 revised its regulations for air traffic controllers to

include additional time for rest between shifts. The

FAA:

• Raised the minimum amount of time off between

work shifts to 9 hours from 8 hours

35 • Prohibited air traffic controllers from swapping shifts

without having a minimum of 9 hours off in between

shifts

• Increased supervisor coverage in air traffic control

towers during late night and early morning shifts

40 • Prohibited air traffic controllers from picking up an

overnight shift after a day off

These adjustments are a step in the right direction,

but they don’t go far enough. Managing schedules

for shift workers in these high-pressure jobs where

45 public safety is at stake is too important to settle for

improvements that don’t actually solve the problem.

Shift workers of all types face challenges to getting

enough sleep while managing long hours, overnight

shifts, and changing schedules that fluctuate between

50 day and night. Research shows that:

• People who engage in shift work get less sleep

overall than those of us who work more regular

hours

• Shift workers are at higher risk for illness and

55 chronic disease

• The sleep deprivation associated with shift work

increase the risk of accidents, injuries and mistakes

in high-profile, public-safety related industries like

medicine and law enforcement, as well as air traffic

60 control

In addition to making people more prone to

accidents and injury, sleep deprivation causes a

number of negative effects—both physical and

psychological—that can impair the on-the-job

65 performance of air traffic controllers and other shift

workers. Sleep deprivation:

• Slows reaction time

• Interferes with memory

• Causes fatigue

70 • Compromises judgment

• Impairs the ability to retain new information

I think we can all agree that we don’t want the

people responsible for guiding our planes to be

sluggish, slow-reacting, forgetful, fatigued and of

75 questionable judgment. But that’s exactly what being

sleep deprived can make them!

It’s the FAAs responsibility to create workplace

regulations that enable air traffic controllers to get the

rest they need. This can include not just mandating

80 reasonable time off between shifts, but also giving

controllers breaks during shifts and allowing them

to nap on their breaks. There are also some basic

things that the controllers themselves—or any shift

workers—can do to help avoid sleep deprivation:

85 • Make sure to get adequate rest before a shift begins.

Take a nap before work, if need be.

• Limit your reliance on caffeine. While it’s okay as

an occasional pick-me-up, coffee and caffeinated

beverages are not substitutes for adequate sleep.

90 And caffeine can interfere with your sleep when you

actually want and need to be sleepy.

• Keep a strong and consistent sleep routine both

during your workdays and your days off. It’s not

always easy, but shift workers in particular need to

95 build their off-duty schedules around making sure

they get the sleep they need.

Similarly to the recent changes in health care,

the FAA is moving in the right direction to help its

employees get the sleep they need to do their jobs

100 safely. As this latest incident at Westchester Airport

confirms, there is a great deal of work still to be done.

And it’s in everyone’s best—and safest—interest that

progress continues to be made.

Sweet Dreams,

Michael J. Breus, PhD

The Sleep Doctor™

www.thesleepdoctor.com

Available at:<https://www.theinsomniablog.com/the-in-

somnia_blog/2012/03/air-traffic-controllers-asleep-on-

the-jobstill.html> Adapted. Retrieved on: July 25, 2012.

A comparison between Texts I and II reveals that