[at-l] Snowbird Mountain-upon further reflection

[MySaabRocks@aol.com (MySaabRocks@aol.com)]

In a follow-up to my earlier message, it occurred to me that the signal the 
FAA tower puts out is very strong and is probably not affected much by the 
surrounding plant life.  I don't know very much about the FAA Air Traffic 
Control system, but I do know that it's controllers can identify which planes 
are in the air.  The aircraft transmit signals which probably are picked up 
by the towers.  Now these signals are much weaker than the tower's output 
signal, especially in small private aircraft, and probably it is the signal 
generated by the aircraft that can't be received by the towers because of RF 
absorption by the leaves.  I would think this would be vector specific.  For 
instance, with heavy growth on the East side of the tower, as a plane flies 
overhead West to East, you may lose track of it at some point in it's flight 
eastward.  Imagine the consternation caused when a controller looses an 
aircraft on his screen!  Especially when there is other traffic in the area.  
Mid air collisions can be the start of a real bad hair day!


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