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(Courtesy of Ryan O’Keefe)

https://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/publications/atpubs/atc_html/chap3_section_11.html

👆 Everything you need to know for helicopter operations, per the 7110.

Controlling as an S1, your main concerns are in 3-11-1 Taxi and Ground Movement Operation. Note, air taxi is a direct route, so before you issue an air taxi clearance you need to coordinate any runway crossings with local control just as you would any runway crossing. Air Taxi is the preferred method, it burns less fuel and creates less rotor wash in ground effect. Note, there are many helicopters with wheels who can taxi like an airplane so don't assume a hover or air taxi is appropriate in every case. Typically, a helicopter pilot will ask for hover or air taxi if they need it, if they ask for taxi without specifying hover or air, they probably have wheels. Treat them as you would in section 3-7-2. The common wheeled types you'll see on the network include the S-76, S-92, B-222B, CH-47, AW139, A109. and UH-60. Note, the B-222UT has skids.

Remember, you can put restrictions on helicopters for air taxi commands if you need to keep them clear of other aircraft moving around the airport. As an example, "Helicopter N6165M, air taxi to the Signature ramp, cross runway 18L south of taxiway Kilo." or "Helicopter N6165M, air taxi to helipad on taxiway G via direct, remain North of the runway 11 centerline."

Note, helipads are movement areas for departures / arrivals, so before you send someone direct to a helipad, coordinate with local control to ensure they don't have anybody inbound to the helipad. Local control should do the same for you, advising when they have an arriving helicopter to a non-movement area on the airport or a helipad. It's good  coordination so nobody is caught by surprise, especially when helipads are embedded in taxiways.

Helicopters are very maneuverable, just tell them what you need to maintain positive control using the phraseology in section 3-11-1.

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When vectoring use square headings (i.e. opposite direction downwinds, 90 degree bases, 30 degree intercepts). Deviating from this will probably cause you to build an inefficient finals box and end up having 20-30 mile finals.

Same thing with speeds. I use a 250/210/170 rule and 90% of the times works like a charm. 250 on downwind, 210 on base, 170 on final. Anything slower than that and compression becomes an issue. Remember, NEVER slow down the guy in the front. Make him go fast that way you have wiggle room to squeeze in more planes in the sequence and be more effective while running 5 mile finals under compression.

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When first learning to control Ground movement, there's a tendency to focus on phraseology and routing, but lose sight of conflict avoidance.  Taxiing two aircraft to the departure runway from different parts of the airport, it's easy to give both of them a routing that ends at the hold-short line and then forget about them, because clearly one of them is much closer to the runway than the other and the sequence is obvious.

Inevitably, one will take much longer than the other to be ready, and they'll end up arriving at the same time.

The way to avoid this, very simply, is -- never issue two aircraft taxi instructions which include the same intersection, unless you've told one to follow the other.  As an example, aircraft #1 might get a taxi instruction to go to runway 1 via A and A1.  Aircraft #2 might get told to go via D, C, A, then A1.  But no matter how far apart they start, the second aircraft should get "via D, C, hold short A" OR the first should get "via A, hold short C".  That way, ONLY ONE aircraft has been given clearance to the intersection of C and A. THEN you can tell one to go first, and the other to give way or follow, and you haven't caused a conflict by telling two planes to be in the same place.

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When working tower, you may have many aircraft calling at once. However, it is important to know which aircraft to talk to first. For this scenario, lets say you have three aircraft on the ground- one lined up and two holding short. In the air, you have three aircraft on final, 4 miles apart, the first one 4 miles from the threshold. No aircraft in the air have called. As you are about to clear the lined up aircraft for takeoff, final 1 calls. In this situation, you can simply tell final one to "continue approach" and go on to clear the lined up aircraft for takeoff. You would then circle back to final one, noting the traffic departing. You could then have hold short one line up (this is for intersecting runways, not same runway.) In general...
1. If you have a line of aircraft on the ground and are using intersecting runways, LUAW ASAP! It will help you punch gaps!
2. Don't be afraid to tell an aircraft on final to continue approach instead of clearing them to land. Just don't forget about them.

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Always be scanning the airport. If you zone in on one person, you may forget that another person is waiting for a runway crossing, or waiting for a handoff to the next controller. Make sure that even if you are working deep into a clearance, you also take a few moments to scan the airport every now and then and make sure you don’t have any instructions to give.

- Daniel G.

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When working a set of parallel runways, where one runway is for departures and the other is for arrivals, it may seem daunting at first. However, it's very easy (and fun) to manage.

For example, at EWR, we can use 4L for departures and 4R for arrivals. If you have a departure and an arrival at the same time, let the arrival land, then as soon as they pass the aircraft holding, clear the departing one for takeoff. Then, as the arrival exits 4R, have them hold short of 4L as "traffic is departing." Then, once the departure is airborne, cross them over the runway and switch them to ground.

"AAL90, wind calm, runway 4L, clear for takeoff."
"UAL2112, welcome to Newark, hold short runway 4L, traffic departing."
*after AAL90 departs*
"UAL2112, cross runway 4L at K, contact ground on 121.8."

After you get the swing of things, controlling parallels is really fun!

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Immediately after clearing a flight to land you can have them "say parking." This way you can both forward that information on to your ground controller and you also know which way to point them after landing so they don't stop on your high-speeds and block them for the next arrival. The runway is the last place you want to get backed up.

For example: DAL1234 exit right on A8, right on B, contact ground 121.9

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All the equipment suffixes can be daunting to learn at first. This handy cheat sheet has them all in one place. However, make sure you still learn the difference between all the acronyms and how they'll affect you as a controller.

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A route may look correct at first, but a preferred routing may exist for that route in which the selected aircraft has not filed. Amend as needed so that the aircraft is on the prefroute.

As you continue through your controlling, you will know many prefroutes by heart which will really help you launch those IFR clearances.
-George T.

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The same Mach number will result in a different true airspeed at different altitudes. There are some rules of thumb to help with estimating speed adjustments at the enroute level.

The same Mach number at a higher altitude will be a lower true airspeed. Aircraft cruising 2000 feet apart will need to be assigned speeds differing by M0.01 to have the same true airspeed, with the higher airplane being assigned a greater Mach number.

A difference of M0.01 at a fixed altitude is approximately 6 kts true airspeed.

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An important concept working approach control to understand is speed and how that contrasts into distance covered as well as separation gained or lost between aircraft.

This may seem like "duh", but you have to make sure you actually put it in your mind to think about it this way when controlling:

20 knots is ~0.33NM a minute, 30 knots is 0.5, and 60 knots is 1.0NM a minute. 120 is 2.0. You can then count in these easy intervals to determine any speed quickly. For example, if an aircraft is showing 340 knots, just count by 12: 12, 24, 36, that's 2.0NM/minute times 3, so 6 miles a minute, but we're 20 knots off so a bit more than 5.5/minute.

This is important for two reasons: 1), realizing the distance an aircraft will cover and 2) realizing the separation an aircraft will gain or lose. So if your airspace goes 40NM out from the airport, then an aircraft going 2 miles a minute will get to the airport direct in 20 minutes.

Similarly, if one aircraft behind is going 230 knots and the one in front is going 260 knots, they will be gaining half a mile each minute. You can then translate this to distance to see if this will really get you the space you need (hint: it frequently won't if you need a lot of space). The aircraft going 230 is going just almost 4 miles per minute, so if they have, let's say, 10 miles to get to whatever point you want to have the separation by, you're only going to buy yourself just over 1 mile (since at 4 miles a minute you'll cover 10 miles in just over 2 minutes).

So if you only need that extra mile, great; otherwise you need a much more dramatic speed difference, or as we often say as a rule of thumb: vector to gain significant separation and use speeds to maintain it.

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Left: Geometry of how this tip works. Right: The result

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Here is a tip I learned that is easy on the phraseology and guess work. For every 10 degrees you turn an aircraft left or right of course, after 30 miles, they will be roughly 5 miles laterally from where they would have been. A lot of your minor TRACONs will have 30-40nm airspace on either side of the primary airport so this tip can come in handy to place an aircraft where you want them in the final or the downwind especially if your airport does not have STARS and aircraft are coming at you direct the field. Let's do an example: In the photo N888 is entering from the NE. While not exactly perpendicular to the airport, this will still work. At the 30nm range ring I issue "N888, turn twenty degrees right, vector to final." (20 degrees because every 10 degrees will give me 5 miles and I would like a 10 mile final for this aircraft). UAL1221 is entering from the SE. I'd like to have them on a 5 mile wide downwind. At the 30nm range ring I issue "UAL1221 turn ten degrees right, vector to final" As we advance the scenario we can see the end result of our single vector to each aircraft. N888 is in perfect position for a turn to join the localizer. UAL1221 just over 5 miles lateral to the airport and ready for your standard downwind heading. Note that with this you don't need to ask the pilot their heading or fumble with RBL lines and should work well even with wind.

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When training for your next rating, it really does help to listen to a controller with that rating.

So, for example, if you're an S2 training for S3, you can listen to a departure or approach controller as an OBS, as a VATSIM pilot, or even from a real controller via a website like liveatc.net. Listening to the transmissions is more helpful than you'd think!