New to the site, but not to ATC

justinmorgan5 Newcomer Virginia Beach, VA

Hey guys, my name is Justin and I have been an air traffic controller for 3 years in the US Navy. I am joining the site so that I can get more insight into what it takes to become an FAA controller. I plan on getting out of the military in 2012 following my last deployment. I love this job and hold a CTO as well as a Radar ticket, but have quite a few questions and delemas that I want to address here before making any huge changes.

Admin I'm Kind of a Big Deal Houston

Welcome to StuckMic....please tell all your friends and co-workers about the site as well.

For some more information into the hiring process, you should start here:

Air Traffic Control - ATC Information

Rosstafari Daaaang. /X

Welcome, glad you're here. You'll find yourself in good company, and there are plenty of VRA applicants and hires here.

justinmorgan5 Newcomer Virginia Beach, VA

I have not been able to find the answer to this question on SM and since it is a n00b question I figured I would ask here. I see on the pay scale that there is no D1 or D2 pay for some category of facilities, why id that? How do you get from D1 to D2 and up to CPC? What are each of these? IS it on like a qualification thing, like CPC is a FWS?

psachs Trusted Member Chicago

Lower-level facilities (4-6) don't have a D1 because there are fewer positions to train on -- e.g. flight data, clearance and ground are often the same position, and there's no local assist.

The Red Book spells out progression through the dev bands, and it's based on how many positions you check out on. AG is what you start out at as a trainee at the Academy and during the first part of your facility training. You're still considered a developmental/in training as you progress through D1, D2 and D3 (if the facility has all those levels). After you complete all that training, you become an FPL (full performance level) controller, aka CPC (certified professional controller).