A new $0.99 Apple iPhone application, Flight Control, is making air traffic control possible to anyone in the street.
The application, by Firemint, makes it possible for users to simulate what it is like to sequence and direct aircrafts in the airspace to safe landing.
The iPhone application shows an overhead view of an airport traffic area or ‘playing field’. The user can direct the flight to a runway for landing – airliners to a long runway, small planes to a short one and helicopters to the helipad – once they enter the airspace.
The game gradually gets more complicated as the amount of air traffic on the screen increases. In what is hoped to be an unlikely scenario, the game – and hence the job of the air traffic controller – comes to an end with the first mid-air collision.
Flight Control was started as a personal project of Firemint CEO Robert Murray and was later supported by the Firemint developers Jesse West and Alexandra Peters
