Jan. 22, 2016 // 2016 Archie League Medal of Safety Award Winners
The 2016 Archie League Medal of Safety Award winners were selected on Jan. 20 during the annual judges meeting held at NATCA’s National Office. Jim Ullmann, NATCA Deputy Director of Safety and Technology, Bruce Landsberg, Senior Safety Advisor, Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA) Air Safety Institute (ASI), and Chuck Hogeman, Aviation Safety Chair, Air Line Pilots Association, International (ALPA), combed through a record 62 nominations and subsequent 210 pages of nomination information prepared and compiled by the NATCA Communications Department. The judges meeting took all day, and included deep discussion on every single nomination from every region.
The 2016 Archie League Medal of Safety Award winners are:
Alaskan Region
Ron Sparks, Anchorage Center
Mike Thomas, Anchorage Center
Central Region
Brett Rolofson, Kansas City Center
Eastern Region
Jeff Schuler, New York TRACON
Great Lakes Region
Dave Kilgus, Columbus
New England Region
Joseph White, Providence
Northwest Mountain Region
Josh Pate, Seattle TRACON
Southern Region
Donald Blatnik, Central Florida TRACON
Kenneth Scheele, Central Florida TRACON
Southwest Region
Wade Martin, Dallas/Love Field (has since transferred to Fort Worth Center)
Steven “Nick” Valadez, Dallas/Love Field
Western Pacific Region
Ryan Nines, Northern California TRACON
William Hoppe, Northern California TRACON
Luis Ramirez, Northern California TRACON
Check the NATCA Insider in the coming weeks for more in-depth coverage of the winners and their life-saving work. Thank you to everyone who submitted nominations of the incredible work by our NATCA brothers and sisters in 2015. This year the Communications Department received a record number of nominations, and they hope to see even more next year.
The awards banquet to honor the winners will take place on the evening of Wed., March 23, closing Communicating for Safety 2016 at Bally’s Hotel in Las Vegas. All of CFS, including the awards banquet, will be live webcast on natca.org. An archive of all videos from CFS and the banquet will then be uploaded to NATCA’s YouTube channel. There will also be full coverage of the winners and their flight assists on the natca.org Archie League Awards web page on March 23, and the Communications Department will publish a booklet for the March 23 banquet, which will also be posted on the NATCA website.
The nomination period for 2016 has already begun! Archie League Awards Coordinator Sarah Zilonis is working on a new submission form for nominations of events occurring in the calendar year of 2016. That form will soon be available at natca.org. In the meantime, please contact Zilonis with the information of your nomination at [email protected].
