The Voice of Van Nuys Airport Retires after 47 Years

The nation's oldest air traffic controller made his final approach Thursday from the world's busiest general-aviation airport.

Phil Aune, 70, the "Voice of Van Nuys Airport," stepped down from the control tower after tracking his last plane, a single-engine Cherokee.

Throughout his 47-year career, the soothing voice of "Papa Alpha" had guided millions of planes in and out of Van Nuys Airport.

"I've been crying; it's very emotional," said the gray-haired grandfather and FAA veteran just after his last shift ended at 1:40 p.m. "My last airplane."

Before dawn, Aune (pronounced awe-nee) hoisted Old Glory for the last time outside the six-story box of glass west of runway One Six Right.

At the top of rush hour, three Los Angeles television and radio traffic aircraft and four traffic choppers flew in tribute past his capacious glass window.

Midmorning, two engines from the Los Angeles Fire Department "crash crew" at VNY -- the FAA designator for the airport -- stopped before the tower to let fly honorary streams of firefighting foam.

After noon, actor and pilot Patrick Swayze called Aune from London to wish him a fine farewell.

"Phil is sort of the Vin Scully of Van Nuys," Dan Katz, president of Hollywood Aviators, a flight school in Van Nuys, said while dropping off a basket of farewell cookies. "He really is the voice of VNY."

"He's just amazing. He's such a fixture here. It'll be sort of funny not to be able to hear him on the radio."

Aune signed on at Van Nuys Airport in 1959 when it was surrounded by fields of corn and wheat. He was among the first hired by what was then the newly founded Federal Aviation Administration.

Over the years, Aune would track Hollywood celebrities from Bob Hope -- who used VNY for his 'round-the-world USO tours -- to pilot-actors Danny Kaye, Tom Cruise and John Travolta.

Because he was hired before the mandatory retirement age of 56 was instituted, Aune was grandfathered into his FAA control tower chair and was one of the rare controllers who could track more than one plane at once -- and take no notes.

To aviators, he was always steady, always calm and always could recall the name of every pilot and every plane.

"As a pilot, if you have a controller who is stressed, without a calm voice, it adds to your stress," said Howard Lewis, a traffic pilot and airport rescue firefighter at Station 114 at the airport. "But when you have a calm voice like Phil's, it gives you confidence."

In the tower, Aune strapped on his earphones. Raised his binoculars. Then scanned the skies for moving specks hovering against the hazy hills.

A half-dozen veteran controllers joined him to check the radar and eyeball instruments from wind-speed dials to altimeters as planes from "prop jobs" to Leer jets skimmed the runways.

"There's a lot of experience we're going to lose, no question about it," said Robert Jones, acting air traffic manager. "Phil knows every nook and cranny of this tower."

"He's taught all these young bucks well."

Aune slowly walked down a tight circular stairway to turn in his badge and key. Retirement?

The West Hills father of three and grandfather of seven can clearly see himself on a high-seas cruise, skiing in Mammoth, two-stepping at the Cowboy Palace in Chatsworth or riding his pink-flamed Harley-Davidson into the sunset.

But he cannot seem to shake the noise of countless aircraft seen from nearly 50 years in the control tower.

"I'm counting airplanes as we speak," Aune said. "After a while, you've been up in the air so long, it's hard to land."

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