This week at Teterboro I was given the opportunity to explore other branches of the airport such as the airport maintenance crew and operations. Operations are responsible for the day to day activity on the runways and working with incoming aircraft. Along with FBO's such as Atlantic, Meridian and Jet Aviation, they work to provide the massive traffic of general aviation services from refueling to aircraft maintenance. Unlike maintenance who is responsible for maintaining airport grounds, operations take care of aircraft maintenance, refueling and other aviation services. I also saw the rooms in which they are able to communicate with the Air Traffic Control Tower and learned that Air Traffic Control is managed by the FAA and not airport staff.
I also observed as maintenance crew closed a runway and started doing necessary maintenance. As I am looking at the runway from one end, I could not see the other end! The runway is much longer than one would think and in fact, it even has enough length for an airliner to land should there be an emergency.
It was truly fascinating to see the behind the scenes of Air Traffic in a busy airport and see planes as they are maintained and runways as they land one aircraft after another!