Narrative:

A P180 landed on runway 07R and was told to exit taxiway A7 and turn left onto taxiway alpha; the P180 rolled past the taxiway and slowly taxied down the runway. Tried to get the P180 to exit at next taxiway but it was blocked by a heavy jet; had the aircraft go to the next taxiway but the P180 stopped then started to taxi again slowly. Realized that a B757 was short final gave go around instructions after the B757 had crossed the threshold. The B757 went around; the P180 finally exited the runway. The local session that I worked was the last position I worked in a 10 hour shift. It was highly complex do to volume of traffic; weather; no local assist the last hour of the session and the taxiways for exiting the runways were congested making it very difficult to get aircraft clear of the runways. I was mentally drained the last hour of the session on local. My relief came up and plugged in just as the incident occurred. The staffing was not appropriate for the amount of traffic and the high complexity of the traffic due to weather and volume of traffic because the airline schedules were running late. Also; the inexperience level of many of the new controllers prohibits the flm's from putting them on busy complex traffic sessions forcing the old; more experienced controllers; to work more and longer on position when it is very busy. The ground controller was overwhelmed with too many aircraft on a limited taxiway space airport with many closures due to extensive construction causing a back up of departures and for arriving aircraft in between the runways. There were numerous runway crossings and double runway crossings to get aircraft to and from the runways caused by ILS critical areas and taxiway closures. A metering position should have been opened to assist the ground controller to reduce the frequency congestion and advise on gate status to expedite aircraft to and from the runways. Local assist should have been staffed to assist the local controller along with hold over overtime. Aircraft should have been taxied appropriately to reduce cross over traffic and unnecessary coordination between the two local controllers which added to the complexity. I and the ground controller should have been relieved earlier as the control sessions were highly complex and mentally tiring especially for the local controller who was at the very end; (minutes left of the shift); and relief had not shown up yet. The night before was very busy and complicated and management should have anticipated the same problems and should have scheduled enough overtime to cover the situation. Management at lax does not keep themselves apprised of situations in the tower cab until something happens and then they are reactionary. They are never proactive and try to solve situations before they become errors.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: LAX Controller described a late go-around event resulting from landing traffic slow to respond and exit the runway; the reporter listing a multitude of contributing factors that included staffing; fatigue and operational complications.

Narrative: A P180 landed on Runway 07R and was told to exit Taxiway A7 and turn left onto Taxiway Alpha; the P180 rolled past the taxiway and slowly taxied down the runway. Tried to get the P180 to exit at next taxiway but it was blocked by a heavy jet; had the aircraft go to the next taxiway but the P180 stopped then started to taxi again slowly. Realized that a B757 was short final gave Go Around instructions after the B757 had crossed the threshold. The B757 went around; the P180 finally exited the runway. The local session that I worked was the last position I worked in a 10 hour shift. It was highly complex do to volume of traffic; weather; no Local Assist the last hour of the session and the taxiways for exiting the runways were congested making it very difficult to get aircraft clear of the runways. I was mentally drained the last hour of the session on Local. My relief came up and plugged in just as the incident occurred. The staffing was not appropriate for the amount of traffic and the high complexity of the traffic due to weather and volume of traffic because the airline schedules were running late. Also; the inexperience level of many of the new controllers prohibits the FLM's from putting them on busy complex traffic sessions forcing the old; more experienced controllers; to work more and longer on position when it is very busy. The Ground Controller was overwhelmed with too many aircraft on a limited taxiway space airport with many closures due to extensive construction causing a back up of departures and for arriving aircraft in between the runways. There were numerous runway crossings and double runway crossings to get aircraft to and from the runways caused by ILS Critical areas and taxiway closures. A metering position should have been opened to assist the Ground Controller to reduce the frequency congestion and advise on gate status to expedite aircraft to and from the runways. Local Assist should have been staffed to assist the Local Controller along with hold over overtime. Aircraft should have been taxied appropriately to reduce cross over traffic and unnecessary coordination between the two Local Controllers which added to the complexity. I and the Ground Controller should have been relieved earlier as the control sessions were highly complex and mentally tiring especially for the Local Controller who was at the very end; (minutes left of the shift); and relief had not shown up yet. The night before was very busy and complicated and management should have anticipated the same problems and should have scheduled enough overtime to cover the situation. Management at LAX does not keep themselves apprised of situations in the Tower Cab until something happens and then they are reactionary. They are never proactive and try to solve situations before they become errors.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.