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> Nothing is going to happen that hasn't happened before, or otherwise can't be anticipated.

By the way, this mentality is at odds with safety. If you design a safety-critical system under the assumption that nothing unexpected will ever happen, then whenever it happens (and it's a question of when, not if) people will die.

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The first and most important reaction to anything unexpected is simple: localize the trouble spot and reroute traffic away from it.

What can't be handled by doing that? You've listed quite a few examples (and thanks for taking the time to do so!) but all but one of them seem like perfectly reasonable scenarios for automation.

Another point I'd raise is that most ATC screwups don't involve anything weird happening except failures to follow existing ATC procedures. Any list of Things That Make For Bad Days at the Airport needs to include that.

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