The recent chronic delays and cancellations at the largest airport in New Jersey have highlighted the shortage of air traffic controllers and the team they use, which the administration of President Donald Trump wants to replace.
The Federal Aviation Administration is working in a short -term solution to problems at Newark airport that includes technical repairs and flight reduction to maintain manageable traffic while it is a shortage of controllers. The officials gather with all the airlines that leave Newark from Wednesday to discuss the plan.
But even before those problems, aviation was already in the center of attention from the mortal midair collision of a passenger plane and a helicopter of the US Army. Uu. About Washington, DC, in January, and a series of other accidents and mishaps since then. Investigations on these accidents continue while the United States Department of Transportation tries obsolete equipment. A audience in the United States Senate on Wednesday morning will focus on FAA’s efforts.
Twice in the last two and a half weeks, the radar and communications systems that air traffic controlle in Philadelphia that run the airplanes inside and outside Newark trust a short time. That happened because the lines that transport the radar signal from another FAA installation in New York failed, and the backup system did not work immediately.
Therefore, the controllers could not see or talk to the planes around the Newark Liberty International Airport for 90 seconds in April 28 and May 9. The lines, some of which were old copper cables, failed for the third time on Sunday, but this time the backup system worked and the radar remained online.
But the first of these stressful situations led to five to seven controllers to take a 45 -day trauma license, and that worsened the shortage of existing personnel in the philadelphia control installation, which led FAA to limit the amount of flights in Newark every day.
FAA currently has 22 fully certified air traffic controllers and five supervisors assigned to Newark at Philadelphia facilities, but the agency wants to have 38 controllers there. Another 21 controllers are training there, and 10 of them are certified in at least part of the area.
FAA quickly limited the number of flights in Newark between 24 and 28 arrivals and the same amount of exits every hour to ensure that the remaining controllers can handle them safely. At a time when the controller staff is especially thin, such as Monday, FAA is limiting traffic even more. Before the problems, 38 or 39 flights would take off and land every hour in Newark.
The meetings that FAA officials are having with all the airlines that begin on Wednesday focus on a plan that continues to limit takeoffs and landings to no more than 28 each per hour until at least in mid -June. By then, a track construction project must be completed, and the controllers who took trauma license would be programmed to return. After that, the FAA has said that it could increase the limit to 34 arrivals and 34 exits per hour.
Meanwhile, the amount of flights per day must be cut because the airport cannot handle everyone during the schedule. That is why Newark has generally led the nation in cancellations and delays in recent weeks. After the FAA meets with the airlines, it will give them a couple of weeks to send information in writing, so it will not issue a decision before May 28.
FAA has been able to install new fiber optic lines at Newark airport and the other two important airports in the New York area, Kennedy International and Laguardia, but they are still being tested and it is not connected until the end of the month. The officials were able to update some computer software last week that He kept the radar from disconnecting for the third time on Sunday when the main line He failed once again.
In the longest term, FAA also plans to build a new radar system in Philadelphia, so the controllers there will no longer have to trust the New York signal. But that could not be done for months, although officials are working with contractors to accelerate that project.
FAA has been working for a long time to hire more air traffic controlle to replace retired workers and handle the growing air traffic. But it may be difficult to find good candidates for stressful positions, and it has been training for the controllers for years.
The Secretary of Transportation, Sean Duffy, has made several movements to try to hire more controllers. FAA is trying to shorten the time between when someone applies to the Academy of Air Traffic Controllers in Oklahoma City and when they begin, and the agency is also trying to improve the graduation rate there by offering more support to students. Candidates with the highest scores in the entrance exam are also obtaining the highest priority.
FAA also offers experienced controllers bonds if they choose not to retire early and continue working to help relieve scarcity.
More high -tech simulators are also being used in airports throughout the country, including Newark, to train air traffic controllers. FAA said Tuesday that controllers tend to complete the training more quickly when they use one of the 111 simulators it has.
“These new simulators give air traffic control apprentices a high -tech space to learn, develop and practice their skills,” said the interim administrator of FAA, Chris Rocheleau.
The Transportation Department plans to request from Congress billions and billions of dollars to pay a review of the air traffic control system throughout the country to replace the 618 Radars, install 4,600 new high -speed connections and update all computers controllers. The exact price has not been determined.
Duffy blames the administration of former President Joe Biden for not updating the air traffic control system, but Congress first recognized that the system was fighting to keep up with the growing number of flights since the 1990s, so the problems date back long before the Biden or First Trump administrations. The former Biden transport secretary, Pete Buttigieg, has defended his efforts to update part of the technology and expand the hiring of the air traffic controller.
Some of the computer teams of decades in which the controllers trust were exhibited at the press conference last week on the plan, which has attracted broad support of more than 50 groups throughout the industry. Duffy has used a variety of colorful metaphors to emphasize how old the team is, saying that the team seems to come out of the set of the movie “Apollo 13” and compared it with a 1967 Beetle Volkswagen.
