There’s no surprise here – it just sounds more official.
A report from an independent panel of aviation experts found that dysfunction in Congress, including the scrambling by the government to avoid shutdowns as well as an underfunded Federal Aviation Administration, are the root causes of a growing number of near-misses.
In fact, the FAA is short nearly 3,000 air traffic controllers and its current group of ATCs is working 10-hour days or six-day weeks to make up a shortfall.
Partisan politics have played a part in the problems, according to the panel, which called for “urgent actions.”
The potential government shutdowns and the inadequate funding of the FAA have played a pivotal role in the issues.
“This stop-and-start process in Congress has resulted in the disruption of critical activities, notably including the hiring and training of air traffic controllers. It has also slowed down the implementation of key technology modernization programs, delayed thousands of flights, and held up billions of dollars of airport infrastructure investments,” the report reads. “… At current funding levels, the FAA has insufficient resources to carry out its portfolio of responsibilities.”
To its credit, the panel didn’t just find the faults, but offered suggestions. The most obvious of which, of course, was to raise funding for the FAA. The panel did say that aviation is safe, but that the number of challenges are chipping away at that safety.
The FAA itself commissioned the panel after an emergency meeting this summer of nearly 100 airports to address the problem.
“Since the summit, the FAA has taken several actions to end serious close calls,” the FAA said in a statement.
Former FAA Administrator Michael Huerta, who was part of the panel, said no clear-cut solution has emerged and the issues will take further investigation. The panel did say in its report that the current level of staffing of air traffic controllers is at a crisis level. It did note, however, that two government shutdowns and the pandemic put a halt to hiring and training for at least a year total in the last 10 years.
“These hiring slots and positions cannot be recaptured and are, in effect, lost due to several hiring and training challenges,” the report says.
Said Airlines for America, the main trade group for the airlines, in a statement: “The air traffic controller hiring and training pipeline is broken, and we cannot afford to wait more than a decade to address the controller shortage.”
The FAA has investigated a starling number of near-misses this year.
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