Air traffic controllers lost contact with aircraft heading to and from Newark Liberty International Airport last week, their union said, detailing an equipment failure that led to massive flight delays and raised more concerns about aging U.S. aviation infrastructure and staffing shortages.
The controllers who guide flights out and in of the Latest Jersey airport on April 28 “temporarily lost radar and communications with the aircraft under their control, unable to see, hear, or consult with them,” the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, their union, said in a press release.
Staffing shortages followed the incident, which was so severe that a number of the controllers involved “have taken day off to recuperate from the stress of multiple recent outages,” the Federal Aviation Administration said Monday.
There have been greater than 1,500 delays on the Latest Jersey airport last week, in keeping with flight-tracker site FlightAware, as disruptions piled up due to shortages of air traffic controllers.
“Our antiquated air traffic control system is affecting our workforce,” the FAA said. “We’re working to make sure the current telecommunications equipment is more reliable within the Latest York area by establishing a more resilient and redundant configuration with the local exchange carriers.”
The FAA and union didn’t say how long the outage lasted, but Bloomberg reported, citing people accustomed to the matter, that it was nearly 90 seconds.
United Airlines said Friday that it should cut 35 flights a day from its Latest York City-area hub at Newark due to the delays, in hopes of putting more slack into the system and ease disruptions.
In a note to customers, CEO Scott Kirby said Friday that last week’s “technology issues were compounded as over 20% of the FAA controllers for EWR walked off the job.”
“This particular air traffic control facility has been chronically understaffed for years and without these controllers, it’s now clear — and the FAA tells us — that Newark airport cannot handle the variety of planes which can be scheduled to operate there within the weeks and months ahead,” Kirby said in his note.
The union denied that the controllers walked off the job and explained that staff took day off under the Federal Employees’ Compensation Act, which “covers all federal employees which can be physically injured or experience a traumatic event on the job.”
The U.S. has faced a shortage of air traffic controllers for years. The Trump administration recently rolled out recent incentives to rent and retain controllers, who’re required to retire at age 56.
The FAA last yr moved controllers who’re answerable for aircraft arriving and departing from Newark from a facility on Long Island in Latest York to a distinct facility in Philadelphia, in hopes of reducing overloaded controllers who were also handling traffic for Latest York City’s major airports.
The airspace is a number of the most congested on the planet.
“The Port Authority has invested billions to modernize Newark Liberty, but those improvements rely on a completely staffed and modern federal air traffic system,” the Port Authority of Latest York and Latest Jersey, which oversees the main airports within the Latest York City area, said in a press release Monday. “We proceed to induce the FAA to handle ongoing staffing shortages and speed up long-overdue technology upgrades that proceed to cause delays within the nation’s busiest air corridor.”
U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy last week visited the Philadelphia facility and said he’ll unveil plans for an “brand-new air traffic control system” this week.
“The system that we’re using will not be effective to manage the traffic that we have now today,” he told reporters last week.
Despite the aging technology, Duffy stressed that the system is secure since the FAA will slow, if not ground, airplanes altogether if air traffic controllers have capability constraints.
Latest Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy on Monday urged Duffy to handle the staffing shortfalls within the Philadelphia facility that oversees Newark in addition to the Latest York facility that controls traffic out and in of LaGuardia Airport and John F. Kennedy International Airport, each in Queens. Of the Philadelphia move and repair reductions Murphy wrote: “It is clear neither effort has led to the specified end result.”
Murphy asked Duffy to prioritize the region in future investments.
“We expect hundreds of thousands of additional passengers next yr as we prepare to host the World Cup Finals and must avoid additional disruptions or strains on the system,” Murphy said in his letter.
Runway construction and bad weather added to Newark travel snarls in recent days.
