What to know about the air traffic reductions ordered by the FAA : NPR
An air traffic control tower rises above Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, one of 40 major airports nationwide targeted by the Federal Aviation Administration’s flight reductions.
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WASHINGTON — Airlines have begun canceling hundreds of flights to comply with a Federal Aviation Administration order, aiming to gradually reduce air traffic by 10% at dozens of the nation’s busiest airports.
The agency says the move is necessary to maintain airspace security as it faces a continuing shortage of air traffic controllers, who must work without pay during the government shutdown.
“We’ll probably see more people on fewer flights, which means less pressure on controllers,” Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy told reporters at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport on Friday.
But many questions remain unanswered about this planned reduction in air traffic and its consequences for airlines and travelers.
How will the FAA’s plan to reduce theft work?
In a order Released Thursday evening, the FAA listed the top 40 airports it has targeted for air traffic reductions. The list includes major airline hubs Atlanta, Chicago, Denver, Dallas, Los Angeles and Newark, NJ.
Flights between these major airports and many other regional and mid-sized airports will also be affected as airlines reduce their schedules. For example, United Airlines has published a complete list of flights it is canceled during the weekend, with many small markets like Moline, Illinois; Shreveport, Louisiana; Grand Junction, Colo.; and Fresno, California, are losing flights.
The FAA plan requires airlines to gradually implement these reductions, starting with 4% of flights over the weekend and gradually increasing to 10% by next Friday. Airlines have some discretion in deciding how they intend to achieve these goals. It is therefore likely that they will seek to protect their most popular and profitable routes while reducing regional flights.
U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy spoke to reporters during a visit to Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport Friday in Arlington, Virginia. He said he expects to see “more people on fewer flights, which means less pressure on controllers.”
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The order to reduce traffic only applies to domestic flights, not international routes. The FAA plan also places temporary limits on commercial space launches, which may place additional demands on air traffic controllers.
How will this impact flight operations?
Major airlines are trying to minimize the impact of flight reductions.
Delta Air Lines says it plans to operate “the vast majority of our schedule” and continue to serve all markets the airline serves, “although frequency may be affected.”
David Seymour, American Airlines’ chief operating officer, said in a letter to company employees that “the majority of our reductions relate to our regional flight program. And, to ensure we can welcome back as many customers as possible, we have also focused discounts on higher frequency markets.”
A United Airlines official says the airline will also try to minimize the impact on customers.
“The good thing, if there’s a silver lining here, is that we’re not in a peak travel period right now,” said David Kinzelman, United’s senior vice president of airport operations, so the airline has more seats available for customers whose flights are canceled.
In a interview On NPR’s All Things Considered on Thursday, Kinzelman said airlines are used to quickly adjusting their operations.
“We frequently have service interruptions in the airline industry. They could be storms. They could be personnel triggers,” Kinzelman said. “So we have a good playbook. Just to put things in perspective, the impact here is what we would expect from a medium-sized storm.”
But this situation is different from a line of storms that only affects one or two regions of the country. There is no exact precedent for a reduction in air traffic at so many airports at the same time, so it is difficult to predict how it will play out.
How did the FAA choose which airports to target?
It’s not entirely clear, although FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford has said the process is based on data, including internal safety measurements and voluntary reports from commercial air transport pilots.
“We’re trying to be prescriptive and surgical,” Bedford said at a news conference announcing the cuts Wednesday. “Put relief where it will do the most good.”
The list of 40 major airports includes some that experienced a persistent shortage of air traffic controllers during the shutdown, including Newark Liberty International Airport and Reagan Washington National Airport.
But surprisingly, the list does not include the Austin and Nashville airports, which experienced frequent screener shortages before and during the shutdown.
Some of the airports that appear on the list are also confusing – perhaps none more so than Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport in Alaska. The airport is a major hub for cargo from Asia. But the FAA has not reported a significant shortage of air traffic controllers at the airport or other facilities that manage traffic around it during the shutdown.
Why is the FAA doing this right now?
The FAA says the move is necessary to keep the system safe as fewer air traffic controllers report to work during the government shutdown.
These controllers must work without pay until the shutdown ends, and they are under increasing pressure as they face the prospect of missing a second full paycheck. Some have taken second jobs and many are sick.
Despite this, the air traffic control system worked quite well during the shutdown — until last weekend, when the FAA reported significant staffing shortages at dozens of installations across the country.
But critics of the Trump administration say the move appears to go beyond simple security.
“This is a political move by the Trump administration to try to force Democrats to adhere to their budget and priorities that cut health care and nutrition benefits for seniors, children and people with disabilities,” said U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen, D-Tenn., a former ranking Democrat on the House subcommittee that oversees aviation. Cohen nevertheless called the decision “prudent” given the additional stress on air traffic controllers.
The head of Airlines for America, an airline industry trade group, rejected the argument that optics or politics are behind the flight reductions.
“This is all in the name of safety,” Chris Sununu, the group’s president and CEO and former Republican governor of New Hampshire, said in a statement. interview with NPR’s Morning Edition. “Airlines stand to lose hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars. They’re not doing this just for political reasons. They’re doing it because they know that safety is absolutely paramount and the pressures are absolutely increasing.”
How do travelers deal with uncertainty about their flights?
Many are understandably worried about their upcoming travel plans.
NPR member station WABE spoke with Ellen Silva, who had just arrived in Atlanta on Thursday. She’s supposed to return to Baltimore on Tuesday, but she’s worried about what might happen if that flight is canceled.
“I would miss the job and I would have very unhappy people that I work for because they depend on me to be able to travel, and if I’m not there, they can’t leave,” Silva said.
Patricia Andeweg was supposed to fly from Boston Logan International Airport to Australia to celebrate her 90th birthday with family this week. But due to a series of delays and cancellations caused by stoppages, she missed her connecting flight.
“I miss my birthday,” Andeweg told member station GBH on Friday. “But on the other hand, I’ve met so many helpful people, right, left and center. I call it the journey to nowhere.”
Jeremy Siegel of member station GBH in Boston and Marlon Hyde of WABE in Atlanta contributed to this report.
