The US Federal Aviation Administration has capped the number of flights at New Jersey’s Newark Liberty international airport, following a series of well-publicised ATC outages and delays.
The agency on 20 May says it will impose the interim order as it found a “persistent number” of flights above capacity at Newark.
Acting FAA administer Chris Rocheleau says the move, which comes after a series of meetings with US operators, will “relieve the substantial inconvenience to the traveling public from excessive flight delays”.
Rocheleau cites factors such as “runway construction, staffing challenges, and recent equipment issues” for the operational challenges at Newark, and warns that they have the potential to “spread through the National Airspace System”.
Under the interim order, the FAA says the maximum number of flights handled per hour at Newark will be 56 (28 arrivals and 28 departures) until mid-June, when construction works on the airport’s main runway are largely completed.
Thereafter, the FAA will allow 34 hourly departures and arrivals until 25 October, when the northern summer operating schedule ends. The airport usually handles around 77 total flights per hour.
It will, however, maintain a tighter limit on Saturdays between June and October, as runway construction works are still expected to take place.
“The FAA may change the targeted limits if it determines capacity exists to accommodate more flights without a significant increase in delays, or that further flight reductions are necessary,” the agency states.
As recently as 9 May, Newark was hit by disruptions, after a telecommunications outage - lasting 90s - impacted communications and radar display at Philadelphia TRACON Area C, which guides air traffic at Newark.
Similar outages took place on 5 May, as well as in April and in November 2024, prompting airlines to urge the FAA to cap the number of flights to resolve the operational disruptions.
