US President Donald Trump has thrown his support behind a multi-billion-dollar project to update the USA’s air traffic control (ATC) system, saying the country needs to modernise airspace management technology to improve aviation safety.
The USA’s top transportation official also says he is working a plan to alleviate a shortage of controllers by allowing some controllers to work beyond the current required retirement age.
“We have very obsolete equipment for air traffic controllers. The towers have horrible equipment,” Trump said during a 30 April meeting with cabinet members. “We want to put a brand new air traffic control system in.”
Indeed, various reports from the US Government Accountability Office have concluded that the FAA has moved slow and struggled over nearly two decades to implement ATC updates under a programme known as “NextGen”.
Trump’s comments came one day after the US House of Representatives’ transportation committee revealed a proposed bill that would set aside $15 billion to fund updates to ATC technology, towers and other infrastructure, and to fund hiring and training more controllers.
US aviation groups were quick to praise that plan as a means of finally addressing ATC technology problems and staff shortages that have proved otherwise intractable and that many times in recent years caused widespread flight disruptions.
“It’s a state-of-the-art system,” US Department of Transportation secretary Sean Duffy says of the envisioned ATC modernisation during Trump’s cabinet meeting. “If we don’t build a brand new system, there are going to be failures and people are going to lose their lives… We need the help of Congress to fund this.”
Between launching its NextGen ATC modernisation effort in 2007 and 2022, the FAA spent $14 billion on NextGen projects, yet one-third of ATC systems are still “unsustainable” due to factors including age, and another 39% are “potentially unsustainable”, according to recent reports from the US Government Accountability Office.
The FAA has estimated the NexGen project will require at least another $35 billion in government and industry funding from 2022 through 2030.
“There have been] Band-Aid fixes that have happened over the course of 20 years. The technology looks like it’s out of 1980s movie,” says Duffy.
Trump said a modern ATC system would prevent accidents like the 29 January midair collision of a US Army Sikorsky UH-60 helicopter and PSA Airlines MHIRJ CRJ700 regional jet, which killed all 67 people on both aircraft.
“If we had the right equipment, you would have heard bells and whistles going off… long before that happened,” he says.
Duffy adds that the DOT is working with the air traffic controllers’ union on a plan to allow some controllers to work beyond the mandatory 56-year-old retirement age.
“We are going to cut a deal to try to get them to stay longer – to stay in the tower,” Duffy says. “We don’t have enough controllers.”
The National Air Traffic Controllers Association declines to comment. It has previously described lifting the retirement age as an ineffective solution to the shortage, saying a small number of controllers reach retirement age annually, according to reports.
