The FAA will impose a 10 percent reduction in scheduled flights at 40 major U.S. airports starting Friday, as the agency works to ease mounting pressure on air traffic control facilities affected by the ongoing government shutdown.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy called the move a “proactive” step to preserve safety as controller fatigue and staffing shortages intensify.
Duffy said the FAA remains about 2,000 controllers short of its required staffing levels and that the shutdown has halted progress in filling those positions.
“Our controllers haven’t been paid in a month,” he said during a Wednesday press conference. “They got a partial paycheck in early October, then a big fat zero. Many are taking side jobs to put food on the table. I don’t want them to take side jobs—I want them to show up for work—but I understand they’re trying to meet their obligations.”
Pressures Build
FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford said agency data shows rising fatigue indicators and a spike in voluntary safety reports from pilots.
“We’re seeing pressures build in a way that, if we allow it to go unchecked, will not allow us to continue to tell the public that we operate the safest airspace system in the world,” Bedford said. “We intend to be proactive.”
The capacity reduction, Bedford added, will apply across 40 high-traffic markets, with airlines asked to scale back schedules evenly.
“We’re going to look for a radical reduction across these markets over the next 48 hours,” he said. “There’s no perfect science here. So it’s really trying to look at where the potential pressure points are building, what we’re seeing in terms of safety disclosure reporting from our commercial air transport pilots, that’s informing us.”
The restrictions will cover IFR operations, Bedford said, including passenger, cargo, and business aviation flights. In certain markets experiencing staffing triggers, the FAA will also limit VFR activity, including general aviation traffic. Space launches will also be restricted.
Duffy added that the FAA will roll back restrictions once staffing and fatigue metrics improve.
“This will be data driven, safety driven,” he said. “If the data goes in the right direction, we’ll roll this back”
The FAA said the list of affected airports will be released Thursday following a meeting with affected airlines.
