by Mike Hall
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA)—under fire for failing to meet inspection deadlines for the nation’s passenger air fleet—is now putting off inspections of equally vital ground-based equipment such as radar and instrument landing systems.
The National Air Traffic Controllers Association (NATCA) says that in March, the FAA relaxed certification and maintenance requirements and removed the time element for the inspections. Appropriate maintenance and certification that the equipment is operating correctly is a critical function in ensuring passenger safety, says NATCA.
Larry Ihlen, a senior engineer, 30-year veteran FAA employee and NATCA Alaska local union president, says:
The engineers of the agency have continued to warn management officials that removing the time element between checking the equipment will compromise the safety of the National Airspace System.
The approach the FAA is taking with its own systems is like saying that you will drive your car across the country without ever checking the oil; it worked yesterday, so it will work tomorrow, unless it quits. Unfortunately, when the agency’s equipments quit, the loss of life is a very real possibility.
Meanwhile, the FAA continues to ignore the growing safety problem controller fatigue poses to the flying public. The agency even disciplined a controller for calling in sick because he was incapacitated for duty from fatigue due to the long hours and increased workloads the controller staffing crisis has created.
Says Edward Wytkind, president of the AFL-CIO Transportation Trades Department:
Congress must step in and address important safety, security and labor issues that have been left unresolved for too long. Restoring collective bargaining at the FAA, ensuring one standard of aircraft repair whether done in-house or at foreign repair stations, providing health and safety protections to flight attendants, increased staffing for air traffic control and safety inspectors, updating firefighting standards at airports, and addressing flight crew fatigue are critical issues that can’t wait.
After the FAA refused to bargain a contract with the controllers and in September 2006, unilaterally imposed new work rules, an already short-handed controller force began shrinking even further as workers eligible to retire began leaving rather than work under the conditions. Younger controllers and trainees also begin leaving at increased rates. That’s meant more forced overtime and fewer breaks and shorter breaks each shift for the remaining controllers.
Under the imposed rules, controllers are prohibited from using their accrued leave as sick leave—even if they are incapacitated due to fatigue. Veteran air traffic controller Kevin Campbell not only received a formal letter from the FAA accusing him of abusing sick leave, but tight restrictions were placed on his remaining leave and he was threatened with dismissal, NATCA reports.
Shortly before the FAA imposed the new work rules, an agency spokesman told reporters that controllers had several leave options available if they believed they were too fatigued to safely work. He also said:
We would never have a controller controlling traffic who was too tired to work.
Yet under the imposed rules, the FAA has full authority to force a controller to work, regardless of fatigue. Says NATCA President Patrick Forrey:
We can only surmise the FAA has done this because of critical staffing levels which are exacerbating the fatigue issue.
Recently NATCA has declared staffing emergencies at several major airports and their surrounding airspace. The emergency declaration means controllers do not have sufficient numbers of trained and experienced personnel on the ground to safely handle the volume of traffic in the air and takeoffs and landings at major airports.
Veterans and trainees have been leaving the FAA at the rate of about six per day, leaving less than 11,000 full certified air traffic controllers in radar facilities and control towers—the lowest number in 15 years.