AUTHENTICITY CERTIFIED: Text
version below transcribed directly from audio. NOTE: First part of the press
conference dealing with
UPS Airlines Flight 2976 not included in the
transcript below.]
In regard to air traffic control, we've had a
conversation over the course of the last month about some of the challenges that
we're having in the airspace. Many of you know that we are 2,000 controllers
short, air traffic controllers short, and we have surged our Academy to bring
more controllers into our system. We are 20% up in controllers through the
Academy thus far this year. I've also offered air traffic controllers who are
of the age of retirement a 20% upfront cash bonus to actually stay on. Some of
the best controllers we have don't retire; [they] keep working for us.
All of that has been reducing the pressure on the staffing side of air traffic
control. It's working, but it takes years to bring more well-trained certified
controllers into the airspace. The shutdown is having an impact on our ability
to maintain those numbers and dent that 2000 shortage that we have.
You also know we're modernizing the airspace. We have an old set of equipment
that we use to control America's airspace. We have, though, the safest airspace
in the world. And that's not because of the equipment; that's because of the
well-trained air traffic controllers that we have operating the national
airspace. We received $12.5 billion from the Congress in one big, beautiful
bill. And we need a total of $31.5 billion to accomplish the mission of
completely rebuilding America's airspace. The work has begun. We're
transitioning our -- our telecommunications. We're about to announce a project
manager to do all of the work for this brand new system.
But I want to talk about what's happening over the course of the last month with
regard to the shutdown. Our air traffic controllers and a lot of those who work
at DOT but throughout government, they haven't received paychecks. And many of
these employees, they're the head of household. They have their spouse at home.
They have a child or two or three, and when they lose income, they are
confronted with real world difficulties in how they pay their bills. And so for
your traffic controllers, they received a partial payment in -- in early October. The
second payment, they got a big fat zero, no paycheck at all. Tomorrow, they get
a pay stub email on what their next paycheck is going to be. And when that
pay stub comes out, that is also going to be zero. So they will have gone a
month without any pay.
And what we're finding is that our air traffic controllers, because of the
financial pressures at home, are taking side jobs. They need to put food on the
table, gas in the car, pay their bills. By the way, I do not want them to take
side jobs. I want them to show up for work. We have asked them to show up for
work, but I'm not naive to understand that they're trying to figure out how they
meet their -- their daily obligations. And so because of that, we have seen staffing
pressures throughout our airspace.
Those who travel will see that we had -- we've had more delays. We've had more
cancellations. We do not want to see disruptions at the FAA or here at DOT. We
don't want that. But our number one priority is to make sure when you travel,
you travel safely. And that's why, as the administrator and I have been talking
throughout the day, his team has been working for the last 24, 36, 48 hours
crunching data. We're noticing that there's additional pressure that's building
in the system. And again, our priority is to make sure that you're safe. And so
we're going to talk about additional measures that we are going to take that's
going to reduce the risk profile in the national airspace.
And I'm going to turn it over to the administrator
to do that. As he walks through what that plan is going to look like, I
anticipate there'll be additional disruptions. There'll be frustration. We are
working with the airlines. They're going to work with passengers. But in the
end, our sole role is to make sure that we keep this airspace as safe as
possible.
The administrator is going to talk about all of the
-- the tools we're going
to deploy. One of them, though, is going to be that there is going to be a 10%
reduction in capacity at 40 of our locations. The administrator is going to tell
you that it's been -- this is data-based. This is not based on what airline travels has more
flights [sic] out of what location. This is about where is the pressure and how do we
alleviate the pressure.
And so I want to thank him for, again, him and his team's great work. He'll lay
out what the specifics are of this plan and then we're happy to take questions
from all of you.
Bryan Bedford.
FAA ADMINISTRATOR BEDFORD: Thank
you, Mr. Secretary. Again, as the secretary said, our primary mission at the FAA
is to manage the airspace in the safest manner possible. That is our only focus.
What we have been monitoring on a daily basis, frankly, hourly basis, is looking
at all of the metrics that we use to surveil the
NAS [National Airspace System]
and its health and its well-being. And for the most part, we're happy to report
that it is running as efficiently today in terms of its safety metrics as it was
prior to the lapse. But as we dig deeper into the data, what we find are implemen -- issues of fatigue that our flight controller, or flight controllers,
are experiencing. And we see that through voluntary safety disclosure reports
coming in from commercial air transport pilots.
That data has allowed us to focus not on the NAS as a whole, but on specific
markets where we're seeing some of these reports come to us. And as we slice the
data more granularly, we are seeing pressures build in a way that we don't feel
will, if we allow it to go unchecked, will allow us to continue to tell the
public that we operate the safest airline system in the world. And we're not
going to react to that, and we intend to be proactive.
So, we're going to implement measures with our commercial airline industry
partners. But this is going to go beyond commercial airspace. It's going to
include restrictions on space launches, restrictions on
VFR [visual flight
rules] traffic in certain markets that have continued FAA controller staffing
triggers, and a host of other countermeasures, if you will, that will give us
the highest level of comfort that we're maintaining the safest aviation space in
the world. And that -- that's the mission. But we do recognize that the
controllers have been working fastidiously for the last five weeks with this
huge burden over their head of lack of compensation. And we are starting to see
some evidence that that fatigue is building in the system in ways that we feel
we need to -- to work towards relieving some of that pressure.
So, again, as the secretary said we've identified 40 high-traffic environment
markets. We'll be happy to share that later. We have decided that a 10 percent
reduction in scheduled capacity would be appropriate to -- again -- continue to
take the pressure off of our controllers. And as we continue to see staffing
triggers, there will be additional measures that will be taken in those specific
markets.
Again, I think it's a holistic plan. I really appreciate the men and women at
the FAA who have been working this situation from the get-go. I want to applaud
the controllers who continue to come to work on a daily basis, keeping our
system safe. But I also want to recognize the fact that the data is telling us
we need to do more and we are going to do more. And I want to reassure the
American travelers that it is absolutely safe to fly in the American skies.
So, with that, I'd be happy to turn it over to you, Mr. Secretary, and/or take
any questions that you have.
SECRETARY OF TRANSPORTATION
DUFFY: Yeah, I do want to -- I want to
reiterate, this is proactive. We don't want to find ourselves in a situation --
I think the administrator said, we don't want the -- was it -- the...horse out
of the barn and then look back and say there were -- there were issues we could
have taken that we didn't. So, we are going to proactively make decisions that
keep the space, the airspace safe.
With that we're happy to take any questions you may have.
QUESTION: Dave
-- Dave Sheppard [ph]. So, just to confirm, those restrictions start Friday? Is
that correct?
SECRETARY DUFFY: Those are going to
start Friday morning.
QUESTION:
And how are you going to portion those among the
airports, the airlines? Is this something the airlines have to do to come up
with their own 10%?
SECRETARY DUFFY: And I'll...let Brian
address that, but again it's going to be based on the locations, the...40
locations, that we feel the pressure. And how that's going to be implemented,
Bryan, I'll let you answer that.
ADMINISTRATOR BEDFORD:
Yes, well, we'll be meeting with the airline community this evening to talk
about how we'll move to implementation. We want to do this in an organized way.
We want to make sure that planes get where they need to go for maintenance and
crew. Crews get to where they need to be as we start to implement this drawdown
in service. But it will be restricted to these 40 high-volume traffic markets.
We're going to ask the airlines to work with us collaboratively to reduce their
schedules pro -- pro rata through the day. So, we're going to look for a
ratable1
reduction across the -- these 40 markets over the next 48 hours.
QUESTION: So [unclear] the envelope, that's
4,000, 3,500-4,000 flights? And that's a -- really, that's a significant number.
And how do you think the airspace or the system is going to handle that dramatic
reduction in such a short period of time?
ADMINISTRATOR BEDFORD: Well, again, we're
trying to lean into the fact that when we see pressures building in these 40
markets, we just can't ignore it, you know, and we're not going to wait for a
safety problem to truly manifest itself when the early indicators are telling us
we can take action today to prevent, you know, things from deteriorating. So,
the system is extremely safe today. It will be extremely safe tomorrow. And if
this -- if the pressures continue to build even after we take these -- these
measures, we'll come back and take additional measures. So, again, we're trying
to be prescriptive, surgical, put the relief where the relief will do the -- the
most good. But again, we are not going to do anything that will compromise the
safety of air transport in the United States.
QUESTION: Mr. Secretary --
QUESTION: Thank you. Grady Trimble with Fox
Business. I'm wondering, in the same vein as David's question, Is there a plan
to make sure that one airline isn't disproportionately affected, or one route or
city or multiple cities aren't disproportionately affected by this? And to your
knowledge, when was the last time this type of thing happened and how did it go?
ADMINISTRATOR BEDFORD:
Well, I -- I'm not aware in my 35-year history in the aviation market where
we've had a situation where we're taking these kind [sic] of measures. Then
again, we're in a -- we're in new territory in terms of government shutdowns.
Also, I think we've learned things through the -- the mishap, you know, the
tragic accident with DCA and
PSA 5342. So, our -- our surveillance on the
NAS is much different today than it was even a year ago. The data that we're
looking at is much different and more granular today than it was a year ago. And
we simply aren't going to ignore that. So, again, I think it is unusual just as
the shutdown is unusual, just on the fact that our controllers haven't been paid
for a month is unusual. These are unusual times, and we look forward to a time
when we can get back to business as usual.
QUESTION: And
how do you apply it proportionately to each airline or -- or is that not part of
the plan?
ADMINISTRATOR BEDFORD:
No, it will be proportionate. We'll be working through that with the airlines
this evening as we start to roll this out, recognizing there will be no perfect
solution. There are some airlines that operate less than daily service, you
know, so how do you reduce 10% of one? You know, we're -- we will work through
those issues. We certainly don't want to disrupt service availability in
individual city pairs. So, we're -- we will take all of those factors into
consideration.
SECRETARY DUFFY: One other point on the
controllers, I think, compared to other shutdowns. Our controllers, again,
though we are not full staffed -- I -- I've laid that out -- I think the
performance of our controllers showing up for work, compared to other shutdowns,
I'm proud of them. Many of them have showed up. But to the administrator's
point, many of the same ones who show up continue to show up. Some of those who
don't show up continue to not show up, which means we have those who come to
work; they're working longer hours; they're working more days. And that's some
of the pressure that we're seeing on them, and we want to alleviate that
pressure before it would become an issue.
QUESTION: And, Mr. Secretary -- QUESTION: Mr. Secretary,
realistically, for the American people that are watching this right now, what
will this mean practically for air travel? Is this going to lead to more flight
delays, more cancellations?
SECRETARY DUFFY:
Well, I think it's going to lead to more cancellations, that we're going to work
with the airlines to do this in a -- a systematic way. And again, we had a
conversation about that. We -- I -- I'm concerned about disrupting people's
travel. We're coming into a weekend. That doesn't...I travel. I travel a lot. We
are concerned about that. But we had to have a gut check of what is our job? Is
it to make sure there's, you know, minimal delays or minimal cancellations, or
is our job to make sure we make the hard decisions to continue to keep the
airspace safe? That is our job, is safety. And so again, when we see pressure,
we are going to get ahead of it and make sure that you get to where you're
going, point A to point B.
QUESTION: And how long will these
restrictions stay in place? Until the government reopens? And are you any closer
to closing parts of the U.S. airspace?
SECRETARY DUFFY:
So we're -- we're going to...the FAA and the administrator are going to continue
to do this, and with me as well.
ADMINISTRATOR BEDFORD: Until we see the
metrics start to move in the right direction.
SECRETARY DUFFY:
We are going to use data. The data will dictate what we do. Again, if the data
goes in the wrong direction, could you see additional restrictions? Yes. If the
data goes in the right direction, we will roll this back. But it's going to be
data driven, safety driven.
Yes.
QUESTION:
Sarah Ploss, with CBS News. Couple of questions, if I could. First is, you
mentioned additional measures on top of this. What are those additional
measures? And secondly, what happened today, or maybe even changed between
yesterday when we last were speaking of this, that prompted this decision today?
SECRETARY DUFFY: So -- So, the...additional
measures were -- were the launches that we are going to guardrail into certain
times. The date [for] launches can be very disruptive to the airspace. They take
a lot more attention from controllers, VFR travel and -- there was one more that
you were --
ADMINISTRATOR BEDFORD: So, well, look, I'm
going to try to address both questions. So, what happened today? What's special
about today versus yesterday? The data we've been looking at is the data that
we've been -- we manage the NAS, whether we were in a shutdown or we're not.
We're always looking at the overall health and safety of the NAS, whether we
have any critical hot spots, right? This is -- These are changes that were
implemented post PSA 5342 under the secretary's leadership. So, I'm grateful
that that's there. And the team of men and women at the FAA work hard managing
this data, and we're leaning -- you know, it's not reactive now; it's proactive.
And that's the difference. We're not going to wait until we see something
flashing red to say, "Oooh, we should take action now." We want to keep
everything in the green. We want to keep all the safety measures within the
guardrails that we have that define the safest system of airspace in the world.
And these actions, we believe, are sufficient to allow us to continue to keep
the safety metrics within the -- the appropriate levels that we want, which is
perfect safety.
So, yes, it's -- it's leaning into it. It's anticipating that if the pressures
continue to build through the shutdown, additional measures will be necessary.
We're going to go ahead and implement those measures proactively. And we'll
continue to measure the safety and health of the NAS.
Yes.
QUESTION:
Chase Williams, Fox Business. I know David kind of alluded to it, but 10% is not
an insignificant number. Did you guys think about starting at maybe a lesser
point, such as 5% capacity; or maybe even talk about, you know, maybe a bigger
number, such as 15 or 20?
ADMINISTRATOR BEDFORD: All right, I can tell
you a whole panoply of options were evaluated. 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. And then as we get into
the granular details on these 40 individual markets, we felt like this was the
appropriate next step. That doesn't mean that we won't come in and surgically do
more if more is required, or if we see maybe we've over-corrected we can
certainly take some of the -- some of the mitigation out.
SECRETARY DUFFY:
But again we thought 10% was the -- the right number based on the pressure that
we were seeing.
Yes.
QUESTION: Sam Ogozalek, Politico. Can you speak
a little more to the 40 markets? Are they the busiest markets or is there some
other metric you're using to determine which ones they are?
SECRETARY DUFFY: So --
QUESTION: And are you going to release the
names?
SECRETARY DUFFY: Yes. I'll...let Bryan give
the specifics.
ADMINISTRATOR BEDFORD: Yes, of course. We'd
like to brief our -- our, you know, aviation users with more of these specifics.
But yes, we will publish the markets that will be affected. And of course,
airlines will be publishing to their customers their -- their implementation of
these processes. Again, I just want to be clear that --
QUESTION: So, when are they going to release
the names of the markets?
ADMINISTRATOR BEDFORD: They'll be released
tomorrow. What I want to be clear on though is the NAS is safe. You know, these
are proactive measures that we're taking to ensure that we can guarantee the
American public that -- that NAS is operating at the highest levels of safety.
And so, we can debate on whether it should have been an 8, 9, 10, or 12 percent,
but this is where -- the point where we're going to start.
<crosstalk>
QUESTION: Hypothetically, if the shutdown
were to end tomorrow, would these restrictions still go into place Friday, or is
this -- ?
ADMINISTRATOR BEDFORD:
I think what we're going to want to see is a -- is a return to controller
performance that's at levels that we were experiencing prior to the shutdown.
You know, we're going to --
QUESTION: Can I just...What about -- How
will this affect cargo carriers, international flights, and GA traffic? Are
there any restrictions [on] any of those?
ADMINISTRATOR BEDFORD:
So, it'll apply to all
IFR [instrument flight rules] users and, if
there are staffing triggers in selected markets, it will apply to VFR traffic as
well.
QUESTION: ...are you going to protect
international flights or no?
ADMINISTRATOR BEDFORD:
I have to tell you we haven't -- we haven't talked through the international
component yet.
QUESTION: Okay.
STAFF: One more [question], guys.
QUESTION: Is -- Is there a concern about the
economics also? 'Cause, I mean, obviously, airlines carry a lot of cargo. Is
there any concern as we move forward into this what the economic impacts of this
could be?
SECRETARY DUFFY:
Go ahead [to administrator Bedford].
ADMINISTRATOR BEDFORD: Well, I'll leave the
economics to the Secretary. But as far as the FAA is concerned, that's not our
-- that's not our interest. Our interest is only in main -- maintaining the
health and safety of the NAS. Full stop.
SECRETARY DUFFY:
Listen, there...are a lot of equities at play. And we think about all those
equities, but the number one is safety. And so again, am I concerned about
cargo? Yes. Am I concerned about disruption in the airspace on Friday? Yes. But
again, we want to make sure we are doing the right measures, implementing the
right measures to make sure we have the best outcomes. We've talked to a number
of the -- the different airlines. Again, would they be pleased that there's a
10% reduction? Probably not. But are they supportive that we are working
overtime to make sure the airspace is safe? Yes. And we will -- we will team up
and partner with them and make sure that we that...they have enough time to, as
best as they can, minimize the disruption to the airspace.
To the -- To the administrator's point, because it's data-driven, if there was a
deal today and the government's going to open tomorrow -- which, by the way,
I've spent time in Congress; that's not the way it works -- this will be data
driven. We...get controllers back in facilities and we get staff back up. We
will make those decisions as the data drives us. I imagine, though, when we do
open and we do get pay flowing and we do get controllers back in, those -- those
-- there'll be a coalition -- a correlation between those events.
So again...this was not taken lightly. There was a
lot of effort put into this. And if you'll remember with the DCA air crash, a
lot of you asked us questions, "Why didn't the FAA see that there were near
misses in the airspace?" "And why didn't you stop the cross traffic with
helicopters and airplanes?" And I think that was a great question. We learned
from that. And so now we look at data and before it would become an issue,
we...try to assess the pressure and try to make moves before there could be
adverse consequences.
And -- And that's what's happening here today.
It's level-setting with the American people, doing the right thing by way of the
American people, working with the airlines. And our heart, you know, goes out to
those who will have flights disrupted. But again, they want to make sure that
the FAA team and their DOT team, when they fly, they are going to make it to
their destination safely because we've done our work. We are doing our work. And
this is what we feel like we have to do to make sure we maintain that safety
profile.
One last one [question].
QUESTION: What
would you say to people who are frustrated this weekend? They might have had a
flight canceled or delayed. What would you tell them?
SECRETARY DUFFY:
Same -- There is...I've -- Well, I've -- Anyone who has my cell phone
number, I'm called based on delays and cancellations. There is frustration. And
I -- And I -- I hear them. But I don't -- I -- I used to sit in Congress. I
don't have any -- I don't have any say or any role in what the Congress does
with regard to funding. I'm -- I've continually asked our controllers to come to
work. I've thanked those who have come in and done the great work by way of the
American people, and there's been a lot of them. Again, I've met a lot of family
men who -- and women -- who are single income families, and they -- they're
coming to work because they're patriotic Americans.
If I can make one last note, though, and I -- I mentioned this before. Many of
the controllers said they can survive without one paycheck. They can do that.
They've put a little money away. They have a little nest egg. They have a rainy
day fund if the car breaks down or there's an unexpected expense. They can
navigate losing one paycheck. They said, almost all of them, virtually all of
them, cannot navigate financially missing two paychecks. And so we see that on
the horizon. We need to take action today.
But if it gets worse, if we have more issues with our controllers, we will
analyze the data and we'll take additional steps. And again, we don't want to
see -- if you've seen, we have worked overtime to minimize disruptions as much
as possible. And some days there's more delays; some days are less delays, based
on how many controllers are coming to work. We will drive these decisions based
on the data that we receive and make the -- the best calls that we can to keep
those who travel through the airspace safe.
One last one, Grady [ph], and then we're really going to go.
QUESTION: I
got you. Can you just tell us some of the cities that are going to be impacted
by this so that people who have travel plans Friday can make an informed
decision.
SECRETARY DUFFY: We -- We want to be fair to
the airlines. Again, they've...they've been -- they've been good partners. They
understand what we're doing. I think we need to talk to the airlines first so
they can set up their schedules, their flights, to make sure they're prepared
to...navigate with their customers as we come into the weekend. So, I -- I don't
want to do that right now. I think we -- [to] be fair to them and to the
customers who are going to travel to make sure they're ready to try to deal with
a -- a 10% reduction.
STAFF: Thank you, guys. Appreciate it.
SECRETARY DUFFY: Yeah, thank you, guys.
Appreciate it.
1 Diction not
entirely clear.
Politco transcribed the word as
"radical" while
Skift and
Planet and Pilot Magazine use
"ratable." Odds favor the latter interpretation.
Page Updated: 11/23/25
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