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Following months of pressure from Congresswoman Laura Gillen and growing concern from aviation workers and local families, the Department of Transportation’s Inspector General has officially opened an audit into the FAA’s decision to relocate air traffic controllers who oversee Newark Liberty Airport’s airspace from Long Island to Philadelphia, which had resulted in multiple radar blackouts and short-staffed crews working 60-hour weeks.
Earlier this week, Gillen met with air traffic controllers and Federal Aviation Administration officials in Westbury, where they discussed the ongoing challenges, including the urgent need for upgrades and staffing support. Gillen said she’ll “continue to work with Secretary Duffy in a bipartisan fashion to make sure we are keeping the skies over the busiest airways in the country safe.”
Read more on the Congresswoman’s efforts:
CBS New York: Rep. Laura Gillen On Air Traffic Controller Concerns
- Concerns amplified by Congresswoman Laura Gillen, who toured the Westbury Long Island air traffic hub that oversees the busiest skies in the nation.
- She called the move exactly one year ago, of a dozen air traffic controllers from here to Philadelphia to address staffing shortages, disastrous.
- “This reckless decision not only uprooted civil servants and their families, taking them from their friends and their lives and their neighborhoods, but it also put the safety of our airspace at risk.”
- After the move, two troubling outages […] in April and again in May. Air traffic controllers overseeing Newark’s airspace dealt with 90-second blackouts of radar and communications.
- Gillen says the FAA vastly underestimated the risks. Now the Department of Transportation’s Inspector General will audit that decision, saying these events have raised questions about FAA’s management of the relocation.
- There is renewed scrutiny over the FAA’s decision to move air traffic controllers from Long Island to Philadelphia to manage airspace over Newark airport.
- The US Department of Transportation’s Office of the Inspector General now looking into why this move was made last year. It comes after air traffic controllers lost contact with planes in the sky for 90 seconds in April and May.
- Long Island Congresswoman Laura Gillen wants the air traffic controllers move back.
- “They’re always in place. They can say, ‘Hey, I’ve lost contact. Can you see what’s going on?’ Whereas, if you have to pick up the phone, it delays that communication in real time. And also, if there’s an emergency and you’ve lost contact with your aircraft, you might not pick up the phone because you’re going, ‘Oh my God, what’s going on?’”
- It’s not clear yet if the feds will decide the FAA made the wrong call and move the air traffic controllers back to Long Island. They will begin an audit next month looking at operations in Newark, New York, and Philadelphia.
Long Island Herald: Congresswoman Gillen questions Federal Aviation Administration decision
- Staffing shortages, safety concerns, the need to update equipment and aircraft noise were the issues discussed when Rep. Laura Gillen met with air traffic controllers and Federal Aviation Administration officials in Westbury.
- “I think everyone can agree TRACON/N90 and other air traffic control towers are understaffed, have outdated technology, long hours and compulsory overtime which is contributing to wider spread burnout and fatigue,” Gillen said on July 29 outside the New York Terminal Radar Approach Control facility known as TRACON/N90.
- Gillen put pressure on the FAA and federal Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy that resulted in an audit of the decision last year to relocate a dozen of the air traffic controllers from TRACON/N90 and determine if this was the right decision.
- “I’m so glad the inspector general is finally looking into the impact on moving N90 air traffic controllers and what this has done to New York airport cancellations and the safety of our passengers,” Gillen said.
- Gillen said she is determined to also address the low staffing for air traffic controllers as this poses a risk as well to passengers safety. They are working on expanding schools for more air traffic control graduates.
- “I will continue to work with Secretary Duffy in a bipartisan fashion to make sure we are keeping the skies over the busiest airways in the country safe. Safe for passengers and to minimize cancellations and delays,” she said.
New York Post: Feds launch audit into FAA over gutted Long Island air traffic control facility as safety concerns rise over Newark airspace
- The Department of Transportation’s Inspector General confirmed this week that it’s auditing the FAA’s 2024 decision to shift control of Newark Liberty Airport’s airspace from New York TRACON, the radar hub in Westbury, to Philadelphia’s air traffic tower after they experienced a series of radar blackouts in New Jersey.
- “The FAA downplayed the safety risks,” Rep. Laura Gillen said of the relocation.
- “They reported the risk of an outage is one in 11 million — and it happened twice in the year since they moved,” Gillen said — referencing two 90-second radar blackouts at Newark airport in April and May of this year.
- The controversial move stripped 12 veteran controllers from TRACON, one of the nation’s busiest radar centers, and left behind what local leaders and air traffic controllers said is a facility in dire need of help.
- “Staff are burnt out — and very concerned about safety and feel very strongly that those moved to Philadelphia should come back to this facility,” Gillen told reporters outside the TRACON building after touring it Tuesday.
- The Department of Transportation audit will probe whether the plan actually backfired — compromising safety, morale, and operational continuity at one of the country’s busiest air traffic control hubs.
- If the audit determines that operations are most efficient out of Long Island, then the air traffic controllers who moved from the area to Philadelphia will have to move back.
Newsday: FAA watchdog opens audit on Westbury air traffic controller transfers
- The Federal Aviation Administration’s official watchdog has opened an audit into the agency’s decision to relocate air traffic controllers from a facility on Long Island to Philadelphia in July 2024.
- Rep. Laura Gillen (D-Rockville Centre), who sits on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, toured the Terminal Radar Approach Control facility in Westbury — a cavernous building, set back behind high barbed-wire fencing, where the controllers were relocated from — on Tuesday.
- The decision “not only uprooted civil servants and their families, taking them from their friends and their lives and their neighborhoods, but it also put the safety of our airspace at risk,” she said at a news conference afterward.
- Gillen said bringing the controllers responsible for Newark back to Westbury makes sense because it will allow them to work from the same room as controllers for nearby Kennedy and LaGuardia Airports.
- “[If] there’s a momentary glitch like we saw, where they lose control or lose communication with the airplane … they can just yell over and say, Hey, what do you have going on?” she said.
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