Topline
A veteran air traffic controller told Forbes the air traffic system is already strained to the point where it is “untenable,” suggesting more sick calls are coming as the shutdown continues.
“The air traffic system, in general, is stressed to the max,” a veteran air traffic controller working at a major East Coast airport told Forbes on Tuesday, adding “sickouts will continue to happen because the [controllers] aren’t fit for duty.”
Six FAA facilities—Boston, Chicago, Houston, Las Vegas, Nashville and Philadelphia—saw staffing shortages Tuesday afternoon, according to an advisory indicating an inadequate personnel level threshold.
The FAA issued a ground delay for Nashville International Airport due to staffing on Tuesday afternoon and evening, noting flight delays of more than two hours.
A dozen FAA facilities saw similar “staffing triggers” Monday evening.
Air traffic controllers, like Transportation Security Administration officers at airport screening checkpoints, are working without pay during the shutdown. By law, they will have their back-pay restored after the shutdown ends—although President Donald Trump suggested Tuesday that might not happen. Air traffic controllers are scheduled to receive a partial paycheck on Tuesday, Oct. 14, and a zero paycheck two weeks later, Nick Daniels, president of the 19,000-member National Air Traffic Controllers Association, told Forbes.
NATCA has warned its members that organized “sick outs” are illegal. But union officials and individual air traffic controllers have told Forbes that missed paychecks will add to the toll of working in an already strained system. “Not paying the understaffed controllers we already have, and then getting upset they find this added stress untenable, is idiotic,” the veteran air traffic controller told Forbes. “Missing even one [paycheck] is a cause of stress—stress they don’t need and you don’t want controlling your airplanes. This will only get worse and escalate the longer this shutdown continues.”
During the last shutdown, which stretched for 35 days from December 2018 to January 2019, the longtime shortage of air traffic controllers led to increased absenteeism, which in turn led to flight delays. For example, after a missed paycheck in January 2019, six air traffic controllers called in sick in New York, leading to more than 600 flights delayed at LaGuardia Airport that day, CBS News reported. Disruptions at multiple airports reportedly led Trump to agree to end the shutdown.