Inaction By FAA And Congress Share Responsibility For Shortcomings

The independent National Transportation Safety Board conducted three days of hearings that wrapped up on August 1 into the causes of the deadly mid-air collision near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA) in D.C. in January, and one of the most striking things that came out was that nobody seemed shocked or surprised that it happened.

By and large, the witnesses who testified during the hearings described a system that seemed destined to fail at some point. The reasons are numerous, including a lack of decisive action by the FAA about the highly congested airspace at DCA and the Washington D.C. area in general, mistakes made the night of the tragedy, overworked air traffic controllers, and lack of effective collaboration between the U.S. Army and the FAA regarding its helicopter operations in the area.

The issues with the FAA are well-documented and just as difficult to resolve, with the Congress sharing some of the responsibility as it seems to regularly flirt with shutdowns, priorities that change from one administration to the next, and intermittent and at times insufficient funding of the FAA.

Jim Hall was chairman of the NTSB under President Bill Clinton. He said, “I was chairman of the board for almost eight years. I’ve followed aviation for several decades. Nothing in this surprises me. It only demonstrates that the past is prologue.”

Another striking revelation was that many solutions were proposed for the DCA area but never implemented. Such as moving helicopter routes, reducing flights at DCA, and using collision-alert technologies.

Most people in aviation know that the FAA has tried to upgrade its equipment and hire more air traffic controllers. However, as noted, the funding – and even some of the proposed changes – are subject to politics rather than what makes sense for the industry and the many federal agencies that use the Washington D.C. airspace.

Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA) is the ranking member of the Senate Commerce Committee, and she said, “We need a more aggressive FAA. That’s their job to protect the flying public, to make these decisions, and if air traffic controllers are telling them, ‘Look, this is too much,’ then they need to listen.”

The other federal agencies using the airspace also need to cooperate with the FAA to help resolve these issues and put aside their priorities for the safety of the traveling public.

FMI:  www.ntsb.gov/