Trump seeks ‘air traffic’ control system overhaul
Airlines push privatization
WASHINGTON, June 5, (Agencies): President Donald Trump plans to lay out his vision for overhauling the nation’s air traffic control system on Monday, outlining his goals to privatize the system in a White House speech.
Trump will push for the separation of air traffic control operations from the Federal Aviation Administration, embracing an approach long championed by US airlines, according to White House officials. Joined by airline industry executives, Trump is expected to point to the changes as a way of accelerating a more modern air traffic control system.
“We’re really moving into the modern decade of technology in air traffic control. It’s a system where everyone benefits from this,” White House economic adviser Gary Cohn said in a conference call with reporters. Trump’s budget plan released earlier this year called for the changes, placing air traffic operations under an “independent, non-governmental organization.”
There are about 50,000 airline and other aircraft flights a day in the United States. Both sides of the privatization debate say the system is one of the most complex and safest in the world.
US airlines have been campaigning for more than two decades to separate air traffic control operations from the FAA. That effort picked up steam last year when the union that represents air traffic controllers agreed to support a proposal by House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman Bill Shuster, R-Pa, to spin off air traffic operations into a private, non-profit corporation in exchange for guarantees that controllers would retain their benefits, salaries and union representation.
Trump
Lobbying
Airlines have been lobbying vigorously for the change, saying the FAA’s NextGen program to modernize the air traffic system is taking too long and has produced too few benefits. The changes would involve moving from the current system based on radar and voice communications to one based on satellite navigation and digital communications.
Airlines and the controllers union say that the FAA’s effort to modernize the air traffic system has been slowed down by the agency’s dependence on inconsistent funding from Congress and occasional government shutdowns and controller furloughs. As a result, the FAA has had difficulty making longterm commitments with contractors.
Union officials have complained that the FAA has been unable to resolve chronic controller understaffing at some of the nation’s busiest facilities and pointed to the modernization effort’s slow progress.
But FAA Administrator Michael Huerta has said the agency has made progress during the past decade in updating its computers and other equipment in order to move from a radar-based to a satellite-based control system.
Winning congressional approval would still be an uphill battle for Trump. Democrats have largely opposed the changes, warning that the proposed board overseeing the estimated 300 air traffic facilities and around 30,000 employees would be dominated by airline interests.
A deadly attack in London and debate over travel restrictions in the United States put safety concerns high on the agenda as global airline executives gathered on Sunday for the industry’s largest meeting of the year.
Alexandre de Juniac, director general of the International Air Transport Association (IATA), said the weekend’s violence in London could discourage potential visitors as similar attacks did in Europe last year.
“In previous events, in Brussels or in Paris, the traffic has reduced coming from certain regions of the world,” de Juniac said in an interview. “So it’s possible that there is an impact, but it’s a bit early to know how big this impact will be.”
Three attackers rammed a hired van into pedestrians on London Bridge and stabbed others nearby on Saturday night, killing at least seven people, in Britain’s third major militant attack in recent months.
US President Donald Trump seized on the violence to argue for an executive order that would temporarily ban entry into the United States of people from six predominantly Muslim countries. The ban has been blocked in the courts and Trump’s legal team has asked the Supreme Court to reinstate it.
Airlines were quick to offer assurances and refunds to travelers on edge after the London attack, but it was unclear whether the impact on tourism would match the fallout from similar attacks in Europe last year, when demand from Asia fell.
Trafficking
Meanwhile, airlines are being urged to train more flight attendants to help prevent human trafficking, placing cabin crew on the front line of the fight against sexual exploitation and slavery.
“We want ... airlines to join our campaigns and our initiatives in order to make human trafficking and migrant smuggling visible,” Felipe De La Torre of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), told Reuters ahead of the June 4-6 meeting of the International Air Transport Association (IATA).
According to the International Labour Organization, almost 21 million people are in forced labour, meaning three out of every 1,000 people on the planet are enslaved at any given time.
In a case that sprang to public attention in February, an Alaska Airlines flight attendant helped rescue a teenage girl from alleged trafficking onboard a domestic US flight in 2011 by leaving her a note in the toilet.
Shelia Frederick told NBC TV her suspicions had been aroused by the girl’s dishevelled appearance compared to the smart clothes and controlling attitude of her older male companion. The pilot alerted police who arrested the man on arrival.
More than 70,000 US airline staff have been trained to identify smugglers and their victims in that way under the Blue Lightning initiative, launched in 2013 with the support of JetBlue, Delta Air Lines and others. Such training has since become mandatory. But Nancy Rivard, a former flight attendant hailed as a pioneer of such training, said the US federal programme is poorly funded and that the majority of foreign airlines are barely starting to focus on the problem.