March 18, 2025 • 33 mins
Flying through a perfect storm of staff shortages, archaic technology, DOGE crosshairs, and mounting safety concerns, America's air traffic control system stands at a critical crossroads. So, how can we fix all this? Master of the Air Greg Aretakis returns to guide us to the runway, providing a 101 course on how air traffic control works.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
air traffic control has been in the news quite a bit
late.
It's even made its way to thepresidential address and, to use
a sports analogy, the bestofficiated games are the ones
where the referees go unnoticedand if you're talking about them
the next day, somethingprobably went wrong.
And I think there's a parallelin the travel universe with air
traffic control.
We want them to be there doingwhat they're doing and we
(00:30):
probably don't want to thinkmuch about it.
We just want it to be flawless.
I'm Jeff Gorman, joined asalways by Matt Brown, and the
reason we do this podcast is tounderstand more deeply how the
travel world around us operates.
It's such a vast ecosystem ofindustries and governance and
policy and passion.
Today we'd like to understandmore about air traffic control,
(00:50):
its current situation and how wegot here To do this.
We're doing what Greg would do.
We called a friend.
Greg is an industry expert andhas the auspicious honor of
being our very first repeatguest.
Thankfully, he's led such anillustrious career that this
shouldn't do too much to sullyhis reputation being back on our
show.
Greg, thank you very much,Welcome back.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Thanks Jeff, thanks Matt, good to see you guys, and
a good topic.
This is a topic that, if youhave enough time, we'll dive in
as deeply as we can.
If you have enough time, we'lldive in as deeply as we can.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
Let's set the table a little bit.
The FAA and air traffic controlhas been in the news a lot
recently.
Obviously A midair collision inArizona, a near miss at Midway,
of course, the AmericanAirlines Blackhawk collision
with no survivors in DC and thishas all just been in 2025.
(01:49):
The number of fatal airaccidents rose sharply in 2024,
according to a major new safetyreport, and the research
published by the InternationalAir Transport Association
acknowledges a significantincrease versus a year even
before that 2024, sevenaccidents were categorized as
fatal by the organization.
2024, seven accidents werecategorized as fatal by the
organization and in total, theyresulted in 244 deaths on board
(02:10):
an aircraft, and there was justone fatal accident in 2023.
So, as we're looking at thesekind of unfavorable year-on-year
comparisons, it's room forpause, for sure.
It's room for looking at aninfrastructure that does need
help.
I think it's also taken intoaccount that the FAA has been
(02:31):
under attack.
I think that's a fair way tosay it.
They've had their fair share ofcriticism and they have been
bearing the brunt of the Dogeassault on the federal
government over the last sixweeks.
The Trump administrationunveiled a plan on Thursday to
supercharge the hiring processfor air traffic controllers to
address a long standing problemwith keeping control tower
(02:52):
staffed.
And all of this is an attemptto just wrangle safety concerns
on America's runways the way.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
I understand this, which is just on the fringes,
and why we're having thisconversation, is that we've got
problems in air traffic control,in kind of two camps.
At least I think that's wherethe question goes here, Greg.
It's both the staffing issuesand the systems issues.
Let's pick whichever one youwant to start with.
I think staffing makes sensebecause it's probably more
(03:22):
personal and the longer biggerfix of what the infrastructure
of systems are.
We'll get to that.
Why do we have the situation wehave today?
Speaker 2 (03:33):
Air traffic control writ large, viewed from afar, is
still by far the safest way ofgetting from A to B.
There is one incident every800,000 flights.
This is safe.
If you think of North America,where we're talking about 200
(03:58):
fatalities in a year, there arewhat 25,000 automobile
fatalities in a year.
So, to frame things, it's apretty safe industry and there
are a lot of dedicated peopleout there.
I can't tip my hat long enough.
So there is a lot to unpackhere.
Let's talk about labor just atthe beginning.
(04:20):
So we have what 14,000 airtraffic controllers and yet
we're only staffed to about 70,72, 75 percent of what the FAA
would say is necessary in thevast array of centers and
approach, controls and towersaround the United States.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
Greg, why do we have that gap?
Speaker 2 (04:47):
Well, there's a lot of reasons, I think when the
pandemic happened, everyone said, oh my gosh, no one's going to
fly, this is the end of aviation.
Airlines gave early retirementto pilots and mechanics and are
still digging out from that.
I think the FAA did kind of thesame thing.
(05:09):
I think the government letpeople go that they didn't need
to let go.
But let me talk about a coupleof other kind of metrics.
To be an FAA controller, youhave to be younger than 31.
When you apply for the job youhave to pass a test.
Only about 10% of the peoplewho apply are hired because of
(05:36):
many things, includingbackground tests, fbi, drug
testing and so on and so forth.
The process to be an airtraffic controller because it's
so important.
It's crucially important forthe safety of this industry.
They go to school for sixmonths in Oklahoma City at the
FAA Academy.
Now that is being broadened outand in fact the president's a
(06:00):
fan of having some other placesother than the FAA Academy do
that training so more potentialscan be sitting in chairs in
classroom being taught.
There are two colleges inOklahoma City that are currently
letting that happen, but Iwouldn't be surprised to see
more.
That makes a lot of sense.
(06:21):
The second part is when yougraduate from that, you go to
where the need is but you arenot allowed to touch the
instruments.
You sit next to an experiencedair traffic controller for two
years, two years of on the jobtraining, getting the morning
(06:42):
coffee, printing the morningreports, doing that kind of
stuff, but not telling pilotswhat vector to be on, what climb
out rate, what taxiway to be on, et cetera, et cetera.
They don't do that for twoyears.
Oh, you and I, we retireostensibly at age 65, some
(07:06):
people a little longer.
By federal law, air trafficcontrollers have to retire at
age 56.
Speaker 3 (07:13):
Why is it so young?
Do they just feel like yourreflexes are?
That feels like an outdated wayof looking at it.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
Maybe I mean this is all part of what has to be
unbundled by Doge, by the WhiteHouse, by the FAA and so on.
Does that really need to be thecase?
We have airlines fighting rightnow to allow pilots to fly past
their 65th birthday up to their67th birthday.
I haven't heard one peep aboutextending the age of air traffic
(07:45):
controllers past the age of 56,but it gets worse.
At age 50, they can retire Ifthey have 20 years.
With the FAA, when you're 50years old, you can retire with
full federal benefits.
The average age of the averageair traffic controller the
14,000 people we are talkingabout is 40 years old.
(08:07):
What happens in 10 years fromnow?
What happened a couple of yearsago in the Biden administration
was someone looked at theactuarial math and said holy cow
, let's get people in schoolright now.
And they went out and started ahiring binge of about 1500
(08:28):
qualified students pass the testand all that jazz people a year
, and there are now about 3,400almost ready to sit at a desk to
air traffic controllers.
Now To Matt's question of wherewe go now.
We need to expand the trainingbase because the way that it
(08:51):
works is the young people sitnext to the old people and the
old people say oh yeah, I sawthis 12 years ago.
This is what you do.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
Greg, why do we need so many air traffic controllers?
Speaker 2 (09:04):
Because the technology stinks, because of
all the technology that becomespart of how we know where planes
are, how fast they're going,what altitude they're at and how
they're coming into airports.
That technology doesn't work.
I mean, all you got to look isat the testimony from the
(09:24):
America Builds Conference thatCongressman Graves held on
Tuesday, and you see thiseverybody who testified gave a
terrible indictment of thetechnology and, of course, it
was mentioned that, well, we'vegot some of this stuff coming,
but it'll be six to 10 yearsaway.
Oh, by the way, 10 years ago itwas six to 10 years away.
(09:46):
We have AI.
We have a ton of technologythat didn't exist 10 years ago.
Why aren't these technologytools being deployed as part of
an air traffic control fix?
If you had that-.
Speaker 3 (10:03):
Why do you think it's taken so long?
Is this just that governmentmoves slow?
Speaker 2 (10:07):
Yeah, I think it's a lot of that.
It's a lot of posturing bytechnology companies to get by
technology companies to getsweet government contracts.
Every four years we replace thetop end of our government and
then favoritism changes.
I mean, that's just a reality,it's not an indictment.
We haven't had the continuityof development.
Speaker 3 (10:30):
Whatever technology would come in to replace the I
think Jeff describes it as AtariPong level of technology.
When you look at what thesystems they actually use,
you're talking about somethingthat has to be universally
implemented over a lot ofdifferent airports.
You have to have training on it, you have to work out all the
bugs for it.
Sure, you have to have all thepilots familiar with the new
(10:51):
system at least on some level.
So I'm sure there are enoughblocks there that stop real tech
evolution the same way that youwould have in a private sector.
Speaker 2 (11:01):
And just to put a point on that, they need to test
, test, test, test.
And I don't mean to throw astone at Elon Musk, but the
self-driving Tesla was a greatidea until a lady got run over
in Tempe, arizona, and it setthe technology back five, six
years because they had to figureout why the lady got run over
(11:24):
and that the technology didn'tprevent that from happening.
They're going to have to dothis here.
This can't be a trial and errortechnological upgrade, because
a mistake could kill 150 to 250people, right?
So that is where the long, long, long lead time comes from.
(11:46):
So there's still multiple partsto the air traffic system and
again, there are many pieces.
I'm going to just go to the twoI've been talking about.
There's the technology piece,and that's the part where a
plane is flying at 28,000 feet,at whatever the speed is, at
(12:08):
whatever the weather is, and theAI pops up and says I have a
better idea.
Why don't you slow down 50knots and why don't you climb
1,500 feet?
Right?
They don't say that to thepilot, they say that to the air
traffic controller, and the airtraffic controller, who's
(12:34):
looking at a whole lot ofairplanes, says, yeah, that
works, and pushes a button andthat information is sent to the
pilot of that airplane.
When that technology is inplace, it helps the air traffic
control system.
All the pilots need to know iswhat do I do now?
And that is a communicationfrom tower or center to airplane
(12:56):
.
That's plain and simple.
Speaker 1 (12:59):
With air traffic growing at, I think, 6%
compounding annually and oursystems already maxed out,
though at some point there hasto be a tech solution that
increases the efficiency ofplanes getting in and out,
Otherwise the economic benefitsand we can talk about that later
but the economic benefits oftravel will start to become
(13:21):
seriously constrained.
You asked about, or we talkedabout, funding briefly, it seems
to me, from what I read, thereare two issues on the funding
side.
First is just the raw number$60, $70 billion is no small
price tag for a solution of thissize.
Now, whether it really warrantsthat or whether that's the kind
of number a contractor handsthe government because they
think they can get it out ofthem, I think that's a question.
(13:43):
But the other part, myunderstanding, is that the way
this is funded, congress has tocontinually approve the project
and for a 10-year project thatmeans a lot of shifts in
Congress will take place duringthat time and there's no
confidence that from oneCongress to the next you can
actually do a 10-year project or15 by the time you train people
(14:05):
on it.
Did those two funding issuesand congressional knots really
resonate?
Am I reading that properly?
Speaker 2 (14:14):
not really resonate.
Am I reading that properly?
Yes, I think you are.
I mean, certainly the devil issomewhat in the details, and not
every member of Congress leavesevery two years, but some
subset do, and the presidencychanges every four years,
ostensibly.
So the real issue here is goingto be it's a big number, it
(14:40):
can't be funded out of onebudget.
It's going to be funded andthen more funding, and then more
funding, and then more funding.
So if you think about an airport, planes approach the runway
every three to five miles apart,right.
And then they land, they taxioff and then maybe 90 seconds
(15:00):
later or two minutes later, thenext plane lands, and so on.
There's got to be enough timeto change things up if there's a
snafu of some kind, right.
So could you land planes closertogether?
And the answer is with theright technology and the right
(15:20):
instantaneous change ofinformation, you probably could.
Now let's think about airportsaround the country.
How much cement do we need topour?
How many more air trafficpieces of equipment do we need
to install at an airport?
How much higher do we have tomake the control tower at the
(15:43):
airport?
The answer is if you spendmoney on air traffic, it might
make sense to take budget moneyaway from airports.
Now the airport.
People will scream about that,but the fact is, if you can use
the cement more efficiently, youneed less of it, and that's
(16:06):
part of the situation.
We have a lot of airports in theUnited States that have none,
or almost no service, and so oneof the questions is if you have
this kind of technology, doesthat open the door for airports?
I just read Manassas, virginia,is now open for commercial
(16:27):
business and they're going toadd flights there, there and of
course they should, because DCis absolutely full and Dulles
has its own congestion issue andManassas could be a third
solution for this outwardmigration of Fairfax County out
(16:48):
to places like Gainesville andCenterville, virginia.
The populations in that areaare growing the fastest and
there is Manassas Airport justwaiting.
So if you have the righttechnology, can you open
Manassas?
How many more Manassases aroundthe country are there?
About 4,000.
(17:09):
Yeah, so the point is you onlyneed one by one, by one.
You don't need all 4,000 to begoing, but you do need the
technology for this increasedkind of cacophony of flights,
and that is where the technologycomes in.
(17:31):
The planes are all flyingaround Metro DC, and some of
them are going to DCA, and someof them are going to BWI, and
some of them are going to Dulles, and now some of them are going
to Manassas, and you got tomake sure that everyone stays in
their lane and that thiscontinues to be a fully safe
system.
Now, I said at the top, it's avery safe system and one of the
(17:54):
reasons why things are gettingcrowded is because there's a
measure of safety and concernthat emanates from the FAA.
I give them full kudos for that.
The question to us is how do wekeep growing travel, tourism
and economic development in aworld where airports are getting
(18:17):
constrained, either people ortechnology?
Speaker 1 (18:21):
I think your answer to that is first, it has to feel
safe, and yes, it does.
It actually is safe.
But as soon as you have oneaccident or, in the recent
months, a few, all of a suddenpeople fear that it's not going
to be safe.
They hear about it in the news,they're afraid to board a plane
, and that's the first step todeclining demand.
(18:43):
The FAA and to all the credityou give through the I think it
was the GovernmentAccountability Office they did a
study late last year at leastthey published it last year
determining that 51 of the 138systems that the air traffic
controllers are using areunsustainably bad.
(19:04):
17 of them are so concerningand they don't think it'll last
10 years and there's no plan todo it.
Do you think, for what you justsaid, we want travel.
It's a tenth of our totaleconomy is powered by travel.
We need people to feel safe andwe need the traffic to be able
to keep growing the way we wantour economy to grow.
Do you think the recent eventshave enough attention that the
(19:28):
FAA, the GOA insert a dozenother acronyms will actually get
together and make what airlineenthusiasts and executives have
known for decades that thisneeds upgraded.
Do we stand a chance?
Now?
Is an accident the sad way toget there.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
We, the three of us and many listeners that you have
, we may or may not make adifference.
Right, Media makes a bigdifference.
So there's an accident in thePotomac River.
There's an accident in Toronto,canada, by a Delta plane.
There's an accident in NorthPhiladelphia by a private jet I
(20:04):
won't even go into thatconversation, but there are
plenty of small planes that haveincidents and they all started
making the news.
So those newspapers or blogs orincidents, and they all started
making the news.
So those newspapers or blogs orMSN articles, they're all
(20:26):
falling onto the front desks ofthe various members in Congress
and the administrators in hisoffice.
So it's not falling on deafears.
And we get, you know, a squeakywheel, gets the Jeff that we are
going to move into a worldwhere there's a little bit more
passion, commitment to makingthis go, and in a world that's
(20:48):
highly politicized and may evenbe polarized.
I don't think this is that.
I think that if the governmentcan get their arms around what
to do and the dilemma isn'twhether this is right or not
We've got a president that wantsto give taxes back to the
(21:11):
people, wants to tax people less, wants a smaller federal budget
and in that vein, we're sayinglet's spend a whole lot of money
on the air traffic system andlet's commit to it for the next
decade.
And I that vein, we're sayinglet's spend a whole lot of money
on the air traffic system andlet's commit to it for the next
decade.
And I promise you, once it'scommitted to nothing's going to
stop it.
Nothing's going to stop it,because these articles are still
(21:34):
going to be in the paper andeveryone's going to have to be
responsive to it.
Speaker 3 (21:40):
I mean.
All this begs the question canair traffic control even afford
to be contracted Like?
Doesn't it need to grow to meetthe demand of tourism's growth
and travel's growth in the US?
Speaker 1 (21:55):
I was looking at a study by ACI and it goes back to
2017, so we're going to do someextrapolation to it.
But where I want to take this isthen we've hinted at the impact
on the US economy that this allhas.
In 2017, 500 commercialairports in the US, being
measured, supported 11.5 millionjobs, $428 billion in annual
(22:18):
payroll and an economic outputof $1.4 trillion.
These airports accounted formore than 7% of US GDP.
So if we take those 2017numbers and do some very rough,
high-level math and say, as oftoday, that $1.4 is probably a
$2 trillion economic impact,what would a 20% reduction in
(22:40):
air traffic mean?
Well, if it's $2 trillion today, then that's a $400 billion
shave.
That's if 7% of GDP, that meanswe're lumping 2% of GDP.
In a year like this and for theforeseeable future, gdp is
going to grow at about 2.5% ayear, we could be basically
erasing, with a 20% cut in airtraffic, nearly all the GDP
(23:04):
growth of an entire year.
If it's 33% shave in economicbenefit from travel, then you
could actually turn growth intorecession by harnessing this
very solvable economic engine.
Speaker 2 (23:21):
And it's uneven.
So I'll pile on to what youjust said, because we can argue
about the details, but what yousaid is generally true.
So let's pretend you live inDallas.
Let's pretend DFW shrinks isobligated to shrink, because of
(23:43):
air traffic control limitations,by 10%.
Do you think the DFW toLaGuardia flights are going to
be reduced?
Or how about the DFW to O'Hareflights?
Or DFW to DCA flights, orDulles or Charlotte or the other
places that are important?
(24:03):
No, San Angelo is going to loseflights.
Abilene is going to loseflights.
Victoria, Texas, is going tolose flights.
Lake Charles, Louisiana, isgoing to lose flights.
That's where the flights aregoing to come out of.
As the airlines are told, youhave to pull X number of flights
(24:23):
.
So who gets the short end ofthis economic stick?
The secondary communities, youknow, and to quote that always
works.
Speaker 3 (24:34):
Nice, call out too, greg of Lake Charles, my
hometown.
Have you?
Well, I mean, you've beeneverywhere.
Have you been?
Have you actually been to LakeCharles?
Speaker 2 (24:41):
I can tell you about my favorite restaurant, pats of
Henderson Another conversationfor another day.
But but if you think about thatand I I will quote from
Ghostbusters every one of thosepeople is a card carrying voter,
is a card-carrying voter, right?
(25:02):
So when you stop and thinkabout the economic impact of
this, you are taking thosecommunities, you are
politicizing their voting.
They're going to call theircongressmen, they're going to
call their senators, they'regoing to raise all kinds of heck
and there's going to beunbelievable turmoil, because
(25:28):
DFW didn't lose anything.
The flights to the big citiesall got saved.
It's those little cities, forwhom those flights are really
economic lifelines, that aregoing to be damaged, and that
really is the situation.
I mean we have to think aboutthis very broadly and ask
(25:49):
ourselves this isn't ahomogeneous plane, this is an
uneven plane that we're talkingabout.
Speaker 3 (25:59):
It's time for the mystery question, greg.
This weekend you get a callfrom the White House.
It's the president.
Greg, love your style, loveyour career, go Packers.
I want you to be the next headof the FAA.
A do you take the job?
B?
What's your first act as headof the agency?
Speaker 2 (26:20):
Boy?
That's a great question, matt.
You know what I care so muchabout this industry, about our
industry, the travel, tourism,economic development engine that
is focused, at least partially,on aviation.
So I probably would take thejob.
(26:41):
First thing I'd do is I'd callfour or five really smart people
that I know or know of and I'dsay this isn't going to get
fixed alone.
Second thing I would say is wehave to change some rules here,
and we're going to get callbackfrom the unions, we're going to
(27:02):
get pressure by companies, butwe have got to speed up the way
that we train people.
So I'll give you a parable.
So, after 2019, we had no pilots, right?
Remember 2018, 2019, pilotshortage.
Everyone's renegotiating laboragreements.
(27:23):
We're paying pilots $175,000 ayear and up just to sit in a
seat.
And where are we going to getall the pilots?
Well, look, today there areflight schools all over the
country, more than ever.
United owns some, even.
But we have flight schools.
They're all associated withuniversities and we have changed
(27:45):
the rules so that if yougraduate from a university
that's associated with a flightschool, you don't need 1,500
hours.
You can do it in 1,250 hours,right?
So we have figured out how tocraft something that's
acceptable to Congress, that'sacceptable to the FAA and which
(28:08):
generates more pilots than wewere looking at as a run rate
back then.
I go back to FAA.
We have got to make those samekind of changes.
The quicker answer iftechnology is indeed six to 10
years away, then the quickersolution is people.
(28:29):
We've got to get more peopleand that means training them
faster and getting them inpositions Now.
I've spent a lot of time talkingabout air traffic controllers
and how important they are.
There's a whole other class ofworkers I didn't mention and
that is the systems specialists,which are also very underfunded
(28:54):
relative to the budget.
They are dedicated to makingsure this stuff works and keeps
working, to making sure thisstuff works and keeps working
and even if these systems areold and decrepit, if you can
make that happen the leastamount of time, you're going to
get the best possible answer Atthe current pay rates.
(29:15):
It should be an attractive joband particularly rules.
If we tell air trafficcontrollers listen.
You come in when you're 31, youretire when you're 51, and you
get a federal pension.
That ought to be enough.
And you're making $150,000 ayear.
That ought to be enough to getthem to want to apply for the
job, and that is we need.
(29:39):
As a smart guy once said to me,you got to fill the top of the
funnel before you can see whatcomes out the bottom of it.
That's where I would start,matt.
I would start with that.
I think I don't know enoughabout the technology.
If I did take the job, that'dbe the first thing I'd look at
is who's doing this right?
Speaker 1 (30:01):
I would have just asked you whether you think
Devante adams is going to be apacker next year.
That was my mystery question.
Matt, you know he controls theshow and the content.
What do I know?
Speaker 2 (30:10):
hey, I'm a lifetime kansas city chiefs fan.
I think he's going to go tokansas city.
How about that?
Speaker 3 (30:16):
wow, you heard it here first everybody.
Great gary talk.
Is you Master of the air?
Speaker 2 (30:21):
ladies and gentlemen, Thanks, guys, great fun.
You know, this is an industrythat evolves and continues to
evolve, and as it does, we'regoing to need more and more of
people who are passionate aboutit, raising their voices and
saying this is what I think wehave to do next.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
I think we're at a pivotal moment here with air
traffic control because, to yourpoint earlier, media is crucial
.
Media tends to only care aboutthis stuff when there's
something bad.
Speaker 2 (30:51):
Well, you know.
So there's two kinds of media.
Right, I read I mean, I've beenup since 5.15 this morning,
central Time.
I have read five aviationpublications that all come out
overnight every single day.
I read them all.
Does the Washington Post readthem?
Does the New York Times readthem?
La Times, denver Post no, no,no, no one reads this stuff.
(31:16):
Maybe, and only maybe, theDallas newspaper.
The Dallas newspaper seems toreally have their thumb on
aviation.
What's going to drive this isthe wall street journal needs to
run articles about how we getaviation to not be the thing we
(31:36):
talk about the most.
Like any good program, if weget a air traffic systems right,
it'll never be mentionedbecause it'll just work.
And I think the New York Timesneeds to say, of the things that
are on our list world peace andeconomic stability and all that
(31:57):
stuff the thing we should beable to check off and put at the
side is the air traffic system.
And if they do that, they'llwrite multiple articles.
And those multiple articles goto the congressmen and the
senators and the administrators,and that's how that all works.
I mean, I can call, I know somemembers, I could call them up
(32:22):
and you know what I know somemembers.
I could call them up and youknow what, if it's not on their
today list.
You know, I talked to JerryMoran once, a senator from
Kansas, and he was telling me hehas a private plane and he had
the largest, one of the largestcongressional districts in
square miles or whatever in thecountry, so he would fly to
(32:45):
these various places.
And he was telling me, you knowpeople in Dodge City and places
like that Hayes, they need thisair service.
And he said, when I fly intoone of these towns to talk to
the voters, air service alwayscomes up.
Now, when I go to St Louis,does air service come up?
(33:08):
Probably not.
How about Chicago?
Maybe, maybe not right, but inthese littler places air service
is huge.
They are thinking about it allthe time.
And it always struck me thatwhat Moran said made great sense
.
You know that if you're in asmall town, it is literally your
(33:29):
umbilical cord to the economy.
air traffic control has been in the news quite a bit
late.
It's even made its way to thepresidential address and, to use
a sports analogy, the bestofficiated games are the ones
where the referees go unnoticedand if you're talking about them
the next day, somethingprobably went wrong.
And I think there's a parallelin the travel universe with air
traffic control.
We want them to be there doingwhat they're doing and we
(00:30):
probably don't want to thinkmuch about it.
We just want it to be flawless.
I'm Jeff Gorman, joined asalways by Matt Brown, and the
reason we do this podcast is tounderstand more deeply how the
travel world around us operates.
It's such a vast ecosystem ofindustries and governance and
policy and passion.
Today we'd like to understandmore about air traffic control,
(00:50):
its current situation and how wegot here To do this.
We're doing what Greg would do.
We called a friend.
Greg is an industry expert andhas the auspicious honor of
being our very first repeatguest.
Thankfully, he's led such anillustrious career that this
shouldn't do too much to sullyhis reputation being back on our
show.
Greg, thank you very much,Welcome back.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Thanks Jeff, thanks Matt, good to see you guys, and
a good topic.
This is a topic that, if youhave enough time, we'll dive in
as deeply as we can.
If you have enough time, we'lldive in as deeply as we can.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
Let's set the table a little bit.
The FAA and air traffic controlhas been in the news a lot
recently.
Obviously A midair collision inArizona, a near miss at Midway,
of course, the AmericanAirlines Blackhawk collision
with no survivors in DC and thishas all just been in 2025.
(01:49):
The number of fatal airaccidents rose sharply in 2024,
according to a major new safetyreport, and the research
published by the InternationalAir Transport Association
acknowledges a significantincrease versus a year even
before that 2024, sevenaccidents were categorized as
fatal by the organization.
2024, seven accidents werecategorized as fatal by the
organization and in total, theyresulted in 244 deaths on board
(02:10):
an aircraft, and there was justone fatal accident in 2023.
So, as we're looking at thesekind of unfavorable year-on-year
comparisons, it's room forpause, for sure.
It's room for looking at aninfrastructure that does need
help.
I think it's also taken intoaccount that the FAA has been
(02:31):
under attack.
I think that's a fair way tosay it.
They've had their fair share ofcriticism and they have been
bearing the brunt of the Dogeassault on the federal
government over the last sixweeks.
The Trump administrationunveiled a plan on Thursday to
supercharge the hiring processfor air traffic controllers to
address a long standing problemwith keeping control tower
(02:52):
staffed.
And all of this is an attemptto just wrangle safety concerns
on America's runways the way.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
I understand this, which is just on the fringes,
and why we're having thisconversation, is that we've got
problems in air traffic control,in kind of two camps.
At least I think that's wherethe question goes here, Greg.
It's both the staffing issuesand the systems issues.
Let's pick whichever one youwant to start with.
I think staffing makes sensebecause it's probably more
(03:22):
personal and the longer biggerfix of what the infrastructure
of systems are.
We'll get to that.
Why do we have the situation wehave today?
Speaker 2 (03:33):
Air traffic control writ large, viewed from afar, is
still by far the safest way ofgetting from A to B.
There is one incident every800,000 flights.
This is safe.
If you think of North America,where we're talking about 200
(03:58):
fatalities in a year, there arewhat 25,000 automobile
fatalities in a year.
So, to frame things, it's apretty safe industry and there
are a lot of dedicated peopleout there.
I can't tip my hat long enough.
So there is a lot to unpackhere.
Let's talk about labor just atthe beginning.
(04:20):
So we have what 14,000 airtraffic controllers and yet
we're only staffed to about 70,72, 75 percent of what the FAA
would say is necessary in thevast array of centers and
approach, controls and towersaround the United States.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
Greg, why do we have that gap?
Speaker 2 (04:47):
Well, there's a lot of reasons, I think when the
pandemic happened, everyone said, oh my gosh, no one's going to
fly, this is the end of aviation.
Airlines gave early retirementto pilots and mechanics and are
still digging out from that.
I think the FAA did kind of thesame thing.
(05:09):
I think the government letpeople go that they didn't need
to let go.
But let me talk about a coupleof other kind of metrics.
To be an FAA controller, youhave to be younger than 31.
When you apply for the job youhave to pass a test.
Only about 10% of the peoplewho apply are hired because of
(05:36):
many things, includingbackground tests, fbi, drug
testing and so on and so forth.
The process to be an airtraffic controller because it's
so important.
It's crucially important forthe safety of this industry.
They go to school for sixmonths in Oklahoma City at the
FAA Academy.
Now that is being broadened outand in fact the president's a
(06:00):
fan of having some other placesother than the FAA Academy do
that training so more potentialscan be sitting in chairs in
classroom being taught.
There are two colleges inOklahoma City that are currently
letting that happen, but Iwouldn't be surprised to see
more.
That makes a lot of sense.
(06:21):
The second part is when yougraduate from that, you go to
where the need is but you arenot allowed to touch the
instruments.
You sit next to an experiencedair traffic controller for two
years, two years of on the jobtraining, getting the morning
(06:42):
coffee, printing the morningreports, doing that kind of
stuff, but not telling pilotswhat vector to be on, what climb
out rate, what taxiway to be on, et cetera, et cetera.
They don't do that for twoyears.
Oh, you and I, we retireostensibly at age 65, some
(07:06):
people a little longer.
By federal law, air trafficcontrollers have to retire at
age 56.
Speaker 3 (07:13):
Why is it so young?
Do they just feel like yourreflexes are?
That feels like an outdated wayof looking at it.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
Maybe I mean this is all part of what has to be
unbundled by Doge, by the WhiteHouse, by the FAA and so on.
Does that really need to be thecase?
We have airlines fighting rightnow to allow pilots to fly past
their 65th birthday up to their67th birthday.
I haven't heard one peep aboutextending the age of air traffic
(07:45):
controllers past the age of 56,but it gets worse.
At age 50, they can retire Ifthey have 20 years.
With the FAA, when you're 50years old, you can retire with
full federal benefits.
The average age of the averageair traffic controller the
14,000 people we are talkingabout is 40 years old.
(08:07):
What happens in 10 years fromnow?
What happened a couple of yearsago in the Biden administration
was someone looked at theactuarial math and said holy cow
, let's get people in schoolright now.
And they went out and started ahiring binge of about 1500
(08:28):
qualified students pass the testand all that jazz people a year
, and there are now about 3,400almost ready to sit at a desk to
air traffic controllers.
Now To Matt's question of wherewe go now.
We need to expand the trainingbase because the way that it
(08:51):
works is the young people sitnext to the old people and the
old people say oh yeah, I sawthis 12 years ago.
This is what you do.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
Greg, why do we need so many air traffic controllers?
Speaker 2 (09:04):
Because the technology stinks, because of
all the technology that becomespart of how we know where planes
are, how fast they're going,what altitude they're at and how
they're coming into airports.
That technology doesn't work.
I mean, all you got to look isat the testimony from the
(09:24):
America Builds Conference thatCongressman Graves held on
Tuesday, and you see thiseverybody who testified gave a
terrible indictment of thetechnology and, of course, it
was mentioned that, well, we'vegot some of this stuff coming,
but it'll be six to 10 yearsaway.
Oh, by the way, 10 years ago itwas six to 10 years away.
(09:46):
We have AI.
We have a ton of technologythat didn't exist 10 years ago.
Why aren't these technologytools being deployed as part of
an air traffic control fix?
If you had that-.
Speaker 3 (10:03):
Why do you think it's taken so long?
Is this just that governmentmoves slow?
Speaker 2 (10:07):
Yeah, I think it's a lot of that.
It's a lot of posturing bytechnology companies to get by
technology companies to getsweet government contracts.
Every four years we replace thetop end of our government and
then favoritism changes.
I mean, that's just a reality,it's not an indictment.
We haven't had the continuityof development.
Speaker 3 (10:30):
Whatever technology would come in to replace the I
think Jeff describes it as AtariPong level of technology.
When you look at what thesystems they actually use,
you're talking about somethingthat has to be universally
implemented over a lot ofdifferent airports.
You have to have training on it, you have to work out all the
bugs for it.
Sure, you have to have all thepilots familiar with the new
(10:51):
system at least on some level.
So I'm sure there are enoughblocks there that stop real tech
evolution the same way that youwould have in a private sector.
Speaker 2 (11:01):
And just to put a point on that, they need to test
, test, test, test.
And I don't mean to throw astone at Elon Musk, but the
self-driving Tesla was a greatidea until a lady got run over
in Tempe, arizona, and it setthe technology back five, six
years because they had to figureout why the lady got run over
(11:24):
and that the technology didn'tprevent that from happening.
They're going to have to dothis here.
This can't be a trial and errortechnological upgrade, because
a mistake could kill 150 to 250people, right?
So that is where the long, long, long lead time comes from.
(11:46):
So there's still multiple partsto the air traffic system and
again, there are many pieces.
I'm going to just go to the twoI've been talking about.
There's the technology piece,and that's the part where a
plane is flying at 28,000 feet,at whatever the speed is, at
(12:08):
whatever the weather is, and theAI pops up and says I have a
better idea.
Why don't you slow down 50knots and why don't you climb
1,500 feet?
Right?
They don't say that to thepilot, they say that to the air
traffic controller, and the airtraffic controller, who's
(12:34):
looking at a whole lot ofairplanes, says, yeah, that
works, and pushes a button andthat information is sent to the
pilot of that airplane.
When that technology is inplace, it helps the air traffic
control system.
All the pilots need to know iswhat do I do now?
And that is a communicationfrom tower or center to airplane
(12:56):
.
That's plain and simple.
Speaker 1 (12:59):
With air traffic growing at, I think, 6%
compounding annually and oursystems already maxed out,
though at some point there hasto be a tech solution that
increases the efficiency ofplanes getting in and out,
Otherwise the economic benefitsand we can talk about that later
but the economic benefits oftravel will start to become
(13:21):
seriously constrained.
You asked about, or we talkedabout, funding briefly, it seems
to me, from what I read, thereare two issues on the funding
side.
First is just the raw number$60, $70 billion is no small
price tag for a solution of thissize.
Now, whether it really warrantsthat or whether that's the kind
of number a contractor handsthe government because they
think they can get it out ofthem, I think that's a question.
(13:43):
But the other part, myunderstanding, is that the way
this is funded, congress has tocontinually approve the project
and for a 10-year project thatmeans a lot of shifts in
Congress will take place duringthat time and there's no
confidence that from oneCongress to the next you can
actually do a 10-year project or15 by the time you train people
(14:05):
on it.
Did those two funding issuesand congressional knots really
resonate?
Am I reading that properly?
Speaker 2 (14:14):
not really resonate.
Am I reading that properly?
Yes, I think you are.
I mean, certainly the devil issomewhat in the details, and not
every member of Congress leavesevery two years, but some
subset do, and the presidencychanges every four years,
ostensibly.
So the real issue here is goingto be it's a big number, it
(14:40):
can't be funded out of onebudget.
It's going to be funded andthen more funding, and then more
funding, and then more funding.
So if you think about an airport, planes approach the runway
every three to five miles apart,right.
And then they land, they taxioff and then maybe 90 seconds
(15:00):
later or two minutes later, thenext plane lands, and so on.
There's got to be enough timeto change things up if there's a
snafu of some kind, right.
So could you land planes closertogether?
And the answer is with theright technology and the right
(15:20):
instantaneous change ofinformation, you probably could.
Now let's think about airportsaround the country.
How much cement do we need topour?
How many more air trafficpieces of equipment do we need
to install at an airport?
How much higher do we have tomake the control tower at the
(15:43):
airport?
The answer is if you spendmoney on air traffic, it might
make sense to take budget moneyaway from airports.
Now the airport.
People will scream about that,but the fact is, if you can use
the cement more efficiently, youneed less of it, and that's
(16:06):
part of the situation.
We have a lot of airports in theUnited States that have none,
or almost no service, and so oneof the questions is if you have
this kind of technology, doesthat open the door for airports?
I just read Manassas, virginia,is now open for commercial
(16:27):
business and they're going toadd flights there, there and of
course they should, because DCis absolutely full and Dulles
has its own congestion issue andManassas could be a third
solution for this outwardmigration of Fairfax County out
(16:48):
to places like Gainesville andCenterville, virginia.
The populations in that areaare growing the fastest and
there is Manassas Airport justwaiting.
So if you have the righttechnology, can you open
Manassas?
How many more Manassases aroundthe country are there?
About 4,000.
(17:09):
Yeah, so the point is you onlyneed one by one, by one.
You don't need all 4,000 to begoing, but you do need the
technology for this increasedkind of cacophony of flights,
and that is where the technologycomes in.
(17:31):
The planes are all flyingaround Metro DC, and some of
them are going to DCA, and someof them are going to BWI, and
some of them are going to Dulles, and now some of them are going
to Manassas, and you got tomake sure that everyone stays in
their lane and that thiscontinues to be a fully safe
system.
Now, I said at the top, it's avery safe system and one of the
(17:54):
reasons why things are gettingcrowded is because there's a
measure of safety and concernthat emanates from the FAA.
I give them full kudos for that.
The question to us is how do wekeep growing travel, tourism
and economic development in aworld where airports are getting
(18:17):
constrained, either people ortechnology?
Speaker 1 (18:21):
I think your answer to that is first, it has to feel
safe, and yes, it does.
It actually is safe.
But as soon as you have oneaccident or, in the recent
months, a few, all of a suddenpeople fear that it's not going
to be safe.
They hear about it in the news,they're afraid to board a plane
, and that's the first step todeclining demand.
(18:43):
The FAA and to all the credityou give through the I think it
was the GovernmentAccountability Office they did a
study late last year at leastthey published it last year
determining that 51 of the 138systems that the air traffic
controllers are using areunsustainably bad.
(19:04):
17 of them are so concerningand they don't think it'll last
10 years and there's no plan todo it.
Do you think, for what you justsaid, we want travel.
It's a tenth of our totaleconomy is powered by travel.
We need people to feel safe andwe need the traffic to be able
to keep growing the way we wantour economy to grow.
Do you think the recent eventshave enough attention that the
(19:28):
FAA, the GOA insert a dozenother acronyms will actually get
together and make what airlineenthusiasts and executives have
known for decades that thisneeds upgraded.
Do we stand a chance?
Now?
Is an accident the sad way toget there.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
We, the three of us and many listeners that you have
, we may or may not make adifference.
Right, Media makes a bigdifference.
So there's an accident in thePotomac River.
There's an accident in Toronto,canada, by a Delta plane.
There's an accident in NorthPhiladelphia by a private jet I
(20:04):
won't even go into thatconversation, but there are
plenty of small planes that haveincidents and they all started
making the news.
So those newspapers or blogs orincidents, and they all started
making the news.
So those newspapers or blogs orMSN articles, they're all
(20:26):
falling onto the front desks ofthe various members in Congress
and the administrators in hisoffice.
So it's not falling on deafears.
And we get, you know, a squeakywheel, gets the Jeff that we are
going to move into a worldwhere there's a little bit more
passion, commitment to makingthis go, and in a world that's
(20:48):
highly politicized and may evenbe polarized.
I don't think this is that.
I think that if the governmentcan get their arms around what
to do and the dilemma isn'twhether this is right or not
We've got a president that wantsto give taxes back to the
(21:11):
people, wants to tax people less, wants a smaller federal budget
and in that vein, we're sayinglet's spend a whole lot of money
on the air traffic system andlet's commit to it for the next
decade.
And I that vein, we're sayinglet's spend a whole lot of money
on the air traffic system andlet's commit to it for the next
decade.
And I promise you, once it'scommitted to nothing's going to
stop it.
Nothing's going to stop it,because these articles are still
(21:34):
going to be in the paper andeveryone's going to have to be
responsive to it.
Speaker 3 (21:40):
I mean.
All this begs the question canair traffic control even afford
to be contracted Like?
Doesn't it need to grow to meetthe demand of tourism's growth
and travel's growth in the US?
Speaker 1 (21:55):
I was looking at a study by ACI and it goes back to
2017, so we're going to do someextrapolation to it.
But where I want to take this isthen we've hinted at the impact
on the US economy that this allhas.
In 2017, 500 commercialairports in the US, being
measured, supported 11.5 millionjobs, $428 billion in annual
(22:18):
payroll and an economic outputof $1.4 trillion.
These airports accounted formore than 7% of US GDP.
So if we take those 2017numbers and do some very rough,
high-level math and say, as oftoday, that $1.4 is probably a
$2 trillion economic impact,what would a 20% reduction in
(22:40):
air traffic mean?
Well, if it's $2 trillion today, then that's a $400 billion
shave.
That's if 7% of GDP, that meanswe're lumping 2% of GDP.
In a year like this and for theforeseeable future, gdp is
going to grow at about 2.5% ayear, we could be basically
erasing, with a 20% cut in airtraffic, nearly all the GDP
(23:04):
growth of an entire year.
If it's 33% shave in economicbenefit from travel, then you
could actually turn growth intorecession by harnessing this
very solvable economic engine.
Speaker 2 (23:21):
And it's uneven.
So I'll pile on to what youjust said, because we can argue
about the details, but what yousaid is generally true.
So let's pretend you live inDallas.
Let's pretend DFW shrinks isobligated to shrink, because of
(23:43):
air traffic control limitations,by 10%.
Do you think the DFW toLaGuardia flights are going to
be reduced?
Or how about the DFW to O'Hareflights?
Or DFW to DCA flights, orDulles or Charlotte or the other
places that are important?
(24:03):
No, San Angelo is going to loseflights.
Abilene is going to loseflights.
Victoria, Texas, is going tolose flights.
Lake Charles, Louisiana, isgoing to lose flights.
That's where the flights aregoing to come out of.
As the airlines are told, youhave to pull X number of flights
(24:23):
.
So who gets the short end ofthis economic stick?
The secondary communities, youknow, and to quote that always
works.
Speaker 3 (24:34):
Nice, call out too, greg of Lake Charles, my
hometown.
Have you?
Well, I mean, you've beeneverywhere.
Have you been?
Have you actually been to LakeCharles?
Speaker 2 (24:41):
I can tell you about my favorite restaurant, pats of
Henderson Another conversationfor another day.
But but if you think about thatand I I will quote from
Ghostbusters every one of thosepeople is a card carrying voter,
is a card-carrying voter, right?
(25:02):
So when you stop and thinkabout the economic impact of
this, you are taking thosecommunities, you are
politicizing their voting.
They're going to call theircongressmen, they're going to
call their senators, they'regoing to raise all kinds of heck
and there's going to beunbelievable turmoil, because
(25:28):
DFW didn't lose anything.
The flights to the big citiesall got saved.
It's those little cities, forwhom those flights are really
economic lifelines, that aregoing to be damaged, and that
really is the situation.
I mean we have to think aboutthis very broadly and ask
(25:49):
ourselves this isn't ahomogeneous plane, this is an
uneven plane that we're talkingabout.
Speaker 3 (25:59):
It's time for the mystery question, greg.
This weekend you get a callfrom the White House.
It's the president.
Greg, love your style, loveyour career, go Packers.
I want you to be the next headof the FAA.
A do you take the job?
B?
What's your first act as headof the agency?
Speaker 2 (26:20):
Boy?
That's a great question, matt.
You know what I care so muchabout this industry, about our
industry, the travel, tourism,economic development engine that
is focused, at least partially,on aviation.
So I probably would take thejob.
(26:41):
First thing I'd do is I'd callfour or five really smart people
that I know or know of and I'dsay this isn't going to get
fixed alone.
Second thing I would say is wehave to change some rules here,
and we're going to get callbackfrom the unions, we're going to
(27:02):
get pressure by companies, butwe have got to speed up the way
that we train people.
So I'll give you a parable.
So, after 2019, we had no pilots, right?
Remember 2018, 2019, pilotshortage.
Everyone's renegotiating laboragreements.
(27:23):
We're paying pilots $175,000 ayear and up just to sit in a
seat.
And where are we going to getall the pilots?
Well, look, today there areflight schools all over the
country, more than ever.
United owns some, even.
But we have flight schools.
They're all associated withuniversities and we have changed
(27:45):
the rules so that if yougraduate from a university
that's associated with a flightschool, you don't need 1,500
hours.
You can do it in 1,250 hours,right?
So we have figured out how tocraft something that's
acceptable to Congress, that'sacceptable to the FAA and which
(28:08):
generates more pilots than wewere looking at as a run rate
back then.
I go back to FAA.
We have got to make those samekind of changes.
The quicker answer iftechnology is indeed six to 10
years away, then the quickersolution is people.
(28:29):
We've got to get more peopleand that means training them
faster and getting them inpositions Now.
I've spent a lot of time talkingabout air traffic controllers
and how important they are.
There's a whole other class ofworkers I didn't mention and
that is the systems specialists,which are also very underfunded
(28:54):
relative to the budget.
They are dedicated to makingsure this stuff works and keeps
working, to making sure thisstuff works and keeps working
and even if these systems areold and decrepit, if you can
make that happen the leastamount of time, you're going to
get the best possible answer Atthe current pay rates.
(29:15):
It should be an attractive joband particularly rules.
If we tell air trafficcontrollers listen.
You come in when you're 31, youretire when you're 51, and you
get a federal pension.
That ought to be enough.
And you're making $150,000 ayear.
That ought to be enough to getthem to want to apply for the
job, and that is we need.
(29:39):
As a smart guy once said to me,you got to fill the top of the
funnel before you can see whatcomes out the bottom of it.
That's where I would start,matt.
I would start with that.
I think I don't know enoughabout the technology.
If I did take the job, that'dbe the first thing I'd look at
is who's doing this right?
Speaker 1 (30:01):
I would have just asked you whether you think
Devante adams is going to be apacker next year.
That was my mystery question.
Matt, you know he controls theshow and the content.
What do I know?
Speaker 2 (30:10):
hey, I'm a lifetime kansas city chiefs fan.
I think he's going to go tokansas city.
How about that?
Speaker 3 (30:16):
wow, you heard it here first everybody.
Great gary talk.
Is you Master of the air?
Speaker 2 (30:21):
ladies and gentlemen, Thanks, guys, great fun.
You know, this is an industrythat evolves and continues to
evolve, and as it does, we'regoing to need more and more of
people who are passionate aboutit, raising their voices and
saying this is what I think wehave to do next.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
I think we're at a pivotal moment here with air
traffic control because, to yourpoint earlier, media is crucial
.
Media tends to only care aboutthis stuff when there's
something bad.
Speaker 2 (30:51):
Well, you know.
So there's two kinds of media.
Right, I read I mean, I've beenup since 5.15 this morning,
central Time.
I have read five aviationpublications that all come out
overnight every single day.
I read them all.
Does the Washington Post readthem?
Does the New York Times readthem?
La Times, denver Post no, no,no, no one reads this stuff.
(31:16):
Maybe, and only maybe, theDallas newspaper.
The Dallas newspaper seems toreally have their thumb on
aviation.
What's going to drive this isthe wall street journal needs to
run articles about how we getaviation to not be the thing we
(31:36):
talk about the most.
Like any good program, if weget a air traffic systems right,
it'll never be mentionedbecause it'll just work.
And I think the New York Timesneeds to say, of the things that
are on our list world peace andeconomic stability and all that
(31:57):
stuff the thing we should beable to check off and put at the
side is the air traffic system.
And if they do that, they'llwrite multiple articles.
And those multiple articles goto the congressmen and the
senators and the administrators,and that's how that all works.
I mean, I can call, I know somemembers, I could call them up
(32:22):
and you know what I know somemembers.
I could call them up and youknow what, if it's not on their
today list.
You know, I talked to JerryMoran once, a senator from
Kansas, and he was telling me hehas a private plane and he had
the largest, one of the largestcongressional districts in
square miles or whatever in thecountry, so he would fly to
(32:45):
these various places.
And he was telling me, you knowpeople in Dodge City and places
like that Hayes, they need thisair service.
And he said, when I fly intoone of these towns to talk to
the voters, air service alwayscomes up.
Now, when I go to St Louis,does air service come up?
(33:08):
Probably not.
How about Chicago?
Maybe, maybe not right, but inthese littler places air service
is huge.
They are thinking about it allthe time.
And it always struck me thatwhat Moran said made great sense
.
You know that if you're in asmall town, it is literally your
(33:29):
umbilical cord to the economy.
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