... are all over the news, and it would appear we are an industry at a crossroad. With pilots, the answer lies in getting new trained bodies into the cockpit; with controllers, the answer lies in technology. However, in both instances, one has to wonder how much the aviation industry is competing with a world of technology in which new gadgets, new games, and new millionaires are the attraction.
The business of finding new pilots, of course, has changed within a generation. Time was, the military fed the system. Then came the G.I. Bill of the 1970s which brought a new influx of pilots from the Vietnam veterans ranks. Since that time, the industry in the U.S. has seen a multitude of small flight training firms depart, many driven away by skyrocketing insurance rates. Today, it is the university system in this country that has become the major feeder for the system.
An article this week in The Wall Street Journal says the shortage of pilots is worldwide, and reports that airlines are staffing their cockpits by reducing the number of hours required of new hires. Other recent reports show that the increasing demand for pilots from the surging aviation industry in China and India is having an impact. Then there’s the boom in U.S. FAR Part 135 charter activity and the ongoing robust state of corporate aviation – two traditional feeders of the airline network have an increasing demand of their own.
Regarding controllers, the picture is fuzzier because new technology offers great promise to eliminate, or at least significantly reduce, the need for humans. Muddying the picture is the fact that the union that represents FAA controllers, NATCA, wants to blame every ill of the system on a shortage of controllers. And, they’re still brewing over former FAA Administrator Blakey’s tough bargaining stance the last time the agency and NATCA negotiated the controllers’ contract.
Case in point: the recent report by the Government Accountability Office on airfield incursions that was highly critical of FAA’s management of the problem. The NATCA response from its president, Patrick Forrey, states, “This report provides yet another credible, compelling, and clear link between safety and controller fatigue, which is caused by staffing shortages and longer hours on the job. My question today is, how much more do we have to hear before the FAA is held accountable for the blatant disregard for safety it is showing by understaffing its facilities, working controllers past their breaking points, and refusing to work with us to settle an ongoing contract negotiating impasse that has created the largest mass exodus of both veteran controllers and trainees we have seen since 1981?†In fact, NATCA, with bitter taste still in its mouth, is opposing the nomination of Bobby Sturgell as Blakey’s replacement primarily because of his involvement with the last negotiating round.
Yet, when it comes to a controller shortage, FAA’s posture is that it’s aware of the issue and is addressing it. In a September 30 press release it states that FAA has exceeded its air traffic controller staffing targets by hiring more than 1,800 controllers during FY07, topping the 2006 year-end total by 256 controllers. As a result, the agency now employs 14,874 controllers. “We’re getting a lot of enthusiastic new recruits who are interested in becoming air traffic controllers,’ says Acting Administrator Sturgell. “Controller hiring, training, and staffing is a major priority and we are on track to meet future traffic needs.â€
With pilots, the answer is clear – attract new students for a system that has a clearly identifiable need. With controllers, the modernization of the ATC system via NextGen will bring a system that’s not so heavily reliant on the human factor. NATCA refuses to accept this reality. It doesn’t help that the two bulls in this ring, FAA and NATCA, continue to butt heads rather than try to take a measured and joint approach to the reality of the need.
Thanks for reading. jfi