▶ 0:28:09Chair Cruz: Then net committee of commerce, science, and transportation is called to order. I recognize senator blackburn for a motion.
▶ 0:28:20Sen. Blackburn: I move the nomination of paul dabbar to be deputy secretary of commerce be favorably reported along with all of the background music that senator young is providing for us.
▶ 0:28:35Chair Cruz: Is there a second? Is there a choral background? Is there any discussion.
▶ 0:28:46Sen. Cantwell: I will enter a longer statement into the record but I do support Mr. dabbar.
▶ 0:28:56Chair Cruz: Without objection your statement will be entered into the record. The clerk will call the role. [roll call]
▶ 0:30:07Chair Cruz: >> the ayes are 17, nos are 11.
▶ 0:30:13Chair Cruz: The motion is agreed and the nomination is ordered reported favorably. We will now turn to the hearing and welcome the witnesses to come to the table. And the executive session is
▶ 0:30:44Chair Cruz: Adjourned.
▶ 0:32:52Chair Cruz: The senate committee on commerce, science, and transportation will come to order. The clerk has directed at showing senator hickenlooper as voting in person rather than by proxy. Good morning to each of our witnesses. It has been nearly one year since the faa reauthorization act of 2024 was signed into law. I was proud to coal lead that effort in the senate along with ranking member cantwell.
▶ 0:33:23Chair Cruz: As we are seeing today in the wake of a major aviation tragedy repeated staffing challenges, and technological failures, the 2024 act was quite precedent. It mandated an audit of all legacy pre-2000 air traffic control systems to assess operational risk, functionality, security, and compatibility with current and future technologies.
▶ 0:33:52Chair Cruz: An additional requirement ensures the faa notifies congress of unfunded priorities not in the budget request that are integral to the operation of the national airspace. It also directed the faa and airports to adopt new runway technology to cut down on the high number of near misses on airport runways. It is clear there is a dire need to fix our trouble airspace.
▶ 0:34:19Chair Cruz: Last week president trump and secretary duffy proposed a major plan to replace vast segments of the national airspace system. Radar, tower, telecommunications and more. Secretary duffy previously announced new policies to attract more air traffic controllers, improve their training, and incentivize good controllers to stay in the workforce longer. These upgrades are overdue and I hope there will be bipartisan support for them.
▶ 0:34:49Chair Cruz: I am committed to helping secretary duffy get the resources he needs to address acute problems like replacing existing unreliable copper lines with faster fiber at facilities managing the newark airspace and other areas as well.
▶ 0:35:05Chair Cruz: The faa's multiyear failure to keep pace with technology and staffing needs underscores a larger problem when a bureaucracy has to fund and manage multiyear products on behalf of private sector stakeholders like airlines and a general aviation while acting simultaneously as a safety regulator.
▶ 0:35:30Chair Cruz: The challenge of quickly and properly implementing new multibillion-dollar mission-critical tech systems is about to become even more daunting with the arrival of air taxis and commercial drones. If you think the faa as currently constructed is ready for the challenge then you have not been paying close attention over the last two decades. Congress and the administration must think boldly about how we can set the faa up for long-term success.
▶ 0:36:01Chair Cruz: Both our economies productive capacity and the safety of our nations airspace depend on it. Regarding the arrival of air track -- of air taxis, the 2024 law took meaningful steps to accelerate the safe integration of these new entrants into the nation's skies, most notably the faa bill required a rulemaking to enable drones to operate the on visual line of sight, a huge priority for the growth of the drone industry.
▶ 0:36:31Chair Cruz: The biden administration missed the bill deadline of september. The bill also directed the establishment of a new center for advanced aviation technologies, a provision I authored, which was recently announced to be at the dallas-fort worth metroplex and will be headed up by the texas a&m system. The central plain extremely important role for the management of new technologies and I'm thankful for the work secretary duffy and the faa has played moving forward.
▶ 0:37:04Chair Cruz: Ensuring the 2024 law is implemented in line with the statutory timelines and consistent with congressional intent is of paramount importance to this committee. I appreciate my colleague's commitment to maintaining robust oversight on the process. I want to express my continued condolences to the families of american airlines flight 5342. Thank you for turning your tragedy into tireless advocacy.
▶ 0:37:37Chair Cruz: I remain dedicated to ensuring and doing everything possible to make sure something like this never happens again. It is precisely why members of the committee hear directly from the faa about the steps it is taking to create a safer and more efficient airspace. I look forward to hearing about the progress the administration is making on these issues. I now turn to ranking member duckworth.
▶ 0:38:03Sen. Duckworth: Thank you chairman cruz and thank you to ranking member cantwell who you'll be hearing from later. I'm disappointed the acting administration or was unavailable but I thank you each for being here. I look forward to hear about the faa efforts but I must address the critical safety lapses we have seen. A deadly crash, equipment outages. They are terrible but unfortunately they are not a surprise. Alarm bells have been reading for years.
▶ 0:38:35Sen. Duckworth: We pass the faa bipartisan reauthorization bill but there is more work to do. We need a long and short-term plan and that is what I hope we will hear from the faa today. A large-scale overhaul of the system will take years. In the meantime we need to know what the faa is doing up to prevent another tragedy. That is the faa ensure other airports do not experience what attacked newark?
▶ 0:39:02Sen. Duckworth: The faa needs to be proactively looking for risk and mitigating it. Yet the faa failed to spot a clear trend of helicopter near misses near dcaa. After 67 people died the faa close the helicopter route but that failed to fully solve the problem. Coronation failures between the faa military has continued with the flight at risk.
▶ 0:39:31Sen. Duckworth: In march a departing flight came within 200 feet of an air force jet conducting a fly over arlington cemetery. Recently another army helicopter from the same per grade involved in january's -- the same per grade involved ingenuous crash -- the same brigade involved in january's cash came within 200 feet near the pentagon. The administration's lack of a more aggressive mitigation is inexcusable. The faa and dod must coordinate better.
▶ 0:40:01Sen. Duckworth: You do not need to wait for the completion of a lengthy investigation to know that. I know this is complicated. I have flown blackhawk helicopters in chicago's airspace and it is among the top three busiest airspace in the nation and it is not easy in the best of circumstances. There are things to mitigate this risk.
▶ 0:40:21Sen. Duckworth: Following the dca crash my colleagues asked the faa to review helicopter crashes and other airspace and direct -- I appreciate the faa taking this action. That required request from me, the ranking member, and the chairman of the committee to spur this analysis. The fact that it took those requests to have that analysis done is hardly inspiring.
▶ 0:40:47Sen. Duckworth: I hope we will hear from the faa about what it is doing proactively to prevent more newark type failures. I also hope to get an explanation from the faa about staff cuts. How does this help the faa meet the critical moment? Earlier this year the faa fired hundreds of probationary workers.
▶ 0:41:12Sen. Duckworth: In addition 700 the faa employees reportedly accepted the faa's first resignation offer and more than 2000 are projected to accept it in a second round. The in ministry or has said the faa expects further reductions in force. -- the administrator has said the faa expects further reductions in force. The mission is entirely safety and everyone who works there is there to support that mission.
▶ 0:41:41Sen. Duckworth: The implementation of the law is also critical for safety. The law requires the faa to require airplane evacuation standards that take in account the presence of carry-on bags, children, and people with disabilities, none of which are included in recent faa simulations. The law also advances airport surveillance and expands aviation workforce developing program to recruit and train future pilots and manufacturing workers.
▶ 0:42:11Sen. Duckworth: All of these were supported in a bipartisan way out of this committee. The law also makes long overdue reforms to improve accessibility to passengers with disabilities so they can travel with the dignity all americans deserve. It requires faa to establishment him training status for airline staff to assist passengers using wheelchairs ordering and deplaning in training for how to handle wheelchairs and scooters so they can be damaged less frequently. Look forward to our discussion today and I yelled back.
▶ 0:42:40Chair Cruz: I will now introduce each of the witnesses. We have Mr. franklin mcintosh who is the deputy chief operating operator for the air traffic organization. We have missed jodi baker from the deputy administrator for aviation safety, and we have Mr. wayne heibeck who is the deputy associate administrator for airports. Mr. mcintosh, you are recognized for five minutes.
▶ 0:43:13Ms. Baker: I am going to do our opening five minutes if that is ok. Thank you for the opportunity to share updates regarding the faa efforts to implement the faa reauthorization act of 2024. The faa has made significant progress over the past year and together with my colleagues from the air traffic organization in the office of airports I would like to highlight several of these accomplishments.
▶ 0:43:43Ms. Baker: Regarding direction to improve the faa's communication and timely decision-making on matters before the agency, so far we have reduced the aircraft registration backlog and applications are now processed with an average of 10 business days or less. We've also shorten the time timeframe for determining acceptance or rejection of air carrier, air operator, and significant applications. We have improved guidance.
▶ 0:44:10Ms. Baker: Our aviation safety inspector uses when waiting for inspections. We are also enhancing and processing the analysis of deity, specifically the aviation safety and analysis system has incorporated an advanced tool to process safety data more accurately and produce actionable safety intelligence to identify trends and mitigate risks.
▶ 0:44:36Ms. Baker: As we enhance the safety of the national airspace system for current users we are also focused on integrating new aviation technologies including advanced mobility. Last month secretary duffy announced the center for advanced aviation technologies to be operated by the texas a&m system. The center will play a critical role advancing technologies and drive innovation in aviation.
▶ 0:45:02Ms. Baker: The faa is ready for power left, the first brand new category of civil aircraft in a century. Last year the faa issued regulation on pilot lift instructor certification, pilot training, and officer rules. President trump and secretary duffy made clear their priority to deliver an all-new new state-of-the-art air traffic control system that makes air traffic safety -- safer for the american people.
▶ 0:45:35Ms. Baker: Secretary duffy announced a plan to replace core infrastructure including radar, software, hardware, telecommunication networks, and facilities. The faa has accelerated the modernization of the system. We expect delivery by july 2025 and are targeting deployment by september. The faa must recruit and retain the best and brightest. This is done with congressional direction.
▶ 0:46:02Ms. Baker: The faa was laser focused on air traffic controllers and safety inspectors. We are updated controller trafficking -- controller staffing targets to reflect negotiated levels. Undersecretary duffers -- under secretary duffy's leadership -- we are offering financial incentives to grow the new controller pipeline and we are using on the spot hiring authority for experienced
▶ 0:46:33Ms. Baker: Military controllers to join the workforce. The faa is leveraging partnerships with colleges and universities to create another pipeline for controllers through the enhanced air-traffic training initiative. We expect these investments to assist staffing at critical federal contract towers. Aviation safety inspectors are the front line in safety oversight and are essential to execute our safety mission.
▶ 0:47:01Ms. Baker: The use of direct higher authority, on the spot hiring authority has enabled the faa to continue targeted recruitment for these positions and accelerate the hiring process. For our nation's airports we have updated airport improvement plan guidance that will benefit airport operators and we are continuing to support the transition to firefighting foam antivert reports which will support the integration.
▶ 0:47:28Ms. Baker: We've made substantial progress implementing requirements made at illuminating dangerous one-way incidents. Since november 2024 the faa has at surface awareness initiatives at 18 sites. We have more than 30 additional sites plan to be operational by the end of 2025 and we are rolling out new enhanced safety technology at more than 70 airports. The faa is committed to implementing the faa reauthorization act.
▶ 0:47:56Ms. Baker: We are confident we are making substantial progress and we intend to keep congress apprised of our progress will forward to answering your questions.
▶ 0:48:02Chair Cruz: Thank you, I appreciate that. I will start with questions for Mr. mcintosh. On april 25, for the first time since the january 28 midair collision from the army resumed flying in the national capital region.
▶ 0:48:21Chair Cruz: Less than a week later air-traffic control had to command two commercial aircraft on final approach to abort their landing at dca due to an army black hawk on an apparent training mission at the pentagon having wandered far too close to the commercial aircraft flight path. Shortly thereafter, and just 10 days after having resumed limited flight in the national capital region, the army aviation brigade suspended operations in the D.C. area.
▶ 0:48:54Chair Cruz: I have been told that prior to the army aviation raids decision to suspend -- aviation brigades decision to suspend operation the faa was preparing to spent the letter of agreement between the army and the faa that gives the army the ability to operate in the D.C. airspace without having to first ask for faa clearance for each flight. Was the faa prepared to suspend the letter agreement and if so what was concerning enough to justify such a decision?
▶ 0:49:21Mr. Mcintosh: Thank you for the question. Like yourself we were extremely troubled by the incident that occurred, especially in light of dca and the events that led up to the accident. To be quite honest we were ready to deploy any option available we felt was necessary to bring safety measures and better behaviors.
▶ 0:49:50Mr. Mcintosh: We were ready to do any option available up to and including what we just spoke to which was removing the ability to fly.
▶ 0:49:58Chair Cruz: Does that mean the faa did actually draft an order suspending the army's ability to fly in the D.C. area?
▶ 0:50:05Mr. Mcintosh: I'm not aware if we drafted an order but we did have discussions that was an option we wanted to pursue. I know the dmd came back and suspended opera -- the dod came back and suspended operations based on that event. We are still working with dod to improve that process.
▶ 0:50:26Chair Cruz: I commend your vigilance in protecting the flying public, particularly in and around dca given the horrific accident that occurred earlier this year. Is it true that the direct line between the pentagon air-traffic control at the dca tower has been inoperable since march 2022?
▶ 0:50:45Mr. Mcintosh: That is correct.
▶ 0:50:48Chair Cruz: Who maintains that hotline?
▶ 0:50:51Mr. Mcintosh: The dod maintains that hotline stop the next question would be why are we not aware of it and insist on it being fixed?
▶ 0:51:02Chair Cruz: I did not have that written down but it is a good one.
▶ 0:51:07Mr. Mcintosh: Jake safety responsibilities extremely seriously at the faa -- we take safety responsibilities extremely seriously at the faa. We were not aware but we became aware after that event. We insist on that monitor being fixed before we resume any operations under the pentagon.
▶ 0:51:27Chair Cruz: You have a timeline for when that line will be operational?
▶ 0:51:31Mr. Mcintosh: I would expect the dod to expedite at timeline so they can begin their operations.
▶ 0:51:38Chair Cruz: While army flights were ongoing, the hotline was not operational. How did controllers communicate?
▶ 0:51:47Mr. Mcintosh: That is a great question. We still have landline abilities. We can make phone calls from the helipad to where the controller in charge can answer so we are aware of the activity in their there was a departure clearance -- and if there was a departure clearance necessary we could relay it through that mechanism.
▶ 0:52:08Chair Cruz: Is it true that the air-traffic controller positions for local traffic and helicopters were combined early as they were on the day of the midair collision?
▶ 0:52:16Mr. Mcintosh: Yes it was.
▶ 0:52:19Chair Cruz: The developments in dca and its airspace are extremely concerning and together with senators cantwell, duckworth, and warren, this -- and moran, this committee remains focused on the safe return to operations at dca and making sure all users of the airspace are operating responsibly. Let's turn to newark.
▶ 0:52:45Chair Cruz: Newark international airport has been beset by delays after the radar system malfunction, leaving controllers unable to see or communicate with aircraft in their sector for approximately 90 seconds. What broke down and have the system become this deteriorated in the first place?
▶ 0:53:00Mr. Mcintosh: To answer your question we were variously -- we were very concerned about the disruptions that occurred as well for the 90 seconds that it occurred. When we did our investigation what we found out is our telecommunication provider that provides network lines into that area -- there are two lines that provide data and transmission. The primary line that came in failed.
▶ 0:53:31Mr. Mcintosh: We have a secondary redundant line that provides the radar transmissions and our voice capabilities and that redundant line is supposed to assume that load and be instantaneous, where if we were to have a fiber cut of a line or a copper cut of a line in -- then that redundant line is supposed to come in. When we lost that first line, the second line did not kick in like it was designed to do. That is what caused the disruption.
▶ 0:53:59Mr. Mcintosh: The disruption was for 90 seconds. I am air-traffic controller by trade so I will talk like an air traffic controller if that is ok. Air-traffic controllers provide positive separation between aircraft. What I mean is we never point aircraft had on at the same altitude and ensure we have appropriate levels of separation.
▶ 0:54:21Mr. Mcintosh: In the event we have something like an aircraft that has estopped -- that has a stuck mic m frequencies, something like that. -- 90 seconds is a long time for an air traffic controller.
▶ 0:54:41Mr. Mcintosh: Although we have contingencies in place that we use to make sure we keep aircraft safe, it is a long disruption for a radar screen to go black, to not talk to aircraft. That is something we wanted to take a look at and we have put in corrective measures since that happened to ensure those redundancies are better for that airspace. We have the system across the united states.
▶ 0:55:07Mr. Mcintosh: Radar data like this where we have aligned and redundant line and we've not had a failure like this to this degree in my memory. We had to put together along with the local vendor responsible for the telecommute occasions to provide more resistant for a better contingency to ensure that if it ever happened again we feel good about the processes.
▶ 0:55:28Mr. Mcintosh: We were able to implement a new contingency and we are working with the telco provider to bring in a third line of redundancy to that airport to prevent this from happening again.
▶ 0:55:38Chair Cruz: When the system was down what was the degree of danger the flying public faced?
▶ 0:55:45Mr. Mcintosh: The real danger would be if our techniques were not good, if our controllers do not put aircraft on factors, if we cannot talk to aircraft the other way. We have the ability to go to emergency frequencies.
▶ 0:56:04Mr. Mcintosh: If all of those fail at the same time, then we would havto assure the aircraft follow what they are supposed to do which is lost cm lost com proceedings where they go into a holding. If all of those start filling at the one -- at the same time you will have to rely on the pilots to do what they do, which is rely on their systems on board which is their traffic pollution systems.
▶ 0:56:29Chair Cruz: During those 90 seconds was there a significantly heightened danger to the flying public?
▶ 0:56:35Mr. Mcintosh: I do not believe there was a heightened danger to the flying public but with that being said from where I sit we want to remove all risk to the flying public and that is what is concerning to me. How do we remove any of that risk? We need to make sure our contingencies are better placed.
▶ 0:56:52Chair Cruz: Senator duckworth.
▶ 0:56:54Sen. Duckworth: I will follow-up under your line of questioning. An unreliable backup means there is no backup as far as I am concerned. An aviation safety critical systems need to be redundant and resilient. I know the faa -- it should never have had a chance to fail in the first place. There is no question we to fix our antiquated air traffic control facilities and equipment.
▶ 0:57:23Sen. Duckworth: Each one of you have been vocal voices for fixing the system across multiple administrations. We held a hearing examining that issue last year put a technological overhaul would take years and we need to know what the faa is doing now to fix this. Mr. mcintosh, how often does air-traffic control inspect infrastructure at airports to ensure backup systems would kick in in the event of a radar and communications failure?
▶ 0:57:49Sen. Duckworth: How often you simulate the main system going down and to test redundancies to make sure it does kick in?
▶ 0:57:55Mr. Mcintosh: There are required maintenance checks our technicians do and they are very vigilant in doing that. To answer your question, I'm not aware if we have checks to make sure if we have two lines that go down at the same time. I will have to follow up on that to make sure I answer your question.
▶ 0:58:13Sen. Duckworth: That would be helpful. If not I would highly encourage those checks happen. Prior to the april radar and communication outages affecting newark, when was the last time the faa inspected the air-traffic infrastructure to ensure the backup system would kick in in the event of radar or communications failure? You can add that.
▶ 0:58:41Sen. Duckworth: After the deadly crash near reagan national airport, faa closed the helicopter route involved but a lack of coordination between faa and the formative defense has continued to put the flying public at risk. We had this conversation already. If for some reason a military aircraft cannot land at the pentagon I do not understand why it would circle around the building, putting itself into the flight path of the dca without being directed to do so. There are many procedures that are not published procedures but are accepted at an airport.
▶ 0:59:12Sen. Duckworth: I used to land at midway airport where the procedure was circle around the tower and land at taxiway alpha, do not go over all the small aircraft. Even though that was established I would never have executed that procedure without atc directing me to do so. I could offer it to atc around e I could offer it to atc around r and land to alpha but I would never do it in this I was given permission to do so. Mr.
▶ 0:59:41Sen. Duckworth: Mcintosh, the faa is responsible for establishing these routes. Had they established a helicopter route that so girls the pentagon? -- that circles the pentagon? Is that an established procedure? Around the pentagon?
▶ 0:59:55Mr. Mcintosh: Yes, ma'am. You are a pilot and I'm a controller so I will be frank. We have asked that question via a letter of agreement. The larger question here, to be honest to your point, what we assure a need to make sure we assure is everybody knows their responsibilities, which is as a pilot, or even a heliport tower, you have an aircraft that you did not give a landing clearance to or the aircraft boarded the
▶ 1:00:26Mr. Mcintosh: Landing, whatever occurred, that aircraft went back and entered class brother airspace. That aircraft is not supposed enter class bravo airspace without permission of air traffic control. That did not occur. My question and I think the larger question is, why did that not occur? Without complaints or procedures and policies come this is where safety -- this is where my line of safety comes into question.
▶ 1:00:50Mr. Mcintosh: Even absent a published go around procedure, if we want to call it that, pilots and controllers have shared responsibilities. Do not enter class bravo without permission from air traffic control.
▶ 1:01:05Sen. Duckworth: As we established, lack of coordination between the faa and dod on airspace in the dca read produce a copy of the memorandum of understanding to this committee and portions of this memorandum need to remain nonpublic come of the committee can make arrangements for that. Can faa do that?
▶ 1:01:26Mr. Mcintosh: I will make sure we get the information requested.
▶ 1:01:30Sen. Duckworth: How often are faa air traffic controllers trained on this? Are they trained up on this particular memorandum? Are they aware of it? Does a get reviewed? Mr.
▶ 1:01:49Mcintosh: We train on sop through our training process and then it is the application of letter of agreement we do every day, so this is -- I would not say this is new but absent an aircraft entering class bravo and pilot deviation what the controllers would do is they would do what you saw them do that night, which is shared situational awareness of what is going.
▶ 1:02:13Mcintosh: We have an aircraft or pilot doing something they are not supposed to be doing, and those controllers to what they should have which was given two aircraft to go around to ensure we capped separation or safe separation between those aircraft versus letting that continue. While we had what is my opinion as a pilot deviation, I want to come in the controllers at the time for their actions for ensuring giving time to go around for those two aircraft.
▶ 1:02:36Sen. Duckworth: I want to join you in committing those aircraft controllers. It was timely and appropriate.
▶ 1:02:44Chair Cruz: Senator moran. Supper moran thank you for having this hearing and what is clearly occurring at a critical time. I want to first indicate your subcommittee on aviation and space and tends to have a dod, faa, ntsb discussion roundtable once again.
▶ 1:03:09Chair Cruz: We have zeroed in on june 11 which we have another understanding from investigator and the faa and the department of defense what is transpiring since the incident and tragedy of january 29.
▶ 1:03:25Chair Cruz: I also want to indicate I have introduced legislation that may be of interest to others on the committee to join, and that would require all aircraft in class b high-volume airspace to utilize adsb in and out, something that was a significant item of discussion and concern on the night of january 29 in regard to the blackhawk.
▶ 1:03:57Chair Cruz: Let me ask a question that -- an issue that bother me in the past and highlighted this in our last hearing. Ntsb -- I suppose this is for you -- well, let me leave it open to whoever wants to answer.
▶ 1:04:14Chair Cruz: Ntsb's preliminary investigation highlighted 15,214 events october 21-december 24 of commercial planes and helicopters that were separated by less than one nautical mile. That information that ntsb provided came from the computer records of the faa.
▶ 1:04:39Chair Cruz: And those numbers, as well as other statistical facts that were told to us, demonstrated to me a continuing problem, continuing circumstance in which there is close proximity between aircraft at dca and -- that is troubling in and of itself but troubling to me is if it is in the faa's computer records, is that something the faa monitors to know the trends so that actions can be taken to reduce the risk?
▶ 1:05:11Chair Cruz: I don't know whether that is -- Mr. mcintosh, seem to be on the scene today.
▶ 1:05:17Mr. Mcintosh: If it is ok, both myself and my colleague Ms. baker will tagteam this question to make sure we give you an appropriate answer. Reference faa databases, we are required -- in a loss of separation, we are required to enter what is called a mandatory occurrence report for further review. Anything near midair collision must be investigated. Any pallets reports of close proximity we investigate.
▶ 1:05:47Mr. Mcintosh: -- in a pilots reports of close proximity we investigate. We keep records. Also our safety reporting. I will say I am concerned and I acknowledge that we missed something. At dca. Our medications failed because we do have quality assurance and quality control processes. Through the data analysis, we are supposed to develop corrective action plans.
▶ 1:06:16Mr. Mcintosh: I know acting administrator talked about what we would like to do to ensure we have better analysis of her trends and I will follow up with exactly what he said, which is updating the aviation safety information analysis and sharing tool with artificial intelligence and machine learning to do a better analysis of the trends that involved mixed aircraft types -- helicopters and fixed wing.
▶ 1:06:44Mr. Mcintosh: When we look over 10 years of data, I think if you get a report once per month or something like twice per month over the year of 10 years trends may escape someone. I think some of these tools we have available to us will help us but these trends better so we can be more proactive in our medications versus reacting to an event. That is what a safety organization is supposed to do. I want to make sure we continue to quantify the data and make surgical improvements to our safety processes.
▶ 1:07:14Mr. Mcintosh: In the surgical's having the biggest benefits of making sure we have that are processes and procedures in place to ensure safety to the flying public. Supper moran want to make sure I understand what you are saying, that data is sufficiently alarming, that it should have raised more awareness and action than it did?
▶ 1:07:31Mr. Mcintosh: Yes, sir.
▶ 1:07:37Ms. Baker: Holistically we are looking at data across the faa booth. Mr. mcintosh describes specific data sets within the air traffic organization but what we want to do is bring together data sets across the faa that requires more computing power because it requires more computing power to bring them all together but we also need to apply artificial intelligence type tools in large land which models to help spot emerging trends that may not be available to one or two incident basis over multiple years as
▶ 1:08:08Ms. Baker: Well as we have a lot of reports that her text base and right now those have to be reviewed by analyst. The application helps us sort through those things and bring together related information faster. >> is the announcement have any sort of consequence to the ability to do what you just described with the resources being talked about or is that going someplace else to the absence of this need? >> we are committed to that and this announcement doesn't impact the resources.
▶ 1:08:36Sen. Moran: Let me say if it is a problem at dca, there helicopters and fixed wing aircraft at many airports across the country. I assume the faa is also doing the same kind of examination and soul-searching across the country, not just focused on dca. Is that true? Mr. mcintosh: that is 100% accurate.
▶ 1:09:04Sen. Moran: We are looking at right now 10 airports or 10 cities with airports that have chartered airport rates. We have important body of work to your point and what we are doing is assessing the data and already have actual items, case in point, las vegas. Las vegas has got some chartered groups close to the international airport.
▶ 1:09:28Sen. Moran: Based on our analysis and what we saw we have established lateral and vertical boundaries for those helicopter routes to keep them separated from aircraft landing and departing the airport area as well as working with our labor partners to work on making sure traffic advisories are well-timed and well-placed. So the helicopter pilots and the commercial pilots know exactly where the helicopter routes have situational awareness.
▶ 1:09:53Sen. Moran: The biggest thing is a lateral confines of those helicopter routes, to make sure they are separated from arriving and departing aircraft. That is an example of what I expect from our data sets to lead to, the appropriate corrective action plans we want to see put in place to actually mitigate any potential issues. That is where we need to be.
▶ 1:10:14Chair Cruz: Centre kolbuchar.
▶ 1:10:18Sen. Klobuchar: Thank you. We have been rightly focused on the tragedy, the loss of life with the american airlines flight. But as has been pointed out by my colleagues, so many problems at newark and as I go into the summer season, hard to believe they won't get worse. And then just across the country.
▶ 1:10:44Sen. Klobuchar: There was one incident, a near miss recently. It was on march 28 between a delta flight and a military aircraft shortly after the tragedy where the military flight was just 500 feet below the delta flight. The delta pilot, I'm paraphrasing, but it was picked up from air traffic control, as are a flight 500 feet below us?
▶ 1:11:13Sen. Klobuchar: That flight was headed to minneapolis, contained a bunch of anna sowden's, families, one of my staff members was on the flight. I had asked and appreciated that the dot got back to me close after eight. I'm still waiting for a final answer about what happened. Do you know?
▶ 1:11:40Mr. Mcintosh: What occurred was the military flight was doing national flyover of arlington. It was opposite direction to departure traffic at dca. The radar was working the military flight. There was a communication exchange between the supervisor of potomac and a supervisor at dca.
▶ 1:12:06Mr. Mcintosh: The potomac supervisor coordinated with dca to stop departures at a certain time. That stop time, stop departures and that the flyover proceed. You sterilize the airspace essentially to keep traffic safe. The controller or the cic that was a dca misunderstood the time or misunderstood the verbiage on what that stop time was. So they let one more aircraft go versus holding the aircraft on the ground.
▶ 1:12:38Mr. Mcintosh: In reviewing that, we have to clean up the phraseology and how we give times to ensure we know exactly which aircraft we are going to stop and keep that kind of incident from occurring. We put both of those facilities together, along with the management team, to ensure we had a better process in place to keep that from happening again. That was unfortunately an event that happened but we improved the procedures to keep that from happening again.
▶ 1:13:02Sen. Klobuchar: As you look at changing the processes and protocols, how about the number of people that are working there? Just in general, what are the faa's hiring targets for the next three years when it comes to air traffic control for 2026, 2027, 2028?
▶ 1:13:24Mr. Mcintosh: This year, 2000. Next year, 2200. The following year, 2300. Your after that, 2400. Those are the faa hiring goals. It is quite robust but with the secretary duffy supercharge hiring, I believe that is a target quite honestly we will achieve.
▶ 1:13:48Sen. Klobuchar: How many down will we be with those targets?
▶ 1:13:51Mr. Mcintosh: For the first time -- are you asking 100% staffing?
▶ 1:13:58Sen. Klobuchar: Yes.
▶ 1:13:59Mr. Mcintosh: I believe right now we are 3000 short controllers. Right now we have 3100 trainees in the pipeline. We have to account for attrition, meaning we will see controllers retire, control or separate.
▶ 1:14:16Mr. Mcintosh: With the numbers I'm speaking to, I think we will finally start gaining traction where we outpace attrition and we will start seeing over the next 18 to 24 months, we will actually see a positive day in the controllers and we start feeling better about where our staffing targets are. I am sure you can appreciate that it takes time to make a quality air traffic controller. It is a high skilled position.
▶ 1:14:42Mr. Mcintosh: The average time to certify across the country is approximately two years from when they graduate. It will take some time to get this process.
▶ 1:14:52Sen. Klobuchar: It is one of the reasons as we look at the faa reauthorization from year ago that we decided on a bipartisan basis to add funding. It is just one of the things that bothers me outside the air traffic control world is just when the administration engages on attacks on government employees and says, hey, we want everyone to be fired that is only been there two years or whatever it is, it doesn't exactly make it an enticing place to work.
▶ 1:15:19Sen. Klobuchar: I hope you bring that back to the administration in general, because it just keeps happening and then people don't want to work there. They don't think they have job security. It doesn't seem like a great place to go. Then we don't get people that work there and you don't get medical devices approved or you don't get planes to leave on time or worse. That is just one of the things I want to pass on. One last question that is very short, Mr. chair. Mr.
▶ 1:15:44Sen. Klobuchar: Heibeck, I've been working to get federal funding for the third oldest air traffic control tower in the country that is in duluth, minnesota, represented a stalwart republican from the house and I and senator smith have joined forces on this. We have seen flooding and there is an airbase up there, national guard airbase. Serious is out there that makes jazz. We have an airport. Just anything you can do.
▶ 1:16:13Sen. Klobuchar: We just got a grant which was helpful and got one last year as well, but we are only about 20% in and we need more funding for that because it really is the third oldest tower in the nation.
▶ 1:16:26Mr. Heibeck: I'm glad we could provide great funding to start that project and will see if we can continue to support it.
▶ 1:16:36Chair Cruz: Senator sullivan.
▶ 1:16:39Sen. Sullivan: I appreciate the witnesses today. By the way, I'm a big fan of our military. I am on the armed services committee. I will say the army needs to really up its game and be more forthcoming on this latest incident. I have requested for my position on the armed services committee a briefing.
▶ 1:17:04Sen. Sullivan: I hope it is not some big shot general who thinks he needs a quick trip over to the pentagon and will blow off the faa safety requirements. Better not be what happened. But they need to start giving answers to this committee and other committees because what happened was unacceptable. We will continue to press them on that but they really have not been forthcoming.
▶ 1:17:29Sen. Sullivan: I want to focus on the alaska safety initiative the faa has worked with me on this committee on. This was the outgrowth of a 10 year study by the ntsb that showed we had crash rates that are almost 2.5 times the rate of the rest of the country. Fatality rates were much higher than the rest of the country as well. So working with the faa, we instituted the alaska aviation safety initiative.
▶ 1:18:00Sen. Sullivan: Last year's the faa reauthorization, we were able to get a whole bunch of things in that bill that related to alaska aviation safety, a goal of reducing the rate of fatal aircraft accidents by 90%.
▶ 1:18:18Sen. Sullivan: It requires the aviation to approve maintenance of weather equipment and growing those equipment issues as you know many of our rural airports don't have any weather reporting in the lower 48. Nobody would accept that. Dozens and dozens. I will say what to complement secretary duffy. He is delivering on these promises. So is the president.
▶ 1:18:46Sen. Sullivan: The faa and s $25 million investment in the initiative at the beginning of april. Significant expansion of the faa's use of satellites in alaska to help support conductivity, in weather monitoring.
▶ 1:19:04Sen. Sullivan: The president announced the secretary duffy vest on may 8 and the press conference a dramatic increase in the number of new weather observations stations in alaska. We really appreciated that. Of course senator cruz mentioned the upgrades they both announced at this very important press conference last week that I am fully supportive of.
▶ 1:19:34Sen. Sullivan: I want to thank secretary duffy, the faa, the president. Focusing on delivering the number of these issues. Can I ask you on the weather observation systems in the maintenance, you know, we don't have enough. The president and secretary duffy acknowledged that with this dramatic announcement. But where are we on the maintenance issues for maintaining our weather systems?
▶ 1:20:03Sen. Sullivan: As you know, we will have a weather reporting system that goes down in a small rural community that has an airport and it will take a long time to get an faa official out there to fix it. Do we have an update on that? I think that was required in the faa bill for 60 days after midnight.
▶ 1:20:25Mr. Mcintosh: I am sorry, I do not have an answer. I know we talk about this all the time. When we do have an outage, I often speak with my team and usually the hardest thing is accessibility to get there. Sometimes it is the weather or terrain.
▶ 1:20:44Sen. Sullivan: We have over 230 communities in alaska that are not connected by roads. A lot of people don't know that. The only way to get in is through an airplane or boat if the community is on a river. That is why this is so important. If you don't have weather reporting, have no idea what it is like to fly in there and we have some pretty nasty weather.
▶ 1:21:04Mr. Mcintosh: We do recognize aviation is the primary form of transportation for alaska. And the need to provide support for resources, food, medical supplies is paramount. We recognize that. And we definitely want to make sure we can so the people that are reliant on us have the faith we are doing what we need to do. We are pursuing the large body of work you are speaking to.
▶ 1:21:34Mr. Mcintosh: At the secretary's request, we are doing critical investments in the things you're speaking to -- deploying dozens of automated weather observant systems and also the visual weather observation systems and numerous weather cameras to make sure there's better accessibility to the items you're talking about. I will take an iou if that is ok as far as what the repair times look like.
▶ 1:22:00Mr. Heibeck: We are in consultation for finalizing guidance to our alaska office regarding the expansion of airport program funding for awos for airports across alaska as well as others I believe you championed, special justifications for runway projects.
▶ 1:22:25Sen. Sullivan: I thank you that and I want to thank secretary duffy and the president. He is the one who made the announcement on the weather observation systems in alaska. Very quick, Mr. chairman, I have been working with some of the controllers on legislation to create a shot clock for updating the atc system from copper wiring to fiber-optic technology. Would that -- would that push from us help you?
▶ 1:22:55Sen. Sullivan: I know you need funding, but this issue of copper wires, the chairman mentioned it come the secretary has been mentioning it. It is something about speed for data we need. Unfortunately, our systems are really slow. What do you about something like that?
▶ 1:23:12Mr. Mcintosh: I will say we would appreciate bipartisan support for infrastructure. It is sorely needed. Fiber is a large piece of the infrastructure improvements we are asking for to replace copper that is currently there.
▶ 1:23:26Chair Cruz: Senator kim.
▶ 1:23:30Sen. Kim: Thank you. I will pick up where my colleague left off. In my home state of new jersey come a lot on the minds about safety, infrastructure. I was at the philly trade con and what I hear from the tech folks on the ground is they still have not heard a real diagnosis or's specifics of what the telecom problems are. They have not heard from fti. Mr.
▶ 1:23:56Sen. Kim: Mcintosh, it sounds like you're saying there has been an investigation so do you feel like there is on the faa's side, a clear understanding of what the problem is?
▶ 1:24:05Mr. Mcintosh: From this outage? Yes, sir, I do. That was relayed to you, that is something I need to address. The reason I'm saying that is weak, the faa, has sent senior leadership from technical operations who helped liaison between our vendor who provides telecommunications --.
▶ 1:24:27Sen. Kim: Who is that?
▶ 1:24:28Mr. Mcintosh: We have two for philadelphia area city, that would be verizon and --.
▶ 1:24:42Sen. Kim: What is the timeline of the fixes you were mentioning in terms of both the primary and secondary and then adding potential tertiary?
▶ 1:24:50Mr. Mcintosh: Right now and our conversations, the administrator and secretary have asked us to assemble a task force to work with those vendors to improve those redundancies. And that task force met -- started meeting yesterday and we are expecting this redundancies to be put in place this summer.
▶ 1:25:10Sen. Kim: This summer. What I was told when I was there the trade con was the main fix to prevent blackouts -- if our goal is to prevent blackouts from happening, it is going to be requiring a switch, realignment of the system direct from newark to philly rather than in 90. Is that correct?
▶ 1:25:29Mr. Mcintosh: There will be different levels that will help increase our infrastructure and it is one of the items we plan on putting in the area. I know secretary duffy announced it in his press conference as well. We are right now having discussions on putting that in place.
▶ 1:25:48Sen. Kim: Is there a timeline for that switch to stars?
▶ 1:25:51Mr. Mcintosh: I was asked to do it as soon as possible and we are having that conversation on how quickly we can get it done. Right now it is a piece of adaptation. What I mean, we have to build the software to make sure that newark, philadelphia rc trait and talk to then90 so that adaptation is really what --.
▶ 1:26:14Sen. Kim: I was told theoretically you can do this in six to eight weeks but without the software enhancements, which is so much needed and that could potentially be six months or 12 month timeline in terms of the testing as well as development of the software. Does that sound roughly right?
▶ 1:26:29Mr. Mcintosh: I think 12 month timeline is very conservative only take a look at adaptations. We have a team going to the tech center to work on the adaptations next week.
▶ 1:26:40Sen. Kim: I would like to stay in touch with you about this. We need to be able to tell the people in new jersey, frankly, around the country, what we can expect when it comes to the goal of zero blackouts. In terms of being able to make sure they can have assurances they are. I really do feel like this is becoming an issue that is undermining confidence not just in the newark airport, but in her system at large. One other issue that is continuing to come up is staffing.
▶ 1:27:10Sen. Kim: I know we are talking about a nationally, at least at philly trade con, I was told when it was at n90, down to about 22, the temporary duty they are going to have ends july 28, 2026, about 15, 16 could move out at that point. The pipeline does not sound like it is keeping up. I was told it is in the single digits right now. Does that track with your understanding?
▶ 1:27:38Sen. Kim: Do you have greater confidence this isn't going to be some cliff come july 28, 2026 when it comes to area c of the philly trade con?
▶ 1:27:47Mr. Mcintosh: That does not truck with my information. We move the air space to improve the pipeline. I currently have 10 individuals that are in the trade con that are actively training. I have another six in simulation lab that are going to go to the floor. In june of this year.
▶ 1:28:07Mr. Mcintosh: Every training class I have signed up through the middle of 2026 is filled with cpc I.t.'s so my pipeline is robust which is the reason we move the airspace.
▶ 1:28:19Sen. Kim: That is what we want to make sure. If you don't mind, if I can follow up with you, to conflict our numbers. I think that is the kind of information that can hopefully put us at greater ease, that we are trying to deal with a short-term problem right now, and sure zero blackouts, but also make sure we are not falling over a cliff. Can you work with me?
▶ 1:28:39Mr. Mcintosh: Absolutely.
▶ 1:28:42Chair Cruz: Senator budd.
▶ 1:28:46Sen. Budd: Thank you. First I want to thank president trump, secretary duffy, and chairman cruz for your leadership on much-needed atc modernization. It comes at a particularly important time in the history of american aviation. So many new technologies come to our airspace. For example today wing aviation and doordash are launching a joint operation in charlotte. This marks the first new market for wing after a successful year in dallas/fort worth.
▶ 1:29:15Sen. Budd: Sadly, the drone industry continues to be stifled by regulatory uncertainty. Which has failed to public proposed rule on beyond visual line of sight. Ms. baker, why is it taken so long for the agency to act giving clear deadlines? Can you commit the faa will advance proposed rule by the summer?
▶ 1:29:38Ms. Baker: We are excited to get the bvlos. We are working hard to get that rule out. It is in review.
▶ 1:29:49Sen. Budd: The chinese company's party has been extremely forward-looking, unfortunately, I am concerned as we are discussing today, somewhat outdated atc system might be yet another challenge for the full integration of these new technologies. Mr. mcintosh, I appreciate the clarity you brought this morning to many areas.
▶ 1:30:08Sen. Budd: As we work to modernize atc, is the faa thinking about how to future proof the system so that new technologies can be more simply integrated international airspace?
▶ 1:30:19Mr. Mcintosh: Thank you for the question. Absolutely, senator. The policy is safety. When it comes to integration come these things you are speaking to work -- we will work tirelessly to make that happen.
▶ 1:30:36Sen. Budd: Companies like boom supersonic on the leading edge of civil supersonic revival. January, their aircraft demonstrated it can fly faster than the speed of sound but without any audible sonic boom reaching the ground. Despite this innovation, current faa regulation sets arbitrary speed limit in the skies.
▶ 1:30:59Sen. Budd: Companies trying to bring back supersonic flight for the first time since the concorde have to ask for special permission from the faa to operate the aircraft above mach one and can only find them in specific flight testing areas even if they do so quietly like boom. Today the U.S. has the only flying civil supersonic aircraft but china is already making clones of western airliners.
▶ 1:31:26Sen. Budd: They recently announced its own supersonic passenger plane. Unless we invent and build the next generation of aircraft here in the U.S., our leadership will pass from america to asia. Today, together with my colleague senator sheehy and telus and lee, I am introducing the supersonic aviation monitor organization act.
▶ 1:31:48Sen. Budd: This bill directs the administrator to issue or revised regulations to allow companies like boom to operate the aircraft above mach one within the united states as long as no sonic boom reaches the ground. Supersonic race has begun. It is critical america wins. My bill will ensure innovative companies like boom have the regulatory certainty they need to continue innovating. I look forward to working with my colleagues on this committee to make sure the U.S.
▶ 1:32:17Sen. Budd: Maintains its leadership in civil supersonic light. Thank you, chairman.
▶ 1:32:23Chair Cruz: Senator markey.
▶ 1:32:27Sen. Markey: Thank you. I would like to talk about the trump administration's cuts to the federal aviation administration's workforce. Over the last few months, the department of transportation has twice sent early retirement offers to its employees and then attempted to fire its probationary workers.
▶ 1:32:54Sen. Markey: In total, more than 1000 faa employees either accepted the buyout or were probationary employees that the administration tried to fire. I understand the department of transportation exempted safety-related positions from these personnel moves, but these reductions can still severely impact faa operations.
▶ 1:33:21Sen. Markey: To each of the witnesses, how many employees in your respective offices either accepted the buyout offer or were fired probationary employees?
▶ 1:33:32Ms. Baker: Right now the process of accepting the deferred resignation program is still in process so we don't have our final numbers at this point. As you mention correctly, our safety critical employees were exempted so that meant our inspectors, engineers, doctors --.
▶ 1:33:54Sen. Markey: How many have accepted?
▶ 1:33:57Ms. Baker: I don't have those numbers. Makiko if you could get me those numbers. -- Sen. markey:. If you could get me those numbers.
▶ 1:34:05Mr. Mcintosh: We are waiting on the numbers.
▶ 1:34:11Sen. Markey: What about the numbers you have?
▶ 1:34:12Mr. Mcintosh: We won't have that number until everyone has had time to accept or decline. We have not hit the deadline yet.
▶ 1:34:20Sen. Markey: What is the deadline?
▶ 1:34:26Mr. Heibeck: It depends on when each individual received the agreement. Most employees have 45-day period.
▶ 1:34:35Sen. Markey: So we are coming up pretty close to the end of the deadline.
▶ 1:34:38Mr. Heibeck: With any personnel manner, we can take that back and see -- make a determination.
▶ 1:34:49Sen. Markey: Did your offices each conduct an internal analysis or risk assessments of how these workforce cuts will impact aviation safety or safety? Did you do an internal analysis?
▶ 1:35:03Mr. Heibeck: We are watching that closely.
▶ 1:35:07Sen. Markey: Did you do an internal analysis?
▶ 1:35:09Mr. Heibeck: Yes, and we are working across geographic boundaries when we see a need to make sure we are providing the same level of service to our airport sponsors.
▶ 1:35:22Sen. Markey: Will you provide that to the committee police, the analysis you have done? Do you have the analysis?
▶ 1:35:29Mr. Heibeck: Yes. Sen. markey: please provide those analysis so we will have that. Ms. baker, can you do that? Ms.
▶ 1:35:43Baker: We've had conversations around how we will fill critical vacancies.
▶ 1:35:47Sen. Markey: Do you have data?
▶ 1:35:50Ms. Baker: We do not have final data.
▶ 1:35:52Sen. Markey: Please send that to the committee.
▶ 1:35:54Mr. Mcintosh: We have not done an internal analysis. We have been fortunate from the largest number of our individuals are safety-exempt employees. The ones that are not are going -- the majority will be needed for continuity of operations.
▶ 1:36:11Sen. Markey: Send us the analysis. What your conclusion is in terms of their role in safety. I do support cutting fraud and waste and ensuring the department is operating efficiently, but the trump administration is forcing agencies to blindly cut without regard to merit or experience. They are targeting probation employees because they are the least efficient or effective, they are targeting them because they are the easiest.
▶ 1:36:41Sen. Markey: -- they are not targeting them because they are least efficient or effective, they are targeting them because they are the easiest. Given the crash in january and the recent air traffic control outages at newark, now it's at the time to be taking chances with personnel levels. We can see the chaos, confusion growing month by month since trump has taken over.
▶ 1:37:04Sen. Markey: Finally, earlier this year, I asked secretary duffy about whether he would convene stakeholders to discuss raising the wages and benefits of airport service workers. These workers are the unsung heroes of our aviation system. I was pleased the secretary agreed to bring together for such a discussion was that Mr. heibeck, are you able to provide any uptake on the secretary's commitment to convene stakeholders on this issue?
▶ 1:37:30Mr. Heibeck: No, I'm not very comely with that issue and I will need to look at it.
▶ 1:37:37Sen. Markey: I need you to do that as quickly as you could. I appreciate that. In terms of my law last year that included my legislation with secretary vance to ban family seating fees under a bill the department of transportation is required to issue a rule prohibiting airlines from charging parents a fee to sit with their children, can any of the witnesses provide an update on that rulemaking?
▶ 1:38:05Ms. Baker: I am a mother with two kids. This one means a lot to me. This is something that is managed by the aviation consumer protection division at the department of transportation we are happy to facilitate any kind of communication on that.
▶ 1:38:17Sen. Markey: It is important for the agency to update the committee. It is a very important issue. I did that issue with vice president pence. -- vice president vance. Thank you, Mr. chair.
▶ 1:38:33Chair Cruz: Senator schmitt.
▶ 1:38:37Sen. Schmitt: Mr. mcintosh, I will start with you, and may have answered this question for numerous senators before, but I did want to get given the recent news and the concerns that are out there, about how outdated some of our systems are, can you give an update on where we are at with modernization and safety?
▶ 1:39:01Mr. Mcintosh: In regards to modernization, we continue to have several safety portfolios that are going to help us maintain safety standards. I will speak strictly for runway safety. Some of the things we're deploying is an initiative that has adsp technology for situational awareness.
▶ 1:39:27Mr. Mcintosh: Several devices being deployed to alert controllers when a runway has been closed or we have an aircraft on a runway for a prescribed amount of time that could be concerning grid we want to make sure we clear the aircraft. A third thing we have deployed recently is something called approach runway verification that alert controllers we may have a misalignment to a closed taxiway or inactive taxiway or landing a fourth one way.
▶ 1:39:55Mr. Mcintosh: We will stack these tools on top of one another to give us better awareness of what is going on. The larger question is, how are we going to fix the current infrastructure in some of the older things we have in place? We have facilities that are more than 60 years old. A lot of the technologies in this facilities are extremely antiquated. Our goal or hope is that we get bipartisan support to move senator duffy or secretary duffy's request forward.
▶ 1:40:25Mr. Mcintosh: Bring a new automation. Were we are better at our jobs and providing safety services.
▶ 1:40:32Sen. Schmitt: Let's say we did that in the next two months. How long would that take?
▶ 1:40:35Mr. Mcintosh: The agency would have a goal of deploying that within four years, sir. What I mean by four years, putting those items in place and --.
▶ 1:40:47Sen. Schmitt: Does not mean it takes four years everywhere or it is staged so laguardia is updated before lax or something like that?
▶ 1:40:56Mr. Mcintosh: We would prioritize based on needs. I do know one of the facilities as has prioritized already is philadelphia in the newark airspace based on some of the outages we have seen.
▶ 1:41:09Sen. Schmitt: Ms. baker, I want to turn to you. I do and just Mr. heibeck a question, too. As it relates to the dca tragedy. We had a hearing, chairman, thankfully convened a hearing on that. Some of the revelations were shocking about the number of near misses that happen at dca rate across the country, but specifically at dca.
▶ 1:41:37Sen. Schmitt: Where do we stand with the grounding of helicopter traffic? I know this is an army conversation, too, but what is your understanding of where we are at with that right now?
▶ 1:41:51Ms. Baker: I think I will defer to Mr. mcintosh.
▶ 1:41:52Mr. Mcintosh: In regards to with the army helicopters and the pentagon? We are having communications with dod right now to ensure compliance. Right now they are not flying out of the pentagon until we have further conversations and some of the equipment issues that we experienced the other day are fixed. As far as total grounding, that may be part of the conversation but right now we have not had to go and pursue that.
▶ 1:42:22Mr. Mcintosh: Right now the dod is working with the faa to make sure we have safety thresholds in place after the latest outage.
▶ 1:42:27Sen. Schmitt: I know that is something a lot of kidding members are focused on and I wanted to get the lay of the land. Mr. heibeck, I want to ask you about kansas city. They just had a new airport completed I think it is been very well received. I fly in and out of there occasionally. I live in the st. Louis area so lambert is top of mind always come a little more closer to home in a little more parochial. The faa approved a master play in 2023.
▶ 1:42:57Sen. Schmitt: Could you give me an update on the faa's engagement in st. Louis? St. Louis has a rich history. I grew up in the shadow of that airport. There's a lot of great opportunities for modernization and consolidation. Can you give me an idea of engagement of where things stand?
▶ 1:43:13Mr. Heibeck: A lot of exciting things happening in st. Louis, including the construction of the new fighter jet. By boeing. Our office has a great working central office has a great working relationship with the city. We are currently working with them closely to finalize the application for the airport terminal program they have applied for. Working with them to get bids.
▶ 1:43:41Mr. Heibeck: I know that will facilitate the consolidation of the two terminals as called for in the master plan. Lots of other programs that were participating in as well including deicing pad, taxiway reconstruction, and I also believe participating in a snow removal equipment building. On the horizon, they have airfield maintenance facility. I know that is in their capital plan. We are tracking very closely the many needs at st.
▶ 1:44:08Mr. Heibeck: Louis lambert international airport and have a great working relationship.
▶ 1:44:14Sen. Schmitt: It is pretty unique. It is right in the middle of metro. They have a billion-dollar runway let say is underutilized. It was built right before twa left the building. So there a lot of opportunities for growth. I know my office will be working with you and working with the airport on that to make sure that is a world-class facility. Thank you for the update.
▶ 1:44:38Mr. Heibeck: I look forward to working with you and the office.
▶ 1:44:42Chair Cruz: Senator rosen.
▶ 1:44:47Sen. Rosen: Thank you for holding the steering today. I want to thank the witnesses for testifying. I'm going to talk a little bit about airspace obstruction. This is in response to the unique airspace challenges over harry reid international airport in las vegas. I authored a section, section 744, last year's faa reauthorization, to improve the airspace obstruction analysis.
▶ 1:45:12Sen. Rosen: The law requires the faa to undertake a robust analysis of potential airspace hazards your certain airports due to factors like building and hotel construction near the runways. However, nearly a year after the reauthorization bill was signed into law, there seems to be little progress in implementing this statutory requirement. Mr.
▶ 1:45:36Sen. Rosen: Heibeck, can you provide the committee with an update about where the faa is on enforcement section 44 and will you commit to ensuring the faa follows the law and implements this critical aspect of faa reauthorization and continue to keep us informed?
▶ 1:45:52Mr. Heibeck: The office of airports is responsible for airport evaluations and I will defer to Mr. mcintosh on this particular provision.
▶ 1:46:03Mr. Mcintosh: I do know it has been slow, ma'am, but I have checked with the team. I have looked at the obstruction clearance and make sure this is done and I will say while it is slow going, they are incorporating the two statutes in the authorization bill. In regards to las vegas, that is moving forward.
▶ 1:46:25Sen. Rosen: Can we reach out to your office for a status update?
▶ 1:46:26Mr. Mcintosh: We would love to.
▶ 1:46:30Sen. Rosen: I'm also going to talk about capacity at harry reid airport. Las vegas has long been the world's leading entertainment destination. We are quickly becoming a global destination for sports as well. The city is hosting nearly 40 significant sporting events. We hosted them just last year. Of these major events bring tourism participants from all over the world. Travel on the larger jet planes as well as private chaz airports.
▶ 1:46:57Sen. Rosen: Harry reid international, we were proud to welcome over 8 million visitors in 2024 come the most in our history. We still want more visitors to the silver state. At this rate, experts expect las vegas airport to reach capacity within five years to which point the airport will not be able to handle any additional flights. Mr.
▶ 1:47:16Sen. Rosen: Heibeck, I assume you are aware that officials from clark county nevada or harry reid international airport is located have been working with the faa for years to build a new supplemental airport in southern nevada which the local economy greatly needs. I know the faa has made great progress on the issue. I would really like your commitment to keeping officials at harry reid international airport, my team directly informed. Do I have your commitment to do this?
▶ 1:47:42Mr. Heibeck: Yes, we will continue to work with the airport sponsor and engage directly with this with the regional director. We are preparing to issue a notice of intent to conduct the environmental impact statement on the southern nevada supplemental airport. I will keep your office informed.
▶ 1:48:01Sen. Rosen: Fantastic. We need it sooner rather than later. I'm going to talk about aging infrastructure at all of our airports. The average faa air traffic control facility, we all know, about 60 years old. Or than half of terminal facilities, over 40 years old. These facilities regularly operate with degraded technology systems.
▶ 1:48:26Sen. Rosen: It results in lack of accurate wind speed, direction calculations, failure of radio frequencies -- we have seen this with an congested airspace. Malfunctioning of runway lights. Terrible at night. And airports they lack functioning radar systems to track taxing planes meaning some controllers have no visual awareness of the aircraft they are directing, especially in poor weather conditions.
▶ 1:48:53Sen. Rosen: Last year's faa reauthorization requires the faa to deploy the latest airport service situational awareness technologies that track runway and aircraft vehicle movements in order to prevent collisions. We have been seeing them in the news. We want increased deployment of surveillance technology at all large and medium hub airports. Again, Mr. heibeck or whoever else thinks they can answer this in a proper way, can you provide us with an update about how the deployment and implementation of this is going?
▶ 1:49:24Mr. Heibeck: I believe you're referring to the service awareness initiative. It is going well. I know we have deployed it at over 30 sites so far and we are on target for another 70. Is that right? I will get you the numbers. We are very excited about this new technology. It uses the newest technology available to us.
▶ 1:49:49Mr. Heibeck: It allows us to deploy the state capability much more economically but also more efficiently and gets it in the hands of the controllers that really need it. We are excited about this technology. We want to get it deployed as quickly as you do. We are on target.
▶ 1:50:05Sen. Rosen: I appreciate it.
▶ 1:50:05Chair Cruz: Senator peters.
▶ 1:50:09Sen. Peters: I want to thank the witnesses for being here today. Before I get into my questions, there are two issues that are critical to michigan I want to highlight despite the fact we don't have dot leadership responsible for them present at today's hearing. The first is the implementation of key workforce provisions that I championed in the faa reauthorization like the promoting women in the aviation act and expansion of the workforce development grant program.
▶ 1:50:39Sen. Peters: Both of which I believe must be implemented to address the aviation workforce shortages that we have. The second is the central air service program, or eas. Michigan has nine rural airports. It is the most in the lower 48 states had last year's faa bill included strong bipartisan reauthorization of this program which guarantees air service to rural communities.
▶ 1:51:07Sen. Peters: Despite this, president trump's budget calls for a $308 million cut to the eas. This could rob hundreds of rural communities from access to air service. I don't think you should have to live in a big city in order to get on an airplane. I'm going to continue to fight for rural air service and against is harmful cuts to the program. Mr.
▶ 1:51:30Sen. Peters: Mcintosh, gerald ford international airport in grand rapids in michigan is the second largest airport in my state that sees well over 200 aircraft operations per day and serves as a growing part of our state, rapidly growing western area.
▶ 1:51:48Sen. Peters: Even as grand rapids serves record number of passengers, it has been stymied in its efforts to expand and modernize its 62-year-old faa air traffic control tower that the agency has not acted to replace. As you will know, grand rapids is not alone. Towers across the country are awaiting replacement. Faa's our approach -- efforts have only been further restricted by budgetary constraints.
▶ 1:52:17Sen. Peters: My question for you, secretary duffy put out a plan to address facilities backlogged at faa but he failed to include how much that will cost. My question is, do you have an estimate of what level of funding would it take to address the air traffic control tower modernization backlog specifically and additionally can you discuss how aging facilities are complicating the job of air traffic control?
▶ 1:52:42Mr. Mcintosh: I apologize, but I do not have that information for you. If it is ok, can circle back with your staff and get you the information you're looking for?
▶ 1:52:53Sen. Peters: Yes. Thank you. Mr. heibeck, have long advocated for the faa to transition away from the use of toxic pfas containing firefighting foams. The faa reauthorization act includes a provision I championed to ensure a quick transition to new non-pfas firefighting foam alongside financial resources for the airports necessary to make that transition.
▶ 1:53:22Sen. Peters: Michigan airports continue to lead the way on this issue but they need a strong partner at the faa to support the transition away from the use of pfas and protect our communities from further contamination. In order for the faa to be that partner, must have the appropriate funding, obviously, to implement that transaction or transition.
▶ 1:53:44Sen. Peters: My question to you, could you speak to the importance of providing the necessary resources for airports to make this transition and additionally what is the timeline for implementation of the pfas replacement program for airports currently? Mr. heibeck: I appreciate your support on this provision. We have made great progress in implementing the requirements of reauthorization.
▶ 1:54:07Sen. Peters: We have met the requirement in the bill to develop and publish a transition plan for the foams. That is on our website along with guidance airport sponsors. We have established the framework for the transition grant program.
▶ 1:54:31Sen. Peters: The non-pfas foam grant program, including consultation with the epa. The only thing we would need there to start awarding grants in that area would be the appropriation. Those are more operational costs, not capital costs.
▶ 1:54:54Sen. Peters: So we need a special appropriation to do things like clean equipment, to dispose of pfas foams, and to acquire non-pfas foams.
▶ 1:55:07Chair Cruz: Senator hickenlooper.
▶ 1:55:11Sen. Hickenlooper: Thank you for calling this. Thank you for your hard work. Let me start with Mr. mcintosh and I know we have talked, given asked questions about the copper wires and issues around newark. I want to take a moment and just lay out what I recognize -- it seems to make -- I fly a lot, too much, back and forth every week.
▶ 1:55:41Sen. Hickenlooper: It is not uncommon that we would get diverted and circle a couple of times. The last time I checked, we are still using tcas, traffic avoidance systems, that some of my constituents are calling and saying, are we less safe? To me in a funny way, what we are dealing with, it would happen in newark, they circle, right?
▶ 1:56:05Sen. Hickenlooper: It is not like they almost landed on somebody, they lost connection and their tcas is still working as they circle in space, they know exactly where everyone else is in the collision avoidance system is to working. Am I correct in communicating that confidence that everyone should continue flying, feel they are safe when they are flying?
▶ 1:56:25Mr. Mcintosh: Absolutely. I fly like you do -- I fly every week. I go back and forth and have the utmost confidence in our air traffic controllers and our managers and how the system works with the redundancies put in place.
▶ 1:56:43Sen. Hickenlooper: Obviously, the point of this hearing as we have a lot of infrastructure that needs to be upgraded. We have a lot of work to do. You guys should be a bc psychoanalyst about whether you really want these jobs are not given the restrictions on funding these days. There's a lot to be done. I want to emphasize the system is safe. People should get on planes. It's such a crucial part of our economy.
▶ 1:57:11Sen. Hickenlooper: The people suddenly decide they are not going to fly, I feel uncertain about flying, the entire economy slows down.
▶ 1:57:17Mr. Mcintosh: Yes, sir, it does. From an air traffic controllers perspective, we love the job. What we really want is better equipment to go along with it. That is really what it comes down to. A lot of our equipment is antiquated. The faa has been known as having the safest and most efficient airspace in the world, but we need to advance our systems to ensure we keep that standard.
▶ 1:57:42Sen. Hickenlooper: I agree. I want to get specific. We have some rural communities like northern colorado regional airport in fort collins working to be able to do their traffic control without a controller. The state of colorado, northern colorado regional airport, had made investments in remote tower technology. These investments are voting to be realized because of ongoing testing at the faa's technology center in new jersey. Can we get an update on that? Where are we? How quickly can we get it approved?
▶ 1:58:12Mr. Mcintosh: I'm excited about the technology. We do have a vendor at the atlantic city at the tech center. They are doing a safety case in the business case now. The faa is ready to validate that safety case, credential that system. As soon as that occurs, the airports will be able to go and purchase that system. I got an update just yesterday and I believe they plan on doing an industry day sometime this summer for people to come and take a look at the new technology out there.
▶ 1:58:43Mr. Mcintosh: With how this works. It is an incredible --. Simple hickenlooper the sense of urgency --
▶ 1:58:53Sen. Hickenlooper: A sense of urgency. Mr. heibeck come as you know, many regional airports are the single most important connectivity hub to the rest of their state or the rest of the country. We work closely with senator fischer to enact the sustainable regional air travel as part of the reauthorization 2024 as a bipartisan bill that commissions a federal study that will be published next month to examine those factors that impact air service to regional airports including pilot availability,
▶ 1:59:24Sen. Hickenlooper: Air traffic control systems -- we talked about -- and other issues. Can you describe what you think are the most pressing can you describe the most pressing issues facing regional airports today, because they're such a huge part of not just colorado, every western state and almost every state?
▶ 1:59:42Mr. Heibeck: Yes, senator, the reauthorization act seeks to provide or expand the types of funding under the airport improvement program to fund critical safety infrastructure development projects at small and rural airports.
▶ 2:00:02Mr. Heibeck: The funding challenges continue to persist there, but the reauthorization act does a good job making changes to the small airport fund and other areas to focus on non-hub airports and non-primary airports. One example is the state apportionment is expended there and that will help with funding challenges of the small airport.
▶ 2:00:25Sen. Hickenlooper: Great. Thank you again. I've just Ms. baker, amount of time, but I have questions I will submit in written form.
▶ 2:00:35Chair Cruz: Thank you. Ranking member cantwell.
▶ 2:00:38Sen. Cantwell: Thank you, Mr. chairman. You said there is great bipartisan support on working on dca on the problems of dca, and is very true, and we remain committed to understanding what's transpired and continuing to get answers. Senator moran might've mentioned we are going to do a roundtable to get further information. Mr.
▶ 2:01:05Sen. Cantwell: Mcintosh, on this point -- first of all, I wish the acting administrator was here. I'm not sure why he is not here. Having somebody who is in charge of the operations and answering to that is very important. The ntsb report was quite damning with a lot of information about close calls beyond the accident that happened.
▶ 2:01:27Sen. Cantwell: It begs the question about the ato process in place, the safety risk management system that is supposed to be there. Post the accident we have had this other incident. Why is your system not working? What is the faa's oversight of this not working?
▶ 2:01:53Mr. Mcintosh: Thank you for the question, senator cantwell. The sms process the ato utilizes is quite robust. We have independent reviews from different levels of the organization to ensure we don't have any human biases. What I mean by that is we are required to review all events, whether -- at all of our faa facilities. Any significant event is required to be entered into a mandatory report and subsequent investigation --
▶ 2:02:22Sen. Cantwell: Are you saying nobody's investigating this? I have to get through about five issues here. If you have all the alarms going off and you have all about oversight and a safety risk management system but nobody read the data and nobody said anything, we have asked this of the faa. I want an answer from the acting prime minister and I'm sure he promised me an answer which I don't have, which is what is your process for saying this is a problem and we're going to put a stop to it?
▶ 2:02:52Sen. Cantwell: I think the answer right now is oh no, I will call air traffic controllers. That is not the answer. The answer is this is too big of a risk and we are not going to continue to do this and we will set better separations and more standards, and you haven't done that. Question number one. All right, newark. There's reports in the press that there were only three people in the tower is there a requirement that there should be seven people in the tower?
▶ 2:03:19Sen. Cantwell: Dca here, isn't it seven air traffic controllers to staff a tower like either of the showers? --towers?
▶ 2:03:29Mr. Mcintosh: Are you speaking to philadelphia tower or your --
▶ 2:03:33Sen. Cantwell: Either.
▶ 2:03:35Mr. Mcintosh: We have basic guidelines.
▶ 2:03:37Sen. Cantwell: Which is what?
▶ 2:03:41Mr. Mcintosh: Depends on facility and how many positions open. You are aware we have critical staffing shortages --
▶ 2:03:46Sen. Cantwell: I can tell you how hard I worked together 3000 increase and I would've gotten more. What I am pinpointing is if "the new york post" is wrong -- I don't know if they are -- but if your number is seven and you don't have seven, what is the faa doing every day to monitor the situation and say this is a problem? This is not I'm going to call the head of the air traffic controllers union. This is what is the faa going to do to fix the system.
▶ 2:04:14Sen. Cantwell: You're going to hear a rejoining theme through my questions. This is about the agency playing the aggressive role we need to play.
▶ 2:04:23Mr. Mcintosh: Yes, ma'am, and thank you for the question, I need to address it. When we have staffing shortages and we cannot open positions, we put in initiatives to slope the -- slow the air traffic down. We put in a ground delay program to keep traffic manageable. When we have too much volume can we put in the ground delay program --
▶ 2:04:45Sen. Cantwell: You had only three people in that tower controlling the is based?
▶ 2:04:49Mr. Mcintosh: For one hour we did go down to that number and we put in the appropriate traffic management initiative to keep things safe.
▶ 2:04:57Sen. Cantwell: Ok, why did we go from seven, a requirement, to three? I'm for safety first for sure, but why is it that we are now down from seven, basically what you think you need, down to three?
▶ 2:05:12Mr. Mcintosh: It comes down to a staffing shortage, ma'am. We did lose controllers in the area due to sick leave that was unscheduled or other leave that was not scheduled. When those things happen, ma'am, we have to keep things safe and we put in the appropriate traffic management initiatives to keep the flying public safe and make sure we could controllers in a position to be successful.
▶ 2:05:35Sen. Cantwell: I definitely think -- yeah, I would not have been firing the safety oversight team that we had as part of our faa safety bill that we implemented. These are people that help us in a very big picture level. I certainly would not have cut back on staffing in general at the faa. I think it is a time when we need people to be doing their job. I need to return to the oda. I sent you a letter and finally got a response last night.
▶ 2:06:05Sen. Cantwell: I don't think it is satisfactory. But what is it -- this process of the faa and the manufacturer working together, what is the criteria that you are going to look for in an oda agreement related to aviation manufacturing?
▶ 2:06:28Ms. Baker: Thank you for the question, and thank you for your patience in the response. We are looking for criteria that the oda is performing its functions. So how is it performing, is in meeting the requirements that we would hold. Oda members are performing work that the faa would perform, so we want to make sure they are performing to the same high standard.
▶ 2:06:56Ms. Baker: We want to ensure that incidents of undue influence or undue pressure are minimized, and when they do occur, they are properly researched and corrective action s are put in place. We are looking for boeing to continue the limitation of the safety management system.
▶ 2:07:15Sen. Cantwell: Management?
▶ 2:07:17Ms. Baker: Excuse me?
▶ 2:07:19Sen. Cantwell: Mandatory. Mandatory safety management system. It is not you got one and decide to make it voluntary. There is a difference. I'm a little concern to your general counsel is confused by this. He was confused by he was confused bbefore and let them off the hook. It is mandatory --
▶ 2:07:40Ms. Baker: Part five sms.
▶ 2:07:44Sen. Cantwell: What is it on the employee input -- what are you looking for? Part of the issue was intimidation by employees speaking up and hte faa not backing them up. What is it you want to see in the oda that would say, yes, I understand that the company is listening to the input from the employees?
▶ 2:08:12Sen. Cantwell: When we asked the former administrator whitaker if the faa should have some foresight into that, said yes. We want to see an feedback system that the faa has some access to.
▶ 2:08:22Ms. Baker: In addition to -- administrator whitaker did invite the boeing employees to leverage the faa hotline. We did see an uptick in that. We saw employees directly communicate with the faa. We have inspectors on the floor every day in the factories having direct interaction with the workforce and inviting the workforce to interact with them, as well as what I mentioned with the under pressure in the oda.
▶ 2:08:53Ms. Baker: We have assigned direct advisors to the oda members to have someone within faahey can reach out to directly, and we monitor any reports of undue pressure in the associated investigations.
▶ 2:09:06Sen. Cantwell: I would like it if you could address this in a written response. What is it that you think the faa believes makes for the right oda agreement related to the employee feedback? W this committee receives lots of whistleblower testimony, the committee receives lots of input about how the employees were bringing up issues and the faa wasn't supporting them.
▶ 2:09:33Sen. Cantwell: We want a clear process with the faa, but the faa is knowledgeable, not after the fact. We are not hoodwinked when it comes to the mcas system. There were people raising questions about mcas all the way along, very senior people. It would've been interesting point if that hadn't surfaced to the faa at that point in time, at least an alarm bell would've gone off, better pay attention to this, this is a bigger seachange than we think.
▶ 2:10:03Sen. Cantwell: Correct?
▶ 2:10:04Ms. Baker: So we are -- part of the bill itself talked about how we are going to improve communication during the certification process, not just during the production process. Some of the provisions will facilitate that as well.
▶ 2:10:20Sen. Cantwell: Please provide in written what is it you're going to expect for a process for certifying a new oda, what is it you are looking for to make sure that employee input when they are identifying problems that they are concerned about, how the faa knows about that and physically gets it on -- basically gets it on your radar screen that this is something the engineering staff things you should pay attention to thank you, Mr. chairman.
▶ 2:10:47Chair Cruz: Thank you. Senator lujan.
▶ 2:10:52Sen. Lujan: We are seeing daily reports of issues that new york liberty international airport, whether it is radar, traffic control issues due to outages and short staffing or the most recent ground delay due to construction. These reports are deeply troubling and require immediate attention. As you know right now, there are shortages in staffing not just at newark, but across the country, forcing air traffic controllers to work intensive schedules and longer hours.
▶ 2:11:21Sen. Lujan: That should raise a concern to everyone for what is happening in our skies. We do not take care of our air traffic controllers, it puts the safety and efficiency of aviation at risk. The most recent faa reauthorization included important provisions to improve the health of our air traffic control systems.
▶ 2:11:42Sen. Lujan: I was proud to be part of such pieces, two specifically in the final reauthorization package, the air traffic controllers hiring act and the workforce transparency act. Both seek to improve the safety and staffing standards to ensure adequate numbers of fully qualified controllers. While secretary duffy has that he is committed to fixing these issues, I would like to hear from you all as well. Mr.
▶ 2:12:08Sen. Lujan: Mcintosh, do you support efforts to ensure the faa is hiring and training as many controllers as are needed each year to address existing shortages?
▶ 2:12:18Mr. Mcintosh: Senator lujan, I appreciate the question. As a former controller that was in the military and the faa and manager who had to oversee having enough staffing to ensure we are able to do our job, I 100% support secretary duffy's supercharged hiring to maximize not just our hiring of faa controllers over the next four or five years, but ensuring they come through the academy at a quick pace, that they go -- that they are incentivized to recruit, meaning there is a 30%
▶ 2:12:49Mr. Mcintosh: Pay bump for academy graduates, as well as retention efforts he put forward as well. Yes but the plan forward. It is the faa in the air traffic organization's job to put that forward but yes, I wholeheartedly support the initiative.
▶ 2:13:08Sen. Lujan: I appreciate that, sir. What is the status of the workgroup needed to determine the number of air traffic control is needed?
▶ 2:13:17Mr. Mcintosh: It has been in limited by the reauthorization bill.
▶ 2:13:21Sen. Lujan: What else can the faa do?
▶ 2:13:24Mr. Mcintosh: Secretary duffy has laid out the plan and now it is up to the faa to execute the plan.
▶ 2:13:30Sen. Lujan: So with your expertise I hope you're advising the secretary. You are the one that is on this. I served with the secretary, I know him. Is there anything lacking or is that plan 100% complete?
▶ 2:13:44Mr. Mcintosh: What we are committed to do or what I need from my vantage point, as long as we hire those numbers, which he is committed to, and we put through the throughput, has invested in our tower simulator systems. We have ensured that will be in place for the real authorization bill as well. We need to ensure that we execute at the facility level to make sure that we have certification so we have enough people to work.
▶ 2:14:12Mr. Mcintosh: That is going to be the number one cure to one -- are fatigue issues that we see and ensuring we have enough people to work the sectors.
▶ 2:14:22Sen. Lujan: Appreciate that, sir. Ms. baker, another thing I jevity is to address safety and educational materials. Can you tell me what progress the faa is made to initiate the call to action?
▶ 2:14:38Ms. Baker: Absolutely. We are having a ramp safety called action safety summit tomorrow, where we are going to bring together air carriers, employees, along with faa employees to identify best practices, areas of improvement, and make suggestions about what we can do to improve safety.
▶ 2:15:00Sen. Lujan: When do you expect to submit your findings and recommendations to congress?
▶ 2:15:07Ms. Baker: Shortly thereafter.
▶ 2:15:09Sen. Lujan: A week, two weeks, a month, a year?
▶ 2:15:16Ms. Baker: It will probably take more than a couple weeks, we will want to diligence.
▶ 2:15:20Sen. Lujan: Before august?
▶ 2:15:23Ms. Baker: We will work on it over the summer.
▶ 2:15:25Sen. Lujan: Before december?
▶ 2:15:28Ms. Baker: We will work on it over the summer.
▶ 2:15:31Sen. Lujan: You said shortly thereafter.
▶ 2:15:35Ms. Baker: Without knowing what will be discussed tomorrow, it is hard to estimate, but we will be happy to get back to you --
▶ 2:15:42Sen. Lujan: I'm sorry to push, Ms. baker, but is it fair to say no more than two years?
▶ 2:15:48Ms. Baker: Yes, absolutely.
▶ 2:15:51Sen. Lujan: That is a timeline we can work with. The faa was directed to collaborate with the national academies of science, engineering, and medicine on a 12-month-long study of unsafe cabinet temperatures and conditions. On january 7 the faa give an update saying they met nasem and will "finalize an agreement after defining the scope." what is the status of this research effort?
▶ 2:16:17Ms. Baker: We are working with them right now.
▶ 2:16:18Sen. Lujan: Do you think more should be done on unsafe temperatures in kevin's?-- c abins?
▶ 2:16:25Ms. Baker: I believe unsafe temperatures in cabins are definitely unpleasant. I am looking forward to the recommendations we get so we can identify what the next steps are.
▶ 2:16:35Sen. Lujan: Is it fair to say that they are more than unpleasant and can cause someone a health problem or condition?
▶ 2:16:42Ms. Baker: I think nasem will identify what the health challenges will be good Sen.
▶ 2:16:47Lujan: I don't know if you have been on a flight when he gets uncomfortable like that, but people react uncomfortably and after call for physicians and volunteers. I would say it is more than uncomfortable would be my response.
▶ 2:16:59Ms. Baker: I was a crewmember for four years so I understand. It can be very uncomfortable .
▶ 2:17:06Sen. Lujan: I think it can be deadly. More than uncomfortable -- I can put a jacket on and fan myself with one of the pamphlets. It can be outright interest -- Ms. bak -- outright dangerous --
▶ 2:17:21Ms. Baker: We look forward to the report from the national academies.
▶ 2:17:25Sen. Lujan: Do we agree that it is more than uncomfortable?
▶ 2:17:28Ms. Baker: We look forward to the report.
▶ 2:17:31Sen. Lujan: Thank you, Mr. chairman.
▶ 2:17:34Chair Cruz: Senator fetterman.
▶ 2:17:38Sen. Fetterman: Thank you, Mr. chairman. Hi. Hello, everybody. You need to be said more, more, flying in america is incredibly safe. It is a good lycee. I and most of my colleague -- it is incredibly safe. I and most of my colleagues, I spent 46, 40 seven weeks out of 52 flying. My plane was in that airspace half an hour or so earlier before that tragedy in dca.
▶ 2:18:08Sen. Fetterman: That was the first accident in quite a while. So I really want to remind people that it is still but we safe, and I refuse to play into the blame, this guy, other things. I want to make sure it is bipartisan, we want to make flying safer but not turning into a finger pointing thing.
▶ 2:18:34Sen. Fetterman: For me, we have constantly heard there is a lot of shortage of air traffic controllers, and we know that sometimes it might be difficult for the faa meet their stepping -- staffing goals. We have what I would describe the harvard of air traffic control schools in beaver county in my state, which plays a usual in training the next generation of air traffic controllers. Mr.
▶ 2:19:00Sen. Fetterman: Mcintosh, can you speak to the importance of training schools like the ones I addressed and the air-traffic controller shortage?
▶ 2:19:09Mr. Mcintosh: Thank you for the affirmation that it is still safe to fly. It is extremely safe to fly. Thank you for that. In regards to schools that offer programs to be an air traffic controller, 100% agree that these schools are essential for continued pipeline.
▶ 2:19:31Mr. Mcintosh: Whether it is a collegiate-trained initiative or the enhanced collegiate training initiative, if this offers additional people into the training pipeline, that is pivotal for us to increase our candidate pool as well as ensuring that we have enough controllers.
▶ 2:19:47Sen. Fetterman: So are you able to commit -- you're going to support these cancer programs. Celexa -- support these kinds of programs. It makes a lot of sense.
▶ 2:19:59Mr. Mcintosh: Yes, senator.
▶ 2:20:02Sen. Fetterman: Essential air service is a lifeline in pennsylvania, and it brings smaller communities that otherwise wouldn't have those kind of things. My state we have places like altoona, johnstown, or lancaster, and I'm not sure why we would have any kind of budget cuts that might impact these kinds of program up to 15%. Mr.
▶ 2:20:24Sen. Fetterman: Heibeck, are we able to make that point to the administration, just how important that is to make these very smart investments, in my opinion, into the small airports, because ironically it is not about politics, but all of those three communities that I referenced in red counties. Flying should be safer, and it is bipartisan.
▶ 2:20:48Sen. Fetterman: I honestly -- I think these kinds of investments are just smart, and that is economic development. If you address that might be possible for those cuts.
▶ 2:21:01Mr. Heibeck: , yes senator fetterman. As a fellow pennsylvanian, I share your interest in small rural airports in pennsylvania. We make significant investments in small airports through our small airport fund and other grant programs. Essential air service program is administered by the department of transportation. And I'm happy to take your message back to our colleagues.
▶ 2:21:28Sen. Fetterman: Well, yeah, no, I had the pleasure of meeting with the head of the lancaster airport. They want to make these kinds of upgrades and I fully support that. , I grew up in new york so I know how close that -- I grew up in york, so I know how close that area, it's an incredible amenity. It's about serving open civilians to have access to travel. I cede back to the chair. Thank you will.
▶ 2:22:00Sen. Fetterman: -- thank you all.
▶ 2:22:01Chair Cruz: Senator blunt rochester.
▶ 2:22:05Sen. Blunt Rochester: Thank you, Mr. chairman, and thank you to the witnesses. Most of my colleagues have noted that we are at a critical juncture for aviation safety, for the sake of our families, constituents, the flying public. We must ensure that the faa is equipped with every tool necessary to meet the mission to provide the safest, most efficient aerospace system in the world.
▶ 2:22:32Sen. Blunt Rochester: We know that we have seen some recent catastrophic incidents and a near-misses, and they have underscore the urgency of strengthening oversight, improving coordination, and abetting equipment, including the faa's -- updating equipment, including the faa's I.t. Systems. We cannot ignore that there are other significant variables that drive the crisis like the lack of a robust and well supported aviation workforce.
▶ 2:23:02Sen. Blunt Rochester: I just left another hearing where one of the nominees said that their son is now an air traffic controller. That was some good news to hear. As the former secretary of labor in the state of delaware, I also was head of state personnel, and I know that a well prepared workforce is really the lifeblood of any organization.
▶ 2:23:28Sen. Blunt Rochester: I was pleased to see the inclusion of the aviation workforce development provision in the reauthorization. I wanted to ask some questions about workforce planning. We know that we have an issue beyond air-traffic controllers and aviation safety inspectors. I was curious if you could talk a little bit about your workforce planning.
▶ 2:23:54Sen. Blunt Rochester: I know in your testimony it says we are reviewing our hiring, training, and replacement processes, as well as the faa academy withdrawals and failures to ensure selection methods effectively identify candidates best suited for control controller profession.
▶ 2:24:12Sen. Blunt Rochester: Can you talk to me about what you are seeing in terms of people who are retiring, designing, -- resigning, where are your shortfalls, where are the areas where you need the help?
▶ 2:24:28Mr. Mcintosh: Thank you for the question -- can I take this one? As far as recruitment for the best and brightest, right now our academy success rate is not where we would like it to be. We would like it to be much higher. Quite honestly, if we are watching him 35% or 30%, we need to do better. We need people in the field to do that.
▶ 2:24:57Mr. Mcintosh: I believe what you are referring to is an air-traffic skills assessment, basically judges somebody's cognitive skills and their ability to multitask as an air traffic controller. We want to review that as a test to make sure it is identifying the right candidate so they have I have a mobility of success. It does take time to hire, select, and go through the medical process and security process.
▶ 2:25:21Mr. Mcintosh: Though secretary duffy has done some things to speed that along, we want to make sure those selections have a higher rate of success. If we were able to gain another 200 or 300 of those candidates and put them in the air-traffic system, that would help us on staffing shortfalls. Speaking with my friends who are my age, we went through training together at field facilities. They still love the job. They love being an air traffic controller.
▶ 2:25:50Mr. Mcintosh: There big thing right now is we need more staffing because they are getting tired. I think we owe them a better quality of life. I do feel that the new numbers that without partnership with -- that we have implemented is definitely going to help that. We are waiting for the transportation research board to provide their recommendations for the staffing model. When that is implemented, we will be in a better place.
▶ 2:26:16Mr. Mcintosh: With the new crwg numbers, that will bridge the shortfall and we are putting people in the pipeline to give those controllers and managers a better quality of life I'm speaking to.
▶ 2:26:26Sen. Blunt Rochester: Also in your testimony you talked about leveraging partnerships with approved colleges and universities. Delaware state university has an incredible aviation program. Can you talk to us about who you are leveraging these partnerships with?
▶ 2:26:41Mr. Mcintosh: Right now we are going to leverage and partner with any university that has interest in the collegiate training initiative. If they want to take it one step further into what we call the enhanced collegiate training initiative, that is where they have simulation training and enough training that would essentially equal to what they would get at our the faa academy. If colleges are wishing to do that, we will assess. If they pass the standards, we will accredit them.
▶ 2:27:10Mr. Mcintosh: Students who go through this program will no longer have to go through the academy. If they receive the necessary medical clearance and security clearance, they bypass the academy in their place in the faa facility.
▶ 2:27:26Sen. Blunt Rochester: For the record, questions for the record -- number one, would love to understand what actual -- what are the partnerships. We would love to see the list of the partnerships. Secondly, would love to follow up with the program that we have at delaware state university. It is an aviation program which is really, really important.
▶ 2:27:53Sen. Blunt Rochester: Lastly, understand a little bit more wife -- how are you getting them in the door, what other things getting them. You mentioned financial incentives, but more creative things you are doing. Would love to follow up with you on the workforce aspect of it as well. Thank you, Mr. chairman, for your patience, and I yield back.
▶ 2:28:12Chair Cruz: One final question and I'm going to wrap up. Airspace around austin burks of international airport has been impacted by a shortage of traffic and strollers -- air-traffic controllers the faa bill had several provisions looking to improve staffing, and get myself received a report that austin bergstrom airport has 33 air-traffic control as well the faa recommends it has 60 controllers. I'm concerned about the impact this will have on texas airspace.
▶ 2:28:43Chair Cruz: Mr. mcintosh, how is the faa air traffic organization working to fix air-traffic control staffing issues across the country, including specifically austin bergstrom airport?
▶ 2:28:54Mr. Mcintosh: Thank you for the question, senator cruz. As you can probably tell, austin is near and dear to my heart. I know I spoke about how we are fixing the broader issue of fixing the controller staffing that we have. Through supercharged hiring and Mr. duffy has started. To answer your question, the faa, along with our naca partners, were proactive increasing the numbers at austin.
▶ 2:29:26Mr. Mcintosh: The cpc numbers at austin was 42. To your point, we realized that the traffic was growing. We proactively raised their numbers to 60, well ahead of the limitation. When you -- well ahead of the implementation. When you say 33 out of 42, that doesn't sound so bad. 33 out of 60 sounds terrible.
▶ 2:29:52Mr. Mcintosh: That is where I want to gauge growth in cbc's versus percentages, because that is where we have to bridge the gap. By proactively increasing the number, senator, what that allowed us to do was drive more trainees into that facility, and that was the goal.
▶ 2:30:08Chair Cruz: We have got of a closing on the floor. Thank you for that answer. I want to ask you to make it a priority to make sure that the air-traffic controllers are there in austin. I want to thank each of the witnesses for your testimony. Senators will have until the close of business on wednesday, may 21, to submit questions for the record. And actually I'm not going to close it out, I'm going to hand it over to senator sheehy to ask as many questions as he likes and then close it out, but I'm going to run and go vote.
▶ 2:30:40Chair Cruz: Congratulations can Mr. chairman.
▶ 2:30:41Sen. Sheehy: Thank you, Mr. chairman. We are both junior senators from our state so when we are chairmen, it is a big event. Thank you for the work you do at the faa. I'm a lifelong pilot and aviation business owner and instructor.
▶ 2:30:59Sen. Sheehy: I have long told folks that the faa is one of the beacons of light in the federal government could sometimes dealing with the federal government can be highly frustrating, but I've always felt that the faa was a competent organization and customer friendly for the most part. But we all know that, frankly, through no fault of your own, through the fault of this great legislative body, for decades on end we have not addressed these sclerotic issues that we have been talking about for decades.
▶ 2:31:26Sen. Sheehy: As many of you alluded to in your statements. Unfortunately, events like the crash in 2009 and the D.C. disaster a couple months ago, that is what the public sees and what the public feels. Most of us know that those events, although the final seconds are caused by something, mechanical failure, human error, normally it is organizational failures that are built up over years and years that start that accident change in the beginning.
▶ 2:31:55Sen. Sheehy: No one knows that better than current the faa folks like yourself and our friends at the ntsb. Many of these stressors that we are all feeling every day, whether it is outdated air-traffic control systems, not enough pilots, not enough faa designated pilot examiners and representatives, you name it, there is a shortage in every key manpower category that we need to stay innovative and aviation.
▶ 2:32:22Sen. Sheehy: One of my biggest concerns is as the mother and father for aviation, america is the birthplace for aviation aerospace, these challenges we are facing across the board are driving aviation innovation to other parts of the world.
▶ 2:32:39Sen. Sheehy: Part 23, would doesn't fall necessarily under your purview directly, but part 23 has been a challenge to certified a clean sheet aircraft for so long that we are seeing places like brazil and asia and europe actually become the hotbeds for next-generation aviation development. That should concern us all, because if we are not the leaders of aviation, somebody else is, and that is bad for all of us.
▶ 2:33:04Sen. Sheehy: Specifically here, I don't have a lot of local questions from although I have a couple one tena just a couple montana- specific questions good anytime there is been the effort to do the best reallocation of the faa, which does involve some private sector partnership, the term "preposition" is -- " privatization" is plastered over every billboard and hearing and it is killed by a mob who do not want privatization to happen.
▶ 2:33:32Sen. Sheehy: Of course there is a role for the government to always play in this, but how can we leverage private industry to hasten our upgrades, which we know have been coming for decades, that should have happened years ago -- how do we use private industry to make sure local airports, be they regional or large commercial facilities, are being upgraded and managed properly, and how do we leverage private funders to fix our dire staffing shortages like taking the controller population we have in the military and helping them more quickly transition to civilian control?
▶ 2:34:03Sen. Sheehy: No particular individual, but I would like to hear your ideas specifically on how we leverage private industry to hasten solutions to problems.
▶ 2:34:13Mr. Mcintosh: I will speak to partnering with our military partners and having air-traffic controllers, something we 100% agree with and something we have signed up to do. Senator, I was a former military controller and I was a benefactor of being hired to guard the by the faa. I do not have to go to the faa academy based on my credentials. I was able to go straight to an faa facility.
▶ 2:34:37Mr. Mcintosh: We are partnering with the military and looking at some of their simulations at the air force base to reese our throughput at the academy. That is one of the things we are looking at to help increase some of the staffing shortages. I definitely feel that partnering with our dod partners is something we can leverage.
▶ 2:34:54Ms. Baker: Likewise in aviation safety, we have relationships with military and trying to facilitate paths to bring folks who bring skills from the military to commercial aviation, whether it is through restricted atp with military credits, programs exploring right now about how do we transition military mechanics to get into the civilian system more easily. There is definitely a role there.
▶ 2:35:21Ms. Baker: I think I'm private partnerships, the fact that there is so much innovation happening in aviation, the opportunity for us to partner with the aviation innovators on training, we do what we call aviation skills enhancement without engineering where our engineers can go to these new manufacturing's and a new dish new manufacturers -- new manufacturers and new aircraft designers so we can learn what they are doing and how they're doing it. That is a great opportunity for us.
▶ 2:35:50Ms. Baker: And as we are developing the new regulatory standards and guidance, working with the industry via formalized structure like a committees or informal structures like industry days helps us learn more rapidly and understand where the system is going and how to manage the risks presenting themselves in the system. There is a great will for partnership with the industry.
▶ 2:36:11Sen. Sheehy: Safety has to be paramount. Safety have to work hand-in-hand with the ability to operate effectively. You can safety anything to death. You can find a reason not to fly. If you want to be safe, don't fly. Don't
▶ 2:36:27Doms. Baker: Don't fly.
▶ 2:36:28Sen. Sheehy: We are told safety warble today, but ultimately we have to get to where we are going. We have to fight, that is the death we have to fly -- we have to fly, that is the point of the aerospace system. I don't want to pile on and speak ill of what we have built because it is incredible system, but it is straining under itself.
▶ 2:36:50Sen. Sheehy: We have to make sure we are evolving into after the crash in 2009, this body -- I was a part of it that, of course -- but past a law for the 50-hour pilot rule. Anyone know what the hours were for the terrible event? 3,250.
▶ 2:37:16Sen. Sheehy: The fact that they had in one case over double the amount of hours that the new law instituted and nothing to do with a accident I think it is very important for you all to make very clear, candid responses to us so we don't make new laws that don't help the problem, that makes it worse.
▶ 2:37:33Sen. Sheehy: Within the agency recently, the ability to do experimental aircraft operations used to be delegated to dar's, and recently that was changed to where they have to sign off on the experimental certificate on aircraft. On the service that seems logical we are adding another safety barrier, but that is adding more bureaucracy to a process -- that is a perfect example of why folks want to innovate elsewhere.
▶ 2:38:04Sen. Sheehy: We are making the application process to experiment with new aviation technologies order to do here. And that's a small example, but I think it is an indicator of at times the bureaucracy getting in the way of common sense. Specifically for atc systems, we hear a lot about radars in copper wire.
▶ 2:38:27Sen. Sheehy: How do we quickly evaluate and implement more advanced and moderate and in many cases more accurate satellite-based capability, automated flight, where we can open our flight levels and c -- flight apps and see aircraft moving in real-time and precision and start injecting that into real-time data sharing with aircraft? We see that in europe now were they, can be stepped on they can be garbled, they could meet Ms. readback.
▶ 2:38:57Sen. Sheehy: When the data is sent to the aircraft, it is much harder to have an error based on that. How do we adopt those things quickly in americanand is more private sector involvement the answer?
▶ 2:39:11Mr. Mcintosh: In regard to issuing the command versus the pilot, part of next in technology, that has been implement it in all 20 centers. We are expecting full operations capability within a year. That is a conservative as debit. -- that is a conservative estimate. We are getting good feedback.
▶ 2:39:42Mr. Mcintosh: We also have our ability to upload clearances aircraft at the gates with doing that without doing -- without doing a double transmission. These technologies you are seeing, while it is taking a long time to be implement it, is coming to fruition.
▶ 2:39:57Sen. Sheehy: Great. Any other comments on those? Finally when I say is some of our rural airports -- the senator from alaska has a unique position -- but in montana where I am from, we have airports where the most critical service they provide is medevac, where they can be a multiple-hours drive from a hospital.
▶ 2:40:25Sen. Sheehy: Our ability to get aircraft in there and get them to a facilities dependent on their access to air. In limiting our new gps approaches to these -- it depends on radar capability of some regional airports like in helena, one of two airports in the country that does not have radar service.
▶ 2:40:50Sen. Sheehy: I agree we have to prioritize the credibly congested areas like dca and a new work and others. But for many of our rural communities this is keep communities this is keey. I asked for general open-mindedness, sometimes open-mindedness and unconventional thinking don't go hand-in-hand with safety in the traditional sense.
▶ 2:41:13Sen. Sheehy: The truth is we have to start reimagining how the faa can operate in the 21st century, and that means looking at our -- thinking of how they fit better in the broader envelope of aviation from uas to new types of vehicles that challenge our existing systems in different ways. Thanks for your testimony. I appreciate you taking the time. Thanks for all the work you are doing.
▶ 2:41:39Mr. Mcintosh: Thank you, senator.
▶ 2:41:42Sen. Sheehy: All right, we will close of the hearing. Senators have until the close of business may 21 judgment questions to the record. This concludes today's hearing. The committee stands adjourned. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap.org]