The Friedman Files

What’s going on at the FAA?  That’s the question, again, after today’s report of supervisors misclassifying error at the DFW air traffic control facility. 

The report is disturbing for two reasons.  First, it’s clearly worrisome that the errors happened.  No one who flies wants to hear about cases of planes coming too close together in the sky.   But, the fact that the errors may have been intentionally concealed is even more concerning because that prevents the system from fixing itself.  

There’s no way that the higher ups in the FAA, or Congress can act to address a problem if the existence of that problem is being hidden from view.  The entire goal of an error reporting system is to identify on-going problems so they can be addressed. 

This is the third time in recent weeks that we’ve seen a breakdown in communication inside the FAA.   Fist, the agency’s inspectors failed to report problems at Southwest Airlines.  Then, maintenance issues at other airlines were not addressed until planes were grounded and hundreds of thousands of travelers were inconvenienced.  All of this leaves us to wonder if bad relationships and a lack of communication between front line employees and FAA management are putting the public at risk.

Controllers at DFW have long argued that errors are occurring because of a lack of staff.  The FAA has argued in return that the controllers are simply complaining because they want a new contract.  The truth is, the facility involved in these errors is now staffed at levels below the FAA’s own minimum numbers (when you look at the number of fully certified controllers on staff). 

Statistically, flying is now as safe as it has ever been.  But today’s story still looks like one more wake-up call for an agency where controllers and management are battling each other and inspectors and management battling each other instead of focusing on why the FAA was created in the first place.