Latest news with #ReauthorizationActof2024
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Live: Aviation industry leaders talk FAA overhaul at House hearing
(NewsNation) — Aviation industry stakeholders spoke before a House subcommittee on Wednesday about the first year under the Federal Aviation Administration's latest framework. The Reauthorization Act of 2024, signed into law last May, effectively outlined the modernization of the national airspace system, ordered higher air traffic control hiring limits and set a five-year funding plan for the administration and its programs — up to $105.5 billion, a 9% increase from the previous law. Trump admin pushes for final trade offers as tariff pause nears end The FAA has faced fierce criticism amid a perceived increase in aviation incidents, air traffic control staffing shortages, firings from the Trump administration and widespread tech issues. Ranking member Rep. Steve Cohen, D-Tenn., said in his opening statement that the FAA needs to focus on regulation and safety, adding that, 'unfortunately, the administration has moved swiftly in the wrong direction.' Prisons ordered to continue gender-affirming care for trans inmates Cohen said White House officials 'eliminated a lot of the people we needed,' and said it's critical to reverse course on some of the firings doled out in the first months of Trump's second term. Sara Nelson, Association of Flight Attendants CWA, AFL-CIO's international president, deemed the staffing cuts as 'simply unacceptable.' Edward Bolen, National Business Aviation Association president and CEO, praised the reauthorization law's goals but acknowledged that those goals have not been fully recognized, one year later. 'I think what we are seeing is that there are parts of that bill that are being moved out on, and moved out quickly … I think all of us need to commit to making sure that great bill is being implemented,' he said. Trump tax bill would add $2.4 trillion to the deficit over a decade: CBO Capt. Jody Reven, Southwest Airlines Pilots Association president, said the reauthorization framework is imperative to aviation safety but urged the system 'urgently needs sustained, robust budget requests.' Reven added that 'there's really no technological solution' that could solve inadequate staffing or prevent tragedy. 'Flightdeck and ATC technology are support tools, never replacement for experienced and rested, fully-trained pilots and air traffic controllers and flight attendants,' he said. Other witnesses included Darren Pleasance, the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association president and Michael Robbins, the president and CEO of the Association of Uncrewed Vehicle Systems International. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy's 2026 budget request seeks $26.7 billion to overhaul the federal agency. That's an additional $1.5 billion, a 5.8% increase, compared to the 2025 fiscal year's budget. That includes a $1.2 billion increase for air traffic modernization and operations, $596 million to ramp up our port and shipyard infrastructure, a $400 million boost for freight rail safety and $770 million for multimodal freight expansion. International student visa freeze may break college town economies In May, Duffy promised to 'work with Congress, get the money and begin to build a brand-new system as quickly as possible.' NewsNation's Xavier Walton contributed to this report. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
30-01-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
I'm a former FAA safety inspector. DCA's airspace is uniquely complicated.
On Wednesday night, what appears to have been a disastrous combination of safety vulnerabilities resulted in a midair collision over the Potomac River that tragically took the lives of more than 60 souls near Washington, D.C. Inspectors are still trying to figure out what exactly caused the crash of an American Airlines flight and an Army Black Hawk helicopter on a routine training mission, but accidents are rarely ever due to a single cause. During my time as an FAA safety inspector, I was based at the FAA headquarters just a couple of miles from Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA) for five years. During that time I observed hundreds of flights from within the cockpit, sitting in the flight observer's jump seat. These flights were mostly at night. And I dreaded nearly all of them. Every flight in and out of the DCA airport creates an incredibly high workload for the flight crews. I'd go so far as to argue it's more stressful than any other airport. DCA is not only one of the busiest airports in the nation but also the most complex. The airport is unique in many ways, and hosts many different types of operations within a tight airspace. According to the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, DCA has the busiest runway in America. And the airspace is both complicated and crowded as an increasingly high volume of passenger planes share the air, and communications frequencies, with military aircraft, VIP flights, White House transportation and drones flying clandestine operations. This delicate balancing act has only gotten more fraught in recent years. The Federal Aviation Administration Reauthorization Act of 2024 added 10 additional daily flights to the airport, sparking a strong reaction from Democratic Sens. Tim Kaine, Ben Cardin, Chris Van Hollen and Mark Warner — all of whom represent constituents in Virginia or Maryland. 'We are deeply disappointed by the Senate Commerce Committee's move to overburden DCA,' the senators said in February 2024. 'With this profoundly reckless decision, the Committee is gambling with the safety of everyone who uses this airport.' Again, we don't yet know what caused this accident. But there are three safety vulnerabilities that initially stand out to me. Military craft generally use a different communications frequency than commercial aircraft, making it harder for their respective pilots to talk to each other and hear the chatter between area aircraft and traffic control. The second vulnerability is pilots' reliance on their Traffic Collision Avoidance Systems (TCAS). These systems do not easily detect threats from behind. So, if the Army helicopter was approaching from the side or rear of the plane as it was turning, the TCAS may not have alerted the airplane's pilots. Another safety vulnerability when commercial airplanes operate near military helicopters is that military aircraft, including helicopters, are usually exempt from the FAA's Automatic Dependent Surveillance–Broadcast (ADS-B) requirements. ADS-B systems allow pilots to automatically transmit their position, altitude and velocity at regular intervals to other aircraft, which is used to maintain separation. If the helicopter did not have such a system enabled, the commercial aircraft may not have been notified of its presence. As investigators piece together the tragic chain of events that caused this accident, the National Transportation Safety Board will prepare a report with contributing factors and recommend changes to the way flights operate in and out of Reagan National Airport. Then the FAA will attempt to make changes that support those recommendations. The goal of every accident investigation, and every person involved in the investigation, has and always will be to make the skies safer. The FAA can't bring back the 67 people presumed dead in Virginia, but it can help ensure a similar crash doesn't happen again. And it must. This article was originally published on
Miami Herald
30-01-2025
- Politics
- Miami Herald
Sen. Kaine warned of dangers at Reagan National Airport before plane crash near DC
Months before the Jan. 29 collision between an American Airlines jet and an Army helicopter near Washington, D.C., political leaders warned that Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport was overburdened. U.S. Senator Tim Kaine, of Virginia, was among the Democratic leaders opposing the expansion of flights added to the Arlington airport in 2024. Kaine, along with Maryland senators Ben Cardin and Chris Van Hollen and Virginia U.S. Senator Mark Warner, began to push back before the passage of the bipartisan Federal Aviation Administration Reauthorization Act of 2024. The act would add 10 additional flights at Reagan National, referred to locally as DCA. They said the airport's three runways were already among the busiest in the United States. 'We are deeply disappointed by the Senate Commerce Committee's move to overburden DCA,' the senators said in a joint statement in February. 'With this profoundly reckless decision, the Committee is gambling with the safety of everyone who uses this airport.' Kaine, the Democratic nominee for vice president of the United States in the 2016 election, warned of the possible dangers of the airport's flight expansion 'God forbid waking up and looking in a mirror one day and say, 'Wow, I was warned. I was warned and I shouldn't have done this,'' Kaine told reporters in 2024, according to Straight Arrow News. The senators filed an amendment to exclude the addition of the flights to Reagan National. Ultimately, the original bill was passed in May. Former President Joe Biden was among those who praised the decision, saying it would 'deliver the safest, most reliable aviation system in the world.' When two planes nearly crashed at the airport later that month, Kaine said it was evidence the airport was at capacity. It was the second near-collision at the airport in 2024. 'This incident underscores again that DCA is at capacity,' Kaine said in a post on X, formerly Twitter. 'This shows why Senate action to jam even more flights into DCA was so dangerous. The FAA must resist any new flights that compromise safety.' Following Wednesday's crash, Kaine said he would push for a 'thorough investigation into what happened.' At least 28 bodies had been pulled from the Potomac River, officials confirmed to The Associated Press early Thursday, Jan. 30. No survivors have been found.
Yahoo
29-01-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Jamestown airport falls short of 10,000 paid passenger boardings for 2024
Jan. 29—JAMESTOWN — Jamestown Regional Airport fell short of its 10,000 paid passenger boardings mark due to the main runway being closed for over a month, according to Katie Hemmer, airport director. Jamestown Regional Airport had 9,346 paid passenger boardings in 2024, 654 short of 10,000 boardings. "To miss our 10,000 passenger goal by such a small amount with the closure that we had this summer was still really encouraging," Hemmer said. "We feel very good about the recovery of boardings after the construction closure." The airport had 818 paid passenger boardings in November and 1,029 in December. Jamestown Regional Airport offers direct flights to and from Denver on United Airlines, which is operated by SkyWest Airlines. SkyWest will provide essential air service at the Jamestown and Devils Lake airports through June 2027. Jamestown Regional Airport's main runway for commercial flights was closed from May 7 through June 13 for a runway rehabilitation project. The primarily mill and overlay project also included crack and joint repair in the concrete. An airfield electrical project was also done at the airport. The airfield electrical project included replacing every light and sign on the airfield and upgrading them to LED fixtures. The project also included getting all new electrical wires and regulators. If the airport gets 10,000 paid passenger boardings in a year, it qualifies for $1 million in entitlement funds from the federal Airport Improvement Program. Hemmer said the formula for entitlement funds through the Airport Improvement Program was modified in the FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) Reauthorization Act of 2024. "They created a more prorated scale, so we will be getting an amount that's slightly less than the amount when you have 10,000 but it's very slight because we are so close to the 10,000 passenger boardings," Hemmer said. She said the calculation has not been done yet for how much Jamestown Regional Airport will receive for entitlement funds for 2024. She said when the grant is awarded it will most likely be for 2027. For this year, Hemmer said the airport is expected to exceed the 10,000 paid passenger boardings as long as there are no anticipated closures of the main runway. "We have previously had goals of getting to 12,000 passenger boardings, but that was based on a slightly different connection schedule with that early-morning departure that we're still missing," she said. "So I think at this point we are going to be happy with over 10,000 passenger boardings, and we'll just continue to request an early morning departure. If at some point the schedule changes to accommodate that, then we can look at much bigger numbers than 10,000." Hemmer said Jamestown Regional Airport is remodeling its Transportation Security Administration checkpoint area. She said TSA allocated a computed tomography scan machine to replace the X-ray machine. Using CT technology allows for enhanced threat detection capabilities for screening luggage. "Because this one is considered dual use, it's actually going to be utilized for checked baggage as well, which they are hand screening right now," Hemmer said. "They currently don't have equipment at Jamestown Regional Airport for the checked baggage, and so this will allow them to utilize equipment for that." She said some walls and doorways are being moved to accommodate the new CT scan machine. An additional bathroom is also being added in the secure area. She said that will accommodate passengers who have gone through the TSA checkpoint. Other projects scheduled for this year include a building expansion for storing snow-removal equipment and a pavement rehabilitation on the crosswind runway and taxiway echo, which is the taxiway to the crosswind runway. The air rescue and firefighting building will be expanded. The 34-by-90-foot expansion will allow that building to store the snow-removal equipment. The pavement rehabilitation project on the crosswind runway and taxiway echo includes doing a crack seal and some form of seal coat on the pavement.
