J. Emilio Flores for The New York Times
A monitor at the air traffic tower in Los Angeles shows air traffic in the United States, one dot per plane. Airline and airport officials fear one result of a sharp cut in federal spending could be flight delays and cancellations.
WASHINGTON — Airlines and airports across the country are preparing for across-the-board federal budget cuts due to hit next week as if they were a hurricane, although with even less certainty about how many flights they will have to cancel and how many passengers will be stranded. The federal government is warning about delays that could begin in March, as the first cuts take effect, and reduced takeoffs and slower security lines that could worsen in April with furloughs.
Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has told Congress that most of the Federal Aviation Administration's 47,000 employees would face a day of furlough per two-week pay period, meaning on average about 10 percent fewer workers on any given day. There are about 14,750 air traffic controllers, including trainees, so that would mean on every shift there would be substantially fewer in all. In some areas, like New York, there could be problems even in advance of furloughs, if overtime budgets are cut.
To handle such a major staff shortage but still maintain safety, federal aviation officials said they would accept fewer airplanes into the system, the same tactic they use in bad weather. That means that in places where airplanes normally follow one another with a six- or seven-mile gap, there might be a 10- to 20-mile gap. As a result, passengers may sit on tarmacs and endure delays as they wait for planes to push back from the gate.
"It's going to be like perpetual bad weather," said Kevin Mitchell, the chairman of the Business Travel Coalition. "You're going to have to look at this as if you're going out knowing there's a storm."
There could also be longer security lines at airports because of anticipated furloughs of Transportation Security Administration workers. In addition, deplaning from international flights could be slower because Customs and Border Protection agents are expected to work fewer hours.
When this would begin in earnest is not clear. Government rules require that employees have 30 days' notice of furloughs, but the notices cannot be given until March 1. But the work of contractors and part-time employees could be cut sooner, along with overtime budgets.
The budget cuts, known as a sequester, "will require indiscriminate spending reductions," Mr. LaHood said in a letter Feb. 11 to Barbara Mikulski, the chairwoman of the Senate Appropriations Committee. But so far the F.A.A. is saying very little specifically about what it would do, although the National Air Traffic Controllers Association is preparing a study correlating levels of furloughs to reductions in the ability to handle traffic.
"Everyone is frustrated with the lack of specific information," said Deborah McElroy, executive vice president of the Airports Council International — North America. "Airports are looking at their contingency plans, but the difficulty is, I don't know what I'm planning for."
Aviation executives were reluctant to be quoted by name for fear of appearing to take sides in the dispute in Congress, but many expressed exasperation. An executive of a major airline who is assigned to the New York area said that the problems were approaching as the price of gas was once again nearing $4 a gallon, making any form of travel less attractive. Reviving a newly coined word from the heart of the recent recession, he said, "Staycation may become the byword of the summer."
Because of the potential cutbacks in T.S.A. workers' hours, Janet Napolitano, the Secretary of Homeland Security, testified Feb. 14 before the Senate Appropriations Committee that wait times at airport security checkpoints could increase by up to an hour. She said waits of four to five hours could be common for international travelers trying to clear customs and immigration.
Thomas P. Glynn, chief executive officer of the Massachusetts Port Authority, which operates Logan International Airport in Boston, said that his agency was talking to airport restaurants and shops about staying open late to serve delayed travelers and setting aside an area on the tarmac to park flights diverted from other airports because of air traffic problems. Airport service agents might have to patrol the lines at security checkpoints to pluck out passengers whose flights were leaving soon and move them to the front, he said. The goal was to "produce a passenger experience that is reasonable to good," he said.
Mr. Glynn, who was President Bill Clinton's deputy secretary of labor during the government shutdown of 1994, said the sequester was more difficult. "Implicit in the shutdown was it was temporary," he said. The sequestration "could be permanent, or for this fiscal year," which does not end until Sept. 30. Congress was repeatedly approaching the brink, he said, because of "shutdown fatigue."
Airline and aviation officials also said that a cutback in F.A.A. operations would lead to complications beyond air traffic control problems. If the agency closes towers at small airports or reduces their hours, for example, airlines could still get permission to land commuter flights at those places although the airlines would have to show they had trained weather observers on the ground, among other requirements. The problem is that the airlines would probably flood the F.A.A. with requests for such permissions to land, but the people who process them would be subject to furlough, an airline executive said.
Applications by airlines to put new airplanes into service or to certify pilots on new planes could also be delayed. A fund that provides grants for airport improvements might not be affected, according to experts, but the F.A.A. employees who process those applications might be subject to furloughs.
The National Air Traffic Controllers Association, the union that represents the controllers and other workers, on Thursday predicted "a negative impact on the efficiency and capacity of the National Airspace System, as well as the nation's fragile economy." If the air traffic system shrinks, it could also set off a conflict within the airline industry. Industry executives said that if the F.A.A. reduced takeoffs and landings at the nation's airports, the carriers might choose to eliminate routes of smaller planes that have fewer seats and so provide less revenue to an airline. But those planes are often the only service to smaller airports in smaller cities.
Anda sedang membaca artikel tentang
Federal Spending Cuts Threaten Delays in Air Travel
Dengan url
https://dunialuasekali.blogspot.com/2013/02/federal-spending-cuts-threaten-delays.html
Anda boleh menyebar luaskannya atau mengcopy paste-nya
Federal Spending Cuts Threaten Delays in Air Travel
namun jangan lupa untuk meletakkan link
Federal Spending Cuts Threaten Delays in Air Travel
sebagai sumbernya
0 komentar:
Posting Komentar