It’s every vacationer’s worst nightmare. Being on the cusp of a dream trip that cost a fortune, only for it to be ruined by a canceled flight.
But for Americans it’s become a lingering worry for every journey, with the country’s aviation system in ruins – and showing no signs of fixing itself.
For years major airports have been beset by delayed, shelved, or diverted flights as the antiquated system creaked under the pressure of millions of passengers.
The problem has been exacerbated in recent weeks with the government shutdown, meaning thousands of federal workers going unpaid, with many calling in sick.
But aviation experts have a solution, inspired in part by our allies who have revolutionized air travel – and are even making huge profits from it.
Privatization is seen as a dirty word by some in the industry amid fears the drive for dividends will be to the detriment of workers.
But, according to specialists, it’d at least shirk the issue of no cash to pay staff amid any future government shutdowns, freeing bosses to focus solely on safety.
Brian Strzempkowski, assistant director for aviation studies at Ohio State University, broke down the benefits of privatizing the system to the Daily Mail.
Travelers were stranded across America due to staff shortages. Experts are now calling for America’s aviation industry to be privatized to avoid such disruptions
He said: ‘Privatization would ensure controllers continue getting paychecks even if the government shuts down, allowing them to focus on safety rather than survival.
‘If you look back during the 2010 period when the privatization talk was strong, the unions actually supported it.’
The federal government shutdown threw airports into pandemonium two weeks ago, exposing deep flaws in the nation’s air traffic control system.
On October 7 alone, flight boards flashed over 6,000 delays, with cancellations piling up from Burbank to Boston.
Burbank’s Hollywood Airport even closed its towers entirely on October 6, forcing diversions and two-hour waits.
Meanwhile facilities in Philadelphia, Dallas, Houston and Ronald Reagan Washington National slashed operations or delayed flights by 90 minutes.
And Nashville imposed a full ground stop on incoming flights on October 8, forcing planes to circle or reroute.
Controllers are burning out under 10-hour, six-day workweeks and even taking part-time jobs to survive without pay.
The culprit was a 10 percent shortage of air traffic controllers, many unpaid and forced to work under grueling conditions.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy noted the 10 percent call-out rate. However, experts said the problem runs deeper with outdated equipment, bloated bureaucracy, and a $10 billion FAA ATC budget that stifles innovation
But, as Strzempkowski says, privatization would alleviate the problem, and bypass the bureaucratic issues caused by a federally-operated network.
He said: ‘Technology is more nimble in private industry. Investments and upgrades can happen quickly, without the bureaucratic delays of government contracting.’
Chronic understaffing, with 3,000 vacancies left unfilled since 2015, has left the FAA unable to absorb disruptions, making shutdowns far more damaging.
During the 2018 and 2019 shutdowns, which lasted 35 days and saw sick-outs cripple New York’s airspace by the second week, forcing Congress to cave.
Strzempkowski said: ‘There were a lot of sick-outs happening at the same time during the 2018 and 2019 shutdown.
‘It started around the two-week mark and continued until the end, which lasted about four and a half weeks.’
Donald Trump’s recent comments, questioning back pay despite a 2019 law he signed guaranteeing it, only deepen the morale crisis.
Burbank’s Hollywood Airport even closed its towers entirely on October 6, forcing diversions, two-hour waits and cancellations. Pictured is an arrival board from that day
As Strzempkowski noted: ‘Funding has to come from Congress first. It’s not entirely up to him.
‘These are just individuals who need an income to support themselves and to support their families.
‘They are struggling at this time because they are going to work and they have not received a paycheck for two weeks.
‘Some of them are working part-time jobs to have income coming into their household.’ Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy noted the 10 percent call-out rate.
But experts said the problem runs deeper with outdated equipment, bloated bureaucracy and a $10billion FAA ATC budget that stifles innovation.
While the American aviation industry has been subject to federal oversight since 1926, other countries have gained freedom by privatizing.
Canada’s Nav Canada, a nonprofit corporation, has operated air traffic control since 1996 and is widely considered a success story.
It is owned by its stakeholders, including the Government of Canada, commercial air carriers, the general aviation sector, and unionized employees, who generate revenue from charges for flying through Canadian airspace and for terminal services at airports.
The Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank in Washington DC, has praised Nav Canada for its development of new technologies.
Nav Canada also implemented space-based ADS-B surveillance in 2019, ahead of the FAA’s NextGen program, which faced delays in full ADS-B integration, and completed a nationwide rollout of electronic flight strips by 2009, well before the FAA’s partial deployment starting around 2017.
The UK’s NATS generated $41.6million in revenue in 1999 before privatizing, but that ballooned to $249million from 2011 to 2012, post-privatization.
The average delay per flight also dropped sharply, from 109 seconds between 2000 and 2002 to just under eight seconds in 2011.
Australia and New Zealand, privatized since the 1980s, mirror these gains, proving the model scales.
Skeptics have argued that the US airspace, ten times the size of Canada’s, complicates privatization.
Others fear airline dominance, yet Canada’s model balances airlines, unions, airports, and government oversight on a nonprofit board.
The US nearly took this path in 2016 when Representative Bill Shuster’s 21st Century AIRR Act proposed a nonprofit ATC corporation, backed by Airlines for America and the National Air Traffic Controllers Association (NATCA), which saw stable pay as a shutdown antidote.
Trump amplified the push in 2017 during his first term, calling the FAA a ‘total waste’ and urging a private corporation takeover.
Though stalled over partisan concerns, the logic remains: a user-fee system would curb congestion, fund upgrades and shield workers from fiscal hostage-taking.
Maintenance could also be privatized, as Strzempkowski noted: ‘If maintenance were private, shutdowns wouldn’t affect it as much.’
‘When it comes to aviation, safety is always the number one priority, no matter what system gets put into place,’ he added.
‘You always have to look at it through the lens of this being a 100 percent fail-safe system, that’s the standard we’re always trying to hit in the industry.
‘Could a private company come in and meet that same standard? Could they bring in new technology faster than the FAA? Potentially.
‘The thing is, we’ve never really tried to do that in this country, so it’s hard to say definitively one way or the other.’
This article was originally published by a www.dailymail.co.uk . Read the Original article here. .