As the government shutdown enters its second week, air traffic controllers are openly discussing calling in sick and driving for Uber to make ends meet, former “Real World” cast member and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said in a press conference. Controllers are among those lucky government employees who are not getting paid during the shutdown, but are required to work anyway. Duffy says that so far there has only been a “slight tick-up in sick calls” nationwide, but staffing shortages are already causing flight delays, according to NPR.
“If we see there’s issues in the tower that are affecting controllers’ ability to effectively control the airspace, we’ll reduce the rate, and you’ll see more delays or you might see a cancellation,” Duffy said. “I’m willing to do that before we’re willing to risk anyone’s life in the air.”
In a statement shared with NPR, the FAA says it “slows traffic into some airports to ensure safe operations” when there are increased staffing shortages. It directs travelers to its website for real-time flight impacts for every U.S. airport.
By their own admission, air traffic controllers are barely holding it together as it is, without a government shutdown taking away their paychecks indefinitely. Duffy is correct that these essential workers will be more distracted on the job, worrying about how they will pay their bills or being extra tired from pulling an Uber shift when they should have been resting. This affects not only the controllers’ well-being but everyone on board the aircraft they guide across the skies.
It’s only going to get worse
Even the “slight tick-up in sick calls” Duffy describes has already started to impact airports across the country. On Monday, staffing issues were directly responsible for ground delays of up to two hours in Newark and Denver. Hollywood Burbank Airport saw an average delay of two and a half hours and had no air traffic controllers for more than five hours. Regional approach and departure control out of San Diego was forced to manage Burbank’s local traffic. Delays due to staff shortages continued on Tuesday in Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, and Philadelphia, as well as a brief ground stop in Nashville.
This is nothing new. Any government shutdown makes flying more hellish than normal, and it’s always for the same reasons: overstressed, unpaid controllers justifiably calling in sick. It’s unlikely that controllers will organize any sort of action, like calling in sick on the same day. When they went on strike in 1981, President Reagan fired them. President Trump already has a history of firing FAA employees, so striking controllers would likely suffer the same fate today.
However, the air traffic control situation is so dire that it doesn’t take many controllers calling out to have a significant effect on the system. In fact, the last government shutdown, during Trump’s previous term in 2019, ended not because the two parties came to an agreement but because many major airports along the East Coast, from LaGuardia to Orlando, suffered serious air traffic delays as a result of not having enough controllers. History could repeat itself. If not, delays could escalate into flight cancellations and a cascade failure that’s scary to think about.
