AUSTIN, Texas — The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said things are back to normal at Austin's airport after long wait times and delayed flights on Sunday.
The FAA blamed a lack of air traffic control staffing for the longer-than-typical wait times, but confirmed there were no delays by Monday morning.
It's an issue that's far from new at Austin’s airport, or airports nationwide. Federal leaders believe delayed flights and long wait times will happen more often – and may cause dangerous accidents in the future.
“Our air traffic controllers are overworked and understaffed and this presents real problems for us,” Congressman Lloyd Doggett (D-Austin) said. “On a day when there's a significant amount of traffic and bad weather, we could face a catastrophe there.”
Doggett blamed Sunday's delays as a "direct result of the FAA’s unresponsiveness." According to the congressman, staff told him there should’ve been 13 air traffic controllers available, but there were only eight on Sunday. There was also no supervisor.
Doggett said the FAA is responsible for hiring air traffic controllers to address the ongoing shortage.
“The [FAA] administrator conceded last year ... that we were very much near the top of the list for these kinds of problems, and yet they have not moved swiftly enough to respond to those needs,” Doggett said. “They're talking about what they can do next year. We need help now. The number of air traffic controllers available today is less than last year.”
According to Doggett, the shortage isn't just inconvenient – it can be dangerous. Part of the issue stems from the FAA's slow response to approving the Austin airport to control larger airspace.
Currently, a small plane coming into Austin doesn't have to notify the tower until it gets within five miles. Multiple close calls have been documented on Austin's runways in the past two years, including one in October that flew within hundreds of feet of an American Airlines plane that was landing.
“We had a plane almost land on top of a packed Southwest Airlines flight last year. This keeps happening again and again because we don't have the margin of safety,” Doggett said.
In May, Congress passed the FAA Authorization Act, aimed at hiring more air traffic controllers. In September, FAA leaders said they exceeded their goal of hiring over 1,800 air traffic controllers.
It's the most that have been hired in a decade to help reverse the effects of the shortage. But Doggett said they have yet to see any results from its passing to help fill vacancies.
According to Doggett, Austin's airport has been getting air traffic control trainees who lack the experience level needed to have a fully operating team.
“We should have assigned 60 air traffic controllers, right now," Doggett said. "We are at about 35 and I expect we will be down perhaps below 30 by the end of the year. That is just not acceptable."