A host of Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) employees have been departing from the agency recently, according to The Wall Street Journal.
The agency is facing a growing number of employees either quitting or retiring, including some senior FAA leaders, fueling concerns that the departures could potentially affect air-traffic control, the WSJ first reported on Thursday. FAA workers are “departing the agency in mass quantities across all skill levels,” according to a May 7 internal presentation to senior FAA leadership discussing the agency’s so-called deferred-resignation program, the WSJ reported.
A separate presentation from the FAA’s human-resources staff noted that over 1,200 employees were resigning through the agency’s deferred-resignation program, according to the WSJ. The agency’s frontline safety employees, such as safety personnel including air-traffic controllers and engineers, are not eligible for this program, according to the WSJ.
The FAA said that the mass departure of staffers, including retirements and resignations, make up roughly 3% of its total workforce and would not impact the agency’s safety-critical functions, the WSJ reported.
The FAA presentation said that staff departures could potentially impact medical clearances for air-traffic controllers and pilots being processed, as well as runway safety work, according to the WSJ.
The FAA has faced increased scrutiny after a deadly midair collision occurred near the Reagan National Airport (DCA) on Jan. 29. Earlier in May, FAA official Franklin McIntosh said while testifying before the Senate Commerce Committee that a hotline between DCA and the Pentagon had been down since March 2022, and his agency had previously not known about the outage.
“We are refreshing an organization that is built for the future,” an FAA spokeswoman told the WSJ.
The U.S. is currently facing a notable shortage of air traffic controllers. Department of Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy has been moving to address the shortage of air traffic controller workers in the U.S., announcing on May 1 a new package of actions he claimed would “further supercharge the air traffic controller workforce.”
The FAA did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
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