Free Republic

Government: The FAA has done an incompetent job of making tiny sequester budget cuts, leading to flight delays across the country. It's time for Congress to haul these people in and make them explain their real priorities. By the Federal Aviation Administration's logic, all it takes is a 5% cut in the FAA's $12.5 billion budget, as the 2011 Budget Control Act requires, to throw the whole air transportation system out of whack. The result? Three-hour delays for 1,200 flights at America's busiest hub airports — including all three in the New York area, Chicago, Los Angeles and Atlanta —...

Washington, DC – House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure Chairman Bill Shuster (R-PA) issued the following statement today after Department of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Administrator Michael Huerta announced that a five percent budget reduction due to sequestration would result in the furloughing of thousands of air traffic controllers and potentially disrupt the travel plans of the flying public: “The FAA’s management of sequestration is quickly going from bad to worse. Given that the FAA’s budget increased more than 100 percent over the last 15 years, finding five percent in savings shouldn’t need to significantly...

Rolling flight delays. Cancellations. Heavy sighs and grim smirks in packed airport concourses. Has the sequester, Washington’s much-debated automatic spending cut package, finally landed? In response to the sequester deal struck by President Obama and Congress, the Federal Aviation Administration this weekend began to furlough its entire 47,000-person workforce (including 13,000 air traffic controllers) to abide by some $637 billion in automatic spending cuts that have to be made by October. The cutbacks mean each employee has to stay at home, unpaid, one day every other week. The furloughs had an immediate impact on travel on Monday, contributing to two-hour...

Since the sequester was a cut in the increase, not a cut in the baseline spending, why is the FAA cutting $600 million dollars and blaming the furloughs on the sequester? Did I miss something? BTW, didn't Bob Woodward say that the sequester was Lew's idea and was jumped on by Obama?

It was a tough start to the week for many air travelers as federal budget cuts led to cascading delays along the East Coast Monday morning. Some flights out of New York and Washington were delayed by more than two hours as the Federal Aviation Administration kept planes on the ground. The federal agency has said furloughs of air traffic controllers could lead to delays if there weren't enough people to monitor busy air corridors. *** Government budget cuts that kicked in last month are forcing the FAA and other agencies to cut their spending. FAA officials have said they...

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) announced Friday that it has formally approved Boeing’s design for modifications to the 787 Dreamliner battery system, clearing the way to end the plane’s three-month grounding. FAA spokeswoman Laura Brown said the agency hasn’t changed the Dreamliner’s ETOPS (“extended operations”) certification, which means the 787 will have continued approval to fly up to three hours away from the nearest airport. Michael Huerta, head of the FAA, told a Senate hearing Tuesday that ETOPS approval was under review. The decision not to reduce the three-hour limit is crucial to the jet’s use for flying long routes...

Flight delays of up to 3-1/2 hours are expected at some busy U.S. airports this summer because of furloughs of air-traffic controllers, the top U.S. aviation regulator warned on Thursday. The estimate from the Federal Aviation Administration is the first to detail, in minutes and hours, the potential delays from the agency's decision to furlough 10 percent of its staff, starting Sunday, as it struggles to meet budget cuts required under so-called sequestration. Other groups, including the air-traffic controller's union, have warned of potentially long delays and reduced capacity to handle airplanes, which could force airlines to cut flights. But...

“[Drones are a] game-changing technology, akin to gunpowder, the steam engine, the atomic bomb—opening up possibilities that were fiction a generation earlier but also opening up perils that were unknown a generation ago.”—Peter Singer, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution America will never be a “no drone zone.” That must be acknowledged from the outset. There is too much money to be made on drones, for one, and too many special interest groups—from the defense sector to law enforcement to the so-called “research” groups that are in it for purely “academic” reasons—who have a vested interest in ensuring that drones...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The closings of control towers at 149 small airports, due to begin this weekend because of government-wide spending cuts, are being delayed until mid-June, federal regulators announced Friday. The Federal Aviation Administration said it needs more time to deal with legal challenges to the closures. Also, about 50 airport authorities and other "stakeholders" have indicated they want to fund the operations of the towers themselves rather than see them shut down, and more time will be needed to work out those plans, the agency said in a statement. The first 24 tower closures were scheduled to begin...

Texas will pay to keep 13 local air traffic control towers that the Obama administration plans shut down in order to play politics with the sequester. Last week, the Obama administration announced it would close 149 air traffic control towers nationwide starting on April 7 to save $600 million. The Texas Department of Transportation said safety and Texas's economy, which relies on air travel, prompted the state to keep the air traffic control towers open. “Safety is the primary reason we felt a need to take immediate action for the air travelers and business aircraft that use these airports," Texas...

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) predicts 10,000 commercial drones could be in the skies by 2020 after guidelines are approved. For now, Congress has asked the FAA to write regulations on civil operation of small unmanned aircraft systems in the national airspace and submit them by 2015. "Once enabled, commercial UAS markets will develop. There are many potential ways for a company to generate revenue from UAS applications, whether from new markets or more efficient applications in established markets. Based upon the expected regulatory environment, FAA predicts roughly 10,000 active commercial UASs in five years," states the FAA Aerospace Forecast...

Sequestration chatter isn’t going away any time soon, and one of the expected headlines is making the rounds again this week. Air traffic control towers at nearly 150 airports across the nation are going to sit empty, forcing pilots to figure out safe landing procedures by a combination of the seats of their pants and furiously cracking open fortune cookies. In other words, you’re all going to die. The Federal Aviation Administration on Friday told 149 regional airports across the country it would begin closing their air traffic control towers in April, but said it would spare another 40 towers...

(Reuters) - The Federal Aviation Administration said on Friday it will close 149 air traffic control towers at small airports across the country beginning on April 7 as it copes with automatic federal spending cuts. The White House and transportation leaders have warned for weeks that the $85 billion in federal cuts known as "sequestration" would force smaller airports across the country to curtail operations. The across-the-board cuts started kicking in on March 1 because Congress was not able to reach an alternative budget deal to replace them. The FAA must absorb $637 million in cuts by September 30. Transportation...

A possible drone sighting near JFK Airport has led to a federal investigation after a pilot spotted the unknown flying object as he landed a commercial jet yesterday. The Alitalia pilot was in his final approach into JFK over Brooklyn, New York, just after 1pm when he saw something hovering about 200 feet away. Sources told the New York Post that the 'drone' was black in color, and had helicopter rotors on its corners. The FAA said that all flights landed without incident, and the agency is currently investigating. The Post reported that the Joint Terrorism Task Force is also...

Will President Obama’s sequester interrupt government services you depend on? The media runs alarmist stories about how average Americans will suffer if Uncle Sam has to pass up a fourth sticky bun for breakfast. Politicians often panic the public to keep the money flowing. Washington is warning of three-hour delays at airports. Remember: Democrats insisted on requiring airport security screeners to be federal employees. So now you must support Democratic spending plans or else. Since 2008, federal spending has increased by $800 billion per year. The looming sequester will shave off $100 billion per year. Washington will still be spending...

<p>WASHINGTON (AP) — In a major step toward opening U.S. skies to thousands of unmanned drones, federal officials Thursday solicited proposals to create six drone test sites around the country.</p> <p>The Federal Aviation Administration also posted online a draft plan for protecting people's privacy from the eyes in the sky. The plan would require each test site to follow federal and state laws and make a privacy policy publicly available.</p>

An official with the Federal Aviation Administration reassured the public Wednesday that no armed drones will be permitted in U.S. airspace, but he acknowledged the agency can do little about privacy fears associated with the unmanned craft.

MCLEAN, Va. — A top official with the Federal Aviation Administration reassured the public on Wednesday that, despite the fear and paranoia of some, no armed drones will be permitted to fly in U.S. airspace. “We currently have rules in the books that deal with releasing anything from an aircraft, period. Those rules are in place and that would prohibit weapons from being installed on a civil aircraft,” said Jim Williams, head of the FAA's Unmanned Aircraft Systems Integration Office, in an address to the drone industry’s leading trade group meeting this week in Northern Virginia.

I found this link from Micheal Yon on Facebook. I haven't heard of Electronic Frontier Foundation before but I found there map very interesting. The have a Google map of all FAA approved drone operations. If you follow there link to larger you can see details on what they say they are doing with the drone.

The crisis that has enveloped Boeing over the grounded Dreamliner, at a cost of billions of dollars in losses in addition to what has already been “invested” in it -- voluntarily by its owner/investors and coercively from taxpayers – exemplifies perhaps more than any other redistributionist corporatism scheme why government intervention is more headache than help. Pass the industrial-strength Excedrin. Of immediate concern to the Chicago-based jet-manufacturer is the lithium-ion battery that powers so many of the 787’s critical functions. Two instances of “thermal runaway” on Dreamliners’ owned by Japan-based airlines caused that country, and the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration,to...