By The Related Press

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy says he plans to scale back the variety of flights out and in of Newark’s airport for the “next several weeks” because it struggles with radar outages and different points, together with one other Sunday that once more slowed air site visitors.

Talking on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that aired Sunday, Duffy mentioned he’ll meet this week with all main carriers flying via Newark Liberty Worldwide, New Jersey’s largest airport. He mentioned the variety of flight cutbacks would fluctuate by time of day with most concentrating on afternoon hours when worldwide arrivals make the airport busier.

Along with gear outages, the airport has been been beset by flight delays and cancellations introduced on by a scarcity of air site visitors controllers.

“We want to have a number of flights that if you book your flight, you know it’s going to fly, right?” he mentioned. “That is the priority. So you don’t get to the airport, wait four hours, and then get delayed.”

The Federal Aviation Administration reported a “telecommunications issue” as the most recent setback Sunday, impacting a facility in Philadelphia that directs planes out and in of Newark airport. An FAA assertion mentioned the company briefly slowed air site visitors to and from the airport whereas guaranteeing “redundancies were working as designed” earlier than regular operations resumed.

Infrastructure points are more and more a key concern at airports across the nation.

In an unrelated incident, lots of of flights had been delayed Sunday at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta Worldwide Airport — one of many world’s busiest — due to a runway gear situation. The FAA mentioned in an announcement that it briefly slowed arrivals into Atlanta whereas technicians labored to handle the issue.

In Newark, Sunday’s disruptions got here two days after radar on the Philadelphia facility went black for 90 seconds at 3:55 a.m. Friday, an episode that was just like an incident on April 28.

The Trump administration just lately proposed a multibillion-dollar overhaul of the U.S. air site visitors management system, envisioning six new air site visitors management facilities and expertise and communications upgrades at the entire nation’s air site visitors services over the following three or 4 years.

The FAA mentioned final week that it slows the speed of arrivals into Newark to make sure security at any time when staffing or gear points come up. The company additionally famous that frequent gear and telecommunications outages might be disturbing, prompting some air site visitors controllers to take break day “to recover from the stress.”

“While we cannot quickly replace them due to this highly specialized profession, we continue to train controllers who will eventually be assigned to this busy airspace,” the FAA mentioned in a Might 5 assertion.

On common, there had been 34 arrival cancellations per day since mid-April at Newark, in response to the FAA, with the variety of delays growing all through the day from a median of 5 within the mornings to 16 by the night. The delays tended to final 85 to 137 minutes on common.

Duffy mentioned in his TV look Sunday that he needs to boost the obligatory retirement age for air site visitors controllers from 56 to 61, as he tries to navigate a scarcity of about 3,000 folks in that specialised place.

And he additionally spoke of wanting to provide these air site visitors controllers a 20% upfront bonus to remain on the job. Nevertheless, he says many air site visitors controllers select to retire after 25 years of service, which suggests many retire across the age of fifty.

“These are not overnight fixes,” Duffy mentioned. “But as we go up — one, two years, older guys on the job, younger guys coming in, men and women — we can make up that 3,000-person difference.”

Including extra air site visitors controllers is in distinction to a prime precedence of the Trump administration — slashing jobs in practically all different federal businesses.

Nevertheless, United Airways CEO Scott Kirby mentioned on CBS’ “Face the Nation” that Duffy deserves credit score for placing “caution tape” round FAA security capabilities and separating these personnel from cost-cutting by Trump’s Division of Authorities Effectivity — DOGE.

Kirby mentioned United has already lowered its schedule at Newark and can meet with Duffy later this week. He expects a deeper lower in capability to final till June 15 when development work on considered one of Newark’s runways is predicted to be full, although he thinks some reductions will final all through the summer time.

“We have fewer flights, but we keep everything safe, and we get the airplane safely on the ground,” Kirby mentioned. “Safety is number one, and so I’m not worried about safety. I am worried about customer delays and impacts.”

Initially Printed: Might 11, 2025 at 9:01 AM EDT