Tag Archives for air traffic control.
Marine One briefly lost separation with an American Eagle flight departing Washington National after the tower apparently missed Marine One’s three-minute liftoff warning over broken radio calls. Neither the president nor airline passengers were in danger, but one wonders why Marine One proceeded without confirmed communication with air traffic control.
A Houston-bound Boeing 747 freighter reported running out of fuel with just 6,000 pounds remaining, yet the pilot still asked to continue another 210 miles to Houston. Air traffic control stepped in, declared the emergency for the crew, and made the plane land at Dallas–Fort Worth instead, almost certainly preventing a much more serious incident.
An American Airlines 737 arriving at Washington National was forced to go around after a Republic Airways regional jet appears to have accepted another aircraft’s clearance and entered Runway 1. The incident involved two nearly identical American Airlines regional jet callsigns at neighboring runways, turning a routine line-up-and-wait instruction into a runway conflict.
The U.S. keeps pouring billions into FAA-run air traffic control while staffing, technology, and accountability lag. Canada’s nonprofit NAV CANADA model shows a better path: separate regulator from operator, fund the system through users, and modernize without waiting on Congress.
Delta pilots went around on final approach at Boston after air traffic control cleared an American jet for takeoff on an intersecting runway. The controller then asked American, “Where are you going?” — even though the flight had already been cleared to depart.
FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford says Trump’s first air traffic control modernization push was “hijacked” into a privatization debate by airlines — but Trump himself explicitly proposed moving ATC into a self-financing nonprofit. Bedford’s Airlines Confidential interview reveals a broader problem: the FAA wants more central control over airline schedules while still running, regulating, and excusing the system whose failures it is supposed to fix.
A Delta regional jet was already landing at LaGuardia when the pilots realized they had been talking to the wrong controller. The crew had switched to the wrong New York tower frequency on approach, and the mistake only became obvious when the controller asked the flight a simple question: where are you?
A single overheated circuit board was enough to ground flights across five Washington-area airports, forcing controllers to evacuate Potomac TRACON and exposing just how fragile the FAA’s aging infrastructure has become. The deeper problem, though, is not one smoking board — it is an air traffic control system where routine maintenance on old equipment was reportedly allowed to slide, making breakdowns like this far more likely.
A Southwest 737 in San Antonio began its takeoff roll after being cleared for departure when a private Pilatus PC-12 inadvertently turned onto the same runway. Tower audio captures the controller urgently canceling the takeoff clearance—“Oh sh*t”—and the Southwest crew rejecting the takeoff at speed, avoiding a runway collision as another aircraft was sent around.
A United Airlines regional jet departing Houston got an automated collision warning seconds after takeoff when another aircraft on the parallel runway turned the wrong way into its departure path. The crews were still low and close enough that the United flight reported a TCAS resolution advisory, the last line of defense designed to prevent midair collisions.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
