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CHILLING audio has exposed the moment that air traffic controllers lost all contact with planes approaching Newark airport last week.
One pilot was left asking, “Approach, are you there?” as he was met with radio silence from controllers in the terrifying recording.
The tense moment marks the latest development as travelers at Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey endure the ninth straight day of delays caused by staffing shortages that began on April 28.
For 90 seconds, screens and radios went dark for all air traffic controllers, leaving them unable to communicate with pilots or even see planes landing at the airport on radar.
During the outage, a United Airlines pilot flying from New Orleans radioed the controllers at least five times as he begged for clearance to land at the busy airport, which is just 12 miles outside of New York City.
The desperate pilot was met with about 30 seconds of silence over the air as he asked if anyone was there, according to a recording on LiveATC.net.
After seconds of not responding, a controller finally answered when the systems came back online.
“United 1951, how do you hear me?” the controller asked.
The pilot replied, “I got you loud and clear, United 1951.”
Days after the outage, United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby said on Friday that Newark Airport “cannot handle the number of planes that are scheduled to operate there in the weeks and months ahead.”
He issued a chilling warning to travelers on Monday, saying the company feels “there is no other choice in order to protect our customers” after about 20% of Newark’s controllers walked off the job in recent weeks.
The remarks came after an air traffic controller spoke candidly about troubling issues at Newark in an interview with MSNBC.
“It’s not safe,” the air traffic controller said. “It is not a safe situation right now for the flying public.”
According to MSNBC correspondent Tom Costello, the air traffic controller also warned him, “Don’t fly into Newark. Avoid Newark at all costs.”
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy acknowledged last week’s outage and insisted no planes were in danger of crashing.
“The primary communication line went down, the backup line didn’t fire, and so for 30 seconds we lost contact with air traffic,” Duffy explained on Fox News’ The Ingraham Angle on Monday.
United Airlines CEO statement
United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby warned customers about perceived issues at Newark Liberty International Airport.
“For many years, United has been very clear and vocal about the need to fix the Air Traffic Control system in EWR.
“While we enthusiastically support the efforts underway to permanently and structurally fix the FAA, the long-simmering FAA challenges boiled over this week.
“In the past few days, on more than one occasion, technology that FAA air traffic controllers rely on to manage the airplanes coming in and out of Newark airport failed – resulting in dozens of diverted flights, hundreds of delayed and canceled flights and worst of all, thousands of customers with disrupted travel plans.
“Unfortunately, the technology issues were compounded as over 20% of the FAA controllers for EWR walked off the job.
“Keep in mind, this particular air traffic control facility has been chronically understaffed for years and without these controllers, it’s now clear – and the FAA tells us – that Newark airport cannot handle the number of planes that are scheduled to operate there in the weeks and months ahead.
“United is committed to doing absolutely everything in our power to minimize the impact that this will have on customers and so we are unilaterally cancelling 35 roundtrip flights per day from our Newark schedule starting this weekend.
“It’s disappointing to make further cuts to an already reduced schedule at Newark, but since there is no way to resolve the near-term structural FAA staffing issues, we feel like there is no other choice in order to protect our customers,” Kirby said.
“Now, were planes going to crash? No. They have communication devices,” he added.
“But it’s a sign that we have a frail system in place, and it has to be fixed.”
At a news conference last week, Duffy emphasized there are “cracks in the system.”
“It‘s our job to actually see over the horizon what the issues are and fix it before there is an incident that we will seriously regret,” he said.
He also admitted that Newark’s air traffic system is “incredibly old,” according to CNN.
“We use floppy disks. We use copper wires,” he said.
“The system that we’re using is not effective to control the traffic that we have in the airspace today.”
There is currently a nationwide shortage of about 3,000 air traffic controllers.
GROUND DELAYS
The Federal Aviation Administration has blamed the lack of workers, along with runway construction, for the recent delays and cancellations overwhelming Newark Airport.
Thousands of flights have been delayed since April 28, the day of the ATC outage.
On Tuesday, the FAA imposed a ground delay for flights heading to Newark.
The average delay is two hours and 41 minutes, according to CNN.
