ATC Staffing Crisis Averted By High Fuel Prices: Review of the Air Traffic Controller Facility Training Program

ATC Staffing Crisis Averted By High Fuel Prices

Well, it looks as though the current record increase in fuel prices,
due to petroleum being used as a safe haven against US$ inflationary
pressure by financial investors and speculators, has a silver lining.
Now there is no longer a need for the FAA, airliner manufacturers,
satellite-based-ATC contractors, and privatization lobbyists to push
for NextGen ATC implementation with its exorbitant costs. And it's
solving the issue with airlines over scheduling flights beyond the
capacities of the airports they "serve."

Send a thank you note to your stock broker. :-)

Review of the Air Traffic Controller Facility Training Program
http://www.oig.dot.gov/item.jsp?id=2308
DoT Office of Inspector General

Title: Review of the Air Traffic Controller Facility Training
Program
Date: June 05, 2008
Type: Audit
Project ID: AV-2008-055
Summary: On June 5, 2008, we issued our review of the Federal
Aviation Administration’s (FAA) air traffic controller facility
training program. Our objectives were to (1) assess the adequacy
of FAA’s plans to effectively train an increasing number of new
controllers at the facility level and (2) determine FAA’s progress
in implementing key initiatives for reducing facility training
time and costs.

We found that FAA’s facility training program continues to be
extremely decentralized and the efficiency and quality of the
training varies extensively from one location to another. We found
similar problems in 2004. FAA is taking actions at the national
level to get this important program on track, but many of its
efforts are still in the early stages.

To successfully achieve its plans to hire and train 17,000 new
controllers through 2017, FAA needs to take the following actions:
(1) reflect the changing composition of the controller workforce
in reports to its stakeholders, (2) establish realistic standards
for how many developmental controllers facilities can accommodate,
(3) ensure the standards developed address individual facilities’
training capacity, (4) continue to encourage veteran controllers
to transfer to busier, higher–level facilities, (5) clarify
responsibilities for oversight of the facility training program at
the national level, (6) ensure there are no gaps in facility
training contract support, and (7) implement key initiatives it
first proposed in 2004 to improve facility training.
Full document: PDF document:
http://www.oig.dot.gov/StreamFile?fi.../av2008055.pdf

FAA is currently training more new controllers than it has in the
past 15 years. The percentage of developmental controllers within
the controller workforce has increased from about 15 percent in
2004 to about 25 percent in 2007.

•
The Atlanta En Route Center received 76 developmental controllers
in FY 2006. In FY 2005, however, the facility had installed the
User Request Evaluation Tool (new controller technology for
separating aircraft). Because the facility was required to train
its existing controllers on the new technology, it had fewer
simulators available for developmental controllers’ OJT. As a
result, the facility was unable to train most developmental
controllers from July 2005 to April 2006. This resulted in
developmental controllers waiting up to 1 year before they could
begin or recommence their facility training.

•
As of December 2007, the Miami Center had 98 developmental
controllers (or 34 percent of the facility’s controller
workforce). Facility management and the local NATCA representative
both agreed that the facility lacked the physical capacity to
effectively train such a large population of developmental
controllers, even when they were evenly distributed throughout the
various stages of facility training. Consequently, developmental
controllers’ facility training was delayed by as much as 9 months.



http://www.avweb.com/eletter/archive...ll.html#198083
"There are far too many trainees, more than the FAA can safely and
effectively handle," NATCA spokesman Doug Church told AVweb on
Wednesday. "These human beings are being put into extremely
perilous, demoralizing and exhausting conditions, often well
before they are prepared to handle it, because the FAA has no
other choice due to the staffing crisis."

Hank Krakowski, head of the FAA Air Traffic Organization,
testified that traffic is down overall in the national airspace,
from airlines to GA traffic, which is helping to "de-stress" the
system.