Amid criticism from President Trump against air traffic controllers, a union leader for the group said he stood behind “every highly skilled, highly trained air traffic controller that is out there.”
Nick Daniels, president of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, told “CBS Mornings” on Friday that controllers go through very rigorous training and multiple “job jeopardy points” before they speak directly to aircraft.
“Any air traffic controller out there – it doesn’t matter their race, color, religion – you can know you are in the best hands that take that responsibility very seriously every day,” he said.
Mr. Trump, without evidence, said that diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI, initiatives at the Federal Aviation Administration have lowered the quality and talent of air traffic controllers.
“I couldn’t tell you what he was talking about because the quality of air traffic controllers out there is outstanding,” Daniels said.
CBS News has learned two controllers were doing multiple jobs at the time of the accident. The same air traffic control worker managing helicopter traffic was also handling some planes taking off and landing around the time the collision happened.
Daniels did not address the staffing at the time of the crash as it is under investigation. He said there is an ongoing controller shortage across the U.S. with 10,800 certified controllers doing the job where there should be 14,335 people.
“It is not uncommon to us to routinely combine positions, de-combine positions,” he said. “There is usually someone in a supervisory position looking at the overall workload and complexity in order to make those determinations of what positions we need open and when we need them open.”
He added: “The number of air traffic controllers that are needed is always a determining factor in and quite often if we don’t have enough people, we begin reducing the number of aircraft we can officially move and safely move through the airspace.”
