Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio news. I'm Stephen Carroll, and
Speaker 1: this is Here's Why, where we take one news story
Speaker 1: and explain it in just a few minutes with our
Speaker 1: experts here at Bloomberg. I don't want to travel in
Speaker 1: the air. I mean, this is part of the problem.
Speaker 1: We just had the worst crash since two thousand and
Speaker 1: nine on January twenty ninth over DC airspace. It seems
Speaker 1: like we are seeing more and more air crashes.
Speaker 2: I think we are seeing more operations that aren't going
Speaker 2: as they should.
Speaker 3: It feels like a miracle that these people were able
Speaker 3: to leave this plane and there was no fatalities.
Speaker 1: It's been a difficult few months for the aviation industry.
Speaker 1: A space of midair incidents, botched landings, and near misses
Speaker 1: has brought safety concerns to the four Flying is still
Speaker 1: one of the safest modes of transports, with far fewer
Speaker 1: deaths per passenger mild than travel by car, ferry or train,
Speaker 1: but events like the mid air collision over Washington, DC
Speaker 1: in January have prompted Donald Trump, among others, to promise action.
Speaker 3: My administration will set the highest possible bar for aviation safety.
Speaker 3: We have to have our smartest people. It doesn't matter
Speaker 3: what they look like, how they speak, who they are
Speaker 3: matters intellect, talent the word talent. They have to be talented,
Speaker 3: naturally talented geniuses.
Speaker 1: Experts have voiced concerns that air traffic control staffing may
Speaker 1: have played a role in the Washington crash, and it
Speaker 1: reflects a wider problem in the industry around the world.
Speaker 1: Here's why there's a shortage of air traffic controllers. Our
Speaker 1: transport reporter Danny Lee joins me now for more. Danny,
Speaker 1: First of all, how widespread is this shortage?
Speaker 2: Stephen? Virtually in every corner of the world, there is
Speaker 2: a shortage of air traffic controllers. In the United States,
Speaker 2: the short full stands at three thousand, five hundred air
Speaker 2: traffic controllers, and that's with almost eleven thousand already on duty.
Speaker 2: In Europe, that number is closer to two thousand out
Speaker 2: of nineteen thives in the ranks at the moment. So
Speaker 2: the numbers don't lie when you look closer at the
Speaker 2: decline of air traffic controllers employed around the world, and
Speaker 2: in a snapshot of some major countries that we've taken
Speaker 2: a look at. So that's the UK the US, Germany, France,
Speaker 2: and Spain. These are some of the big countries with
Speaker 2: airtraf controllers and have a lot of airflight activity. Since
Speaker 2: twenty eleven, that number has actually fallen in terms of
Speaker 2: headcount or just not grow at all, and that data
Speaker 2: is remarkable against the backdrop of there may have been
Speaker 2: advancements in technology to improve the efficiency of the role
Speaker 2: of an aircraft controller, but the pace and the growth
Speaker 2: of air travel overtime has made the role of an
Speaker 2: aircraft controller busier than ever, and especially dealing with perhaps
Speaker 2: a more global complex environment, whether it be related to
Speaker 2: the climate or geopolitics. So clearly, for the role of
Speaker 2: an aircraft controller day to day, they have to navigate
Speaker 2: a whole list of issues that crop up, and it's
Speaker 2: not getting any easier when the growth of aircraft has
Speaker 2: been going up and up and up.
Speaker 1: So then what practical effects does a shortage of air
Speaker 1: traffic controllers have on those of us that want to
Speaker 1: get on planes.
Speaker 2: There are more delays, frankly, that air passengers face if
Speaker 2: there are just not enough air traffic controllers on duty.
Speaker 2: In some extreme cases we have seen in the places
Speaker 2: like the United States, airports such as Newark and New
Speaker 2: Jersey airlines have being forced to cut back on on
Speaker 2: their flight schedules during some of the peak travel periods
Speaker 2: because there are just not enough air traff controllers to
Speaker 2: handle the volumes of planes wishing to come in and
Speaker 2: out of that airport. And that is mirrored when you
Speaker 2: look at other partstored particularly in Europe, where there have
Speaker 2: been warnings over recent years that during the peak summer
Speaker 2: period they just will not have enough manpower in order
Speaker 2: to cope with the volumes of traffic that there is.
Speaker 2: So clearly there is a growing problem and with the
Speaker 2: number of air traffic controllers employed, there is a challenge
Speaker 2: there on how to cope with that growth aviation and
Speaker 2: their travel.
Speaker 1: Does it have consequences for safety?
Speaker 2: I think there is a concern, a lingering concern that
Speaker 2: with the most recent accent that took place in Washington,
Speaker 2: DC that brought into question the role of air traffic
Speaker 2: controllers and the shortage that were there was at the
Speaker 2: time that this accent could happen again if people are
Speaker 2: not careful. And in the United States there has been
Speaker 2: an increase in concern of the shortfall of air traffic
Speaker 2: controllers and the likes of the Trump administration now trying
Speaker 2: to take action to boost the number of staff on
Speaker 2: duty and to improve the aviation infrastructure as a whole.
Speaker 2: And clearly safety is paramount in aviation, and so a
Speaker 2: lot of concern around the world about can the aviation
Speaker 2: industry cope with the levels of growth and with some
Speaker 2: parts of the system actually breaking down like that.
Speaker 1: What are the important reasons behind there being a shortage
Speaker 1: in this particular role of air traffic controls.
Speaker 2: Well, during COVID there was an increasing number of staff
Speaker 2: that had retired from from the various organizations that manage
Speaker 2: the industry, and on top of that, there was not
Speaker 2: enough training put in in order to allow the number
Speaker 2: of people who were retiring to be replaced. And one
Speaker 2: of the more challenging things for these authorities was the
Speaker 2: fact that when you are socially distant, you cannot train
Speaker 2: in close quarters. So training stopped. A lot of the
Speaker 2: priorities at the same time were shifting focus, particularly as
Speaker 2: air traffic demand collapsed, and so we have seen this
Speaker 2: this backlog of training that has not been taking place,
Speaker 2: and only now in the recent several months, and so
Speaker 2: there has been an improvement in terms of backfilling these roles,
Speaker 2: but still we have a long way to go, particularly
Speaker 2: in the likes of the United States, where they have
Speaker 2: seen a huge understaffing in some of its major air
Speaker 2: traffic control centers and so there's a lot of catchup
Speaker 2: going on. But it takes years, up to free years
Speaker 2: in some cases for air traffic controllers to be trained properly,
Speaker 2: and so this is not a quick fix when you
Speaker 2: think about the training, because there is a multi stage
Speaker 2: process along the way.
Speaker 1: Okay, our transport reporter Danny Lee, thank you. For more
Speaker 1: explanations like this from our team of three thousand journalists
Speaker 1: and analysts around the world, go to bloomberg dot com
Speaker 1: slash explainers. I'm Stephen Carroll. This is here's why. I'll
Speaker 1: be back next week with more. Thanks for listening.