Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy announced a task force to deal with technical problems that have contributed to a plague of delays and cancellations at Newark Liberty Airport over the last couple of weeks. L3Harris and Verizon, along with FAA reps, have been named to a task force charged with digging in on literally the nuts and bolts of why there have been three troubling system failures since April 28. Duffy said the goal is to replace the existing copper phone lines between New York and Philadelphia, where Newark traffic is controlled, with three fiber-optic lines. “We are going to fix Newark,” Duffy said. No timeline has been set other than “as soon as possible.”
The wiring is only part of the problem, however. Like most of the busiest ATC facilities, the Newark section of Philadelphia Center has been chronically understaffed for years, and controllers are working mandatory overtime just to keep the system operating. The staffing issues were compounded when five controllers went on stress leave after the service outages.
There were two total system outages on April 28 and May 9 in which controllers’ headsets went silent and screens went blank. A third incident occurred on Sunday, but a new software patch helped the backup system hold and some communications were maintained. Based on prior experience, controllers initiated a 45-minute ground stop in Newark just to be sure. Almost every flight for the rest of the day was either delayed or canceled, although some of the delays were only a few minutes. The airport is also down a runway due to construction.
To help ease the delays and cancellations, Duffy is convening a meeting of airline representatives to get them to cut flights by as much as half. “The airport clearly is unable to handle the current level of scheduled operations,” the FAA said in advance of the meeting, which will last two days. Duffy said he wants to reduce arrivals and departures to 28 per hour through June. According to Newark’s flight tracking page, there were more than 60 flights scheduled to leave Newark Monday between 7 p.m. and 8 p.m.
