By David Shepardson
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The Federal Aviation Administration is holding a two-day meeting with major airlines on Wednesday to discuss its proposal to cut flights at Newark Liberty International Airport in order to address major delays.
The meeting in Washington comes as a series of equipment outages and staffing issues plaguing the airport – one of the United States’ busiest located in the New York metro area – have caused travel chaos.
“The airport clearly is unable to handle the current level of scheduled operations,” the FAA said in a notice issued ahead of the meeting, adding it believes the proposal “would reduce overscheduling, flight delays, and cancellations to an acceptable level.”
The FAA also cited ongoing runway construction at Newark that regularly forces the cancellation of dozens of flights daily and delays hundreds more.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said the Delay Reduction Meeting is the first in more than 20 years.
“Families shouldn’t be going to Newark and waiting five hours for a flight that then gets canceled,” he said.
The FAA meeting is not open to the public, but the agency will release a transcript in the coming weeks. The FAA also plans separate confidential sessions with each airline to discuss voluntary flight reductions.
United Airlines has sharply cut flights at its Newark hub and wants the FAA to impose new limitations on flights there to address ongoing delays. United said on Tuesday it expects to temporarily cut a few additional flights.
Newark has also been hit by a series of telecom outages.
The latest incidents highlight the U.S. air traffic control network’s aging infrastructure and come after Duffy last week proposed spending billions of dollars to fix the system over the next three to four years.
Duffy is testifying before two congressional committees this week on the department’s budget.
The FAA last year relocated control of Newark’s airspace to Philadelphia to address staffing and congested New York City-area traffic.
The FAA said the area overseeing Newark has a targeted staffing level of 38 certified controllers, but currently has just 24 in place.
Nationwide, the regulator is about 3,500 air traffic controllers below targeted staffing levels, and some controllers overseeing Newark took stress leave following a serious April 28 outage.
United on Monday sent emails to 3.7 million New York-area customers and passengers with upcoming Newark flights seeking to reassure them about safety.
(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Joe Bavier)
