FAA-NATCA Safety Partnership Identifies Top Safety Concerns
Thursday, May 12, 2011

The Partnership for Safety between the FAA, National Air Traffic Controllers Association, and the Professional Aviation Safety Specialists has identified the top safety concerns they have agreed to resolve cooperatively.

In response to the series of events in the spring of 2010, the FAA, NATCA and PASS launched the Partnership for Safety program. Since then they have been working together to identify hazards within the FAA that need mitigation based on the reports submitted by union representatives and facility management across the country.

The top five air traffic hazards, selected from approximately 500 submissions, deal with:

  • Letters of Agreement that need to be revised at specific locations
  • Class B airspace at specific locations
  • Air Traffic Controller currency
  • Special activity airspace
  • False alarms with Airport Surface Detection Equipment-Model X and Minimum Safe Altitude Warning

The top five technical operations hazards, selected from approximately 300 submissions, deal with:

  • Staffing related to safety concerns, for example, two-person rules
  • ASDE-X antenna deicing
  • Notices to Airmen
  • The Remote Monitoring and Logging System
  • Orders and information sharing

In the next few weeks, joint management and labor teams will determine action plans for each of the major concerns.

Moving forward, the Partnership for Safety is considering a four-part approach to risk identification and resolution. This includes:

  1. Local safety councils made up of management and labor representatives
  2. A national partnership team with access to other voluntary reporting system data, and labor-management workgroups to address concerns
  3. Pilot-controller communications outreach
  4. An awareness campaign to address safety concerns identified through the effort

For more details on the top safety concerns please see the FAA Partnership for Safety page at: https://employees.faa.gov/org/linebusiness/ato/safety/p4s/.

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The new Pilot-Controller Training DVD, as well as a story for GA pilots, may also be found here on the NATCA Partnership for Safety page of the members' site.