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Among the hundreds who lost their jobs at the Federal Aviation Administration is an employee who specialized in maps that help ensure safety for those flying.
Last week, Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency fired more than 320 specific FAA employees.
The cuts included 13 people in a department that produces and regularly updates digital and paper maps and charts used by airlines, pilots and air traffic controllers to stay on their routes and be aware of potential obstructions that could impact safety.
“We have hundreds of changes every day across the country that need to be made,” one of those terminated employees told WTOP. The employee spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution.
This navigation data is updated daily so the airlines, airline pilots, controllers and thousands of general aviation pilots who fly smaller aircraft have the latest information.
“Say, you have to remove an airport that’s no longer in operation. You might have to add airways to a busy airport that has their summer rush coming up. These are crucial and critical to what the air traffic controllers do for their routes and without maps, they could not operate,” the employee said.
It is a highly demanding and detailed-orientated job, requiring specific knowledge of FAA regulations, aviation safety, graphics and map design. Only a handful of people nationwide, in both the private sector and government, are trained in the roles.
Employees in the department fear more cuts are coming, reducing the critical margin of safety for the thousands of planes in the air every day and millions of people who fly.
Highly specialized FAA employee loses job over probationary status
The termination came in a form email citing the employee’s probationary status, with less than one year of full-time government employment and alleged performance deficiencies.
“DOT FAA finds, that based on your performance you have not demonstrated that your employment at DOT FAA would be in the public interest,” the document said.
“The hardest thing about the email was that it said it was performance based, and it broke my heart,” the employee said. “I was just three weeks away from probationary to career level.”
As a career level employee, the person would have had civil service protection from being fired.
WTOP has seen the employee’s performance reviews and they showed an employee who supervisors said was “a leader” in the small unit, always willing to take on new responsibilities and who “produced high quality charts that played an important role in the success of our mission.”
The employee is appealing their termination through the union, the Professional Aviation Safety Specialists.it’
“We are troubled and disappointed by the administration’s decision to fire FAA probationary employees PASS represents without cause nor based on performance or conduct,” PASS National President David Spero said in a statement to WTOP. “These employees were dedicated to their jobs and the critical safety mission of the FAA.
The union also said the timing of the terminations were hastily made and unconscionable considering the recent increases in fatal aviation crashes.
FAA cuts, DC plane crash raise safety concerns
While declining a request for an interview, the FAA released a statement to WTOP stating that the cuts, as ordered by Department of Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, will not impact aviation safety.
“The FAA continues to hire and onboard air traffic controllers and safety professionals, including mechanics and others who support them. The agency has retained employees who perform critical safety functions,” the statement said.
In a recent social media post, Duffy said the FAA has 45,000 employees and less than 400 were fired in this round of cuts, and all of those dismissed were probationary, or first-year status employees: “No air traffic controllers nor any professionals who perform critical safety functions were terminated.”
“I would say to Secretary Duffy that by overlooking these critical safety staff firings, I believe that you’re essentially saying that you don’t have more regard for the public safety,” the former FAA employee said.
“You cannot take the aviation infrastructure out at the knees, and that’s what’s happening right now. Just because there’s the focus on air traffic controllers doesn’t mean that they can operate without the critical support staff around them, and without that, mistakes are eventually going to happen.”
Until the Jan. 29 midair collision near Reagan National Airport that killed 67 people, there had not been a major aviation accident in the U.S. in 15 years.
Aviation safety consultant Jeff Guzzetti, a longtime employee at both the FAA and National Transportation Safety Board, told WTOP he worries the cuts will diminish the level of safety, one piece at a time.
“The charting, the data is critical for safety of flight, for the pilots and the air traffic controllers,” Guzzetti said. “These cuts do, at some level, decrease the safety margin. The aviation safety system is built on layers of safety, the redundancy. And if you remove the levels, you increase the risk that something can get through and cause an accident.”
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