Budget paralysis | Authorities anticipate a significant reduction in air traffic

(Washington) The American Secretary of Transport warned on Sunday that air traffic would gradually reduce “inexorably”, due to the budgetary blockage which is stretching out and leading the authorities to reduce the number of flights in the face of the shortage of air traffic controllers.

These disruptions, which only concern domestic flights, have become the main point of attention in the political battle between Republicans and Democrats over the federal budget, each seeking to blame the other for the troubles experienced by travelers across the country.

Since Friday, the American aviation regulator, the FAA, has been asking companies to reduce their schedules, leading to the cancellation of more than a thousand flights per day, or, at this stage, around 4% of American air traffic, as a major crossover approaches in the country.

“Air traffic is going to be reduced inexorably as everyone wants to travel to see their families” during the traditional Thanksgiving holiday at the end of November, Sean Duffy said on Fox News.

“You’re going to see fewer air traffic controllers coming to work, which means there’s only going to be a handful of flights taking off and landing,” he added.

The gradual reduction in traffic must go from 4% “now” to 10% on Friday, “in order to reduce the pressure on controllers,” said Donald Trump’s Secretary of Transport. “It’s going to be a big disruption, and Americans are going to be upset about it. »

Since the beginning of October, the American state has been in a situation of “ shutdown », the longest paralysis in the history of the country, with Democratic and Republican parliamentarians unable to agree on a budget text.

Hundreds of thousands of federal civil servants have been working without pay since then, including air traffic controllers.

Some of them “will be faced with the idea (…) of finding an extra job to make ends meet, to buy food, stock up on supplies, pay their rent,” the secretary regretted on CNN on Sunday. “Yesterday, in Atlanta, 18 out of 22 controllers did not come” to work, he gave as an example.

These disruptions are in addition to the queues which are lengthening at airport checkpoints managed by security agents, who have also been deprived of pay for more than a month.