The United States’ aviation system is riddled with unsustainable problems that mean it is no longer the international “gold standard” that it was once claimed to be, according to testimony heard by a US House subcommittee on 4 March 2025. The systemic issues include infrastructure that is no longer fit-for-purpose, delays to upgrades, a shortage of staff in air traffic control (ATC), age discrimination in hiring processes, and conflicts of interest among those responsible for making improvements, such as Elon Musk and his newly-formed Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
Congressman Troy Nehls, chairman of the subcommittee on aviation, said the US “must do better” and noted that 76% of Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) systems (105 out of 138) are in a worrying state. According to the testimony of US Government Accountability Office (GAO) auditors,, 51 systems have been deemed “unsustainable” by the FAA and 54 others are “potentially unsustainable.”
🚨As Chairman of the House Aviation Subcommittee, I’m holding a hearing to examine the state of our nation’s air traffic control system infrastructure and staffing.
— Congressman Troy E. Nehls (@RepTroyNehls) March 4, 2025
In its current form, our ATC system is unsustainable.
Be sure to tune in! pic.twitter.com/qczHR2PLNe
Aging systems and few staff to fix them
Heather Krause, the GAO’s managing director of physical infrastructure, said six of the ATC systems date back over 60 years, and 40 of them are three decades old, while 72 have been in operation for over 20 years. Their age leads to difficulties in finding both spare parts and personnel who know how to maintain and fix them, creating “risks to the FAA’s ability to ensure the safe, orderly, and expeditious flow of air traffic,” Krause said.
That maintenance problem has potentially just been made worse by Elon Musk’s elimination of hundreds of FAA employees “including those maintaining radar systems and landing equipment”, said Rep. Hank Johnson from Georgia, who described Musk as “co-President.”
“Dangerous” decisions by Musk who has “conflict of interest“
“Americans are deeply troubled and concerned about how our aviation safety is being compromised by co-President Elon Musk’s glaring conflict of interest,” Johnson added, referring to Musk’s attempts to use his own Starlink to replace Verizon, which has a $2.4 billion (€2.2 billion) upgrade contract with the FAA.
Musk came in for further criticism from Tennessee’s Rep. Steve Cohen, another Democrat and the most senior in the aviation subcommittee, who said the “billionaire” firings at the FAA “have consequences” and called them “dangerous and unjustified.”
Knowledge and expertise are also unnecessarily lost due to US age thresholds on recruitment and retirement in aviation. New air traffic control candidates must be younger than 31 years old and must end their careers by the age of 56, a brain drain situation chairperson Nehls said was “ridiculous”.
I’m working with @POTUS to restore faith in American air travel.
— Secretary Sean Duffy (@SecDuffy) March 3, 2025
Under this administration, we will prioritize safety at every step. pic.twitter.com/vBS9L35yBA
Successive US administrations have tried to address the national ATC hiring crisis, including recent announcements by President Trump’s Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy aimed at “supercharging” the sector with a 30% pay increase. Whether new and well-qualified candidates will be attracted by that remains to be seen, in an industry which, due to DOGE’s federal layoffs, has the appearance of little job security and that is no longer deemed a world leader, even by its own experts.
