Was money stolen from Air Traffic controllers?

along with all federal employees. How many did? There was already a shortage.

ATC, from what I have heard, is 30% understaffed. My source also said that it takes about 3 full years to train a controller.......

but there is a high burnout rate among ATC's, it's got to be a very high stress job, one I certainly wouldn't want.

fishing bodies and those who survived out of the freezing water, while republicans disparage and threaten them as public servants.

My source says it is way, way, beyond stressful currently. They are only supposed to work so many hours, so many days, have MANDATORY breaks during their shifts, etc. All of which has gone out the window to keep up with the huge amount of passenger aircraft and freight aircraft flying in the air...due to the shortage.

Apparently, the Air Traffic Controllers/Towers for the Military are totally separate/independent from the U.S. Government ATC.......Different navigation systems, Different landing "systems" and "procedures", Different radio channels, different controllers, etc etc

You would think that the military aircraft would be under the control U.S. ATC, at least coordinated, especially when operating in densely congested air space here in U.S.???? in order to avoid nightmares like last night......

We live near Buckley air base in Aurora. They have two F something or others, fully armed on standby at all time after 9/11.
Every week or two, they are "scrambled" due to some airline deviating from normal..... We live about 5-10 miles from the base. When they take off, most of the time they come right over our house, at maybe less than 1000??? feet, with a really high noise level, appearing to be going wherever they please. If they have their "after-burners" on, the noise is deafening, rattling windows. My source says they are supposed to adhere to certain flight paths when taking off, etc, but they seem to sometimes ignore that, making things crazy for the Civilian ATC.....

(I gotta tell you MCE, that if true, it is utterly disgusting to me that Trump is blaming the crash on the "Diversity employment" factor this morning according to NBC).....

At any rate, the complete FAA/NTSB final report on the cause of the crash will be issued two? years from now, long forgotten, except by families and friends of the deceased.........Any information re: the crash, prior to that, is just speculation.........

ATC was in contact with the helicopter and was told to pass behind the AA aircraft.

Amazing that a You Tuber tells the true and most likely cause of the Crash. None of the major Media, with all it’s money and resources have explained the crash with anywhere near this amount of detail……….

Could be that the Media doesn’t want to say anything that would conflict with Trump’s "Presidential Orders"/agenda, esp his recent appointments that will have MAJOR effects on lowering air traffic safety……(95+% of all media in the U.S. is owned/operated by Uber Rich Republicans ????) His recent appointments in several positions affecting Air Traffic Safety, have gone to individuals totally and completely un-qualified for the positions……..Noem, Duffy, ETC……..

Typically, FAA investigations take months.

Is that the cause of the crash? Understaffing?

That's what we need to know.

Most, if not all, trump voters will believe him.

He's the one who just requested all federal employees resign asap. Trump is the one who negated the need for federal government workers.

Do Trumpers KNOW that the FAA and the Coast Guard etc. are "the government?" Gawd, they're idiots.

military appointee who wants to change the military. The messaging should not let up about this tragedy. Eliminating federal employees has made air travel unsafe. Trump is responsible.

Nine days in and 60 civilian airline passengers died* from a midair collision with a military helicopter?? I’m so livid.

Our whole economy revolves around consumer confidence. Trump is creating so much chaos, and now there is a deadly outcome.

*60 passengers onboard, not recovered yet.

on 911. He should have been held accountable, quickly.

into his regime that blaming the MFer will achieve anything among the 5% of voters that really matter. Sure, great for us, but what are we going to do— call for a Congressional investigation of trump’s role.

He looked like a martyr then. He wasn’t in charge. He was playing the victim.

What are we supposed to do, not criticize him for the next four years? Count on the Republican Congress and Senate to do a fair investigation?

Trump just requested mass resignations from the very people who can help prevent situations like this. He owns it.

and they rattled the sabers for those 8 months leading up to 9/11 too. Me and my Mom lived in total fear each and every month wondering when something was going to blow up. After breakfast or dinner, I'd say "Well, Mom, let's go see if something blew up." Then I'd roll her to the TV room to transfer her to her lift chair & turn on the news. And then something did happen. True story.
Well, Mom's gone now, but here we are again, but this time only 8 days after a Republican took office.

And yet again, are we doing enough now?

for the withdrawal from Afghanistan less than 6 months into his term.

and stupid, callous thing to say, especially, since this is an ongoing investigation. And to bring politics into this with all these grieving families right now, is just plain inhumane. But, like usual Trump form, he'll find someone to take the blame

I gotta tell you, that if true, it is utterly disgusting to me that Trump is already blaming the crash on the "Diversity employment" factor this morning according to NBC.....

He deserves the blame. It's happened while he is in charge and changing how the govt works. How's this working so far?

eom

Replacing qualified folks with his TV stooges like Pete and our new secretary of transportation.

And they will only make things worse. A plane crash happens on the same day they fire 100 people from the FAA? Just the stupidity... argh!

now.

Granted, it's too soon to know what specifically occurred. But Trump suggesting that federal workers (including FAA employees) are disposable, while demanding a mass resignation a couple days ago, should wake a few people up.

Sounds like an accusation the Repubs would make...

in this situation, given Trump just asked for the resignations of every federal employee (including air traffic controllers) a few days ago.

Or, do you think we should let that slide?

The point is the two circumstances may (or may not) be totally unrelated. It is much too early to determine or even speculate what the cause of the crash might be.

Last edited Thu Jan 30, 2025, 01:57 AM - Edit history (1)

It's still important to point out that Trump considers federal employees disposable and told them to resign or be fired, when we already have a shortage in these critical positions.

So, I don't care about a direct relationship frankly. But, I'd venture to guess there is one.

If the two are shown after investigation to be unrelated I trust you will issue a retraction of the accusation(?).

once Trump starts telling the truth, how about that?

“The whole my honorable friend…” bit.

And they would do it quickly. And they would do it on every social media platform. And they would have their talking points down - all of them.

It looks like the airline was approaching the runway correctly. Therefore, it appears to be the military craft's fault. Was their an ATC issue? I have no idea? But why did the helicopter fly into it? The helicopter was flying parallel to the Potomac. ATC asks the helicopter if they can see the plane


Audio between PAT25 and DCA tower asking if they have the CRJ in sight. Affirms and requests visual separation.

Link to tweet

Yes, If. That's the point - we don't know one way or the other now so claims that Trump is responsible are at this point without basis.

Or, did you miss that?

Did any cuts he made in the past 10 days involving ATC or the military etc? Were hours cut resulting in decreased staff? Was there a decrease in supplies, support staff? etc etc...

I'm sure his statements resulted in decreased morale. However, that will not be made public because, then they will just blame ATC for all of this.

It appears that the helicopter didn't see the airplane until it was too late.

The helicopter might have been warned, with sufficient air traffic control.

Trump doesn't deserve the benefit of the doubt, here. Fox News will cover for him.

The coast guard isn't responsible for the flights.

ATC has been around much longer than TSA. TSA are the people who operate X-ray machines and make you take your shoes off and check your bags etc.

You also skipped right over the resign now, or be fired later threats to federal workers.

I’m sure Trump will have plenty of apologists that share your sentiments. I plan to encourage dem leaders to hold him accountable regardless.

This was a tragic accident and not political. They will be pulling bodies out of the freezing Potomac all night. Have some respect.

I have respect for the people that died on Trump’s watch. Criticizing his “leadership” does not disrespect those who perished. Criticizing his desire to gut the federal government, which prevents tragedies like these - is important to point out. May the deaths of those who perished not be in vain.

It is respectful to not start pointing fingers and trying to lay blame -with no evidence and scant facts about the accident- when the victims and possible survivors haven't even been recovered from the wreckage and water. At the time of the OP, it was not known if there were any survivors.

Furthermore, those of us in and around DC can be especially touchy about respecting the families and victims of plane crashes in the icy Potomac. We've seen the herculean and heartbreaking rescue efforts of this very situation before, live as it happened, and it was traumatic af.

Blaming the current administration for the accident because of a hiring freeze implemented last week is definitely jumping the gun. It sounds like Trump Derangement Syndrome, tbh. The whole "blame them first because they'll just blame us."
I get it, but: time and place, man. Time and place.

What he has done is, indeed, horrible. I hate him and would like nothing more than to blame him and effin Elon for everything that goes wrong. There's a scary amount of things we'll being going through over the next few years that will be directly and obviously their fault. But, air traffic controllers take their job VERY seriously. The same number of people were likely working last night as there were a few weeks ago, during the prior administration. Changes in such a hugely important, controlled and regulated industry don't happen overnight. Or over few weeks, even. Especially when it involves security around DC, in any capacity.

Accident are terrible but they do happen. Wait for the facts, the actual details of went wrong in a tragedy like this one, before laying blame. Let the families of the passengers know if their loved one is even alive before pointing fingers at politicians. That's what is respectful.

Just my 2 cents.

that prevent situations like this. He's also blaming "DEI" - today.

Read through the points made in this thread, and tell me he has no blame.

It's time Democrats held Trump accountable for his failures, without waiting for the obvious to present itself. We must start controlling the narrative, or that asshat will continue to do so. He needs to be on defense vs. offense - for once.

around DCA for years.
https://www.cnn.com/2025/01/30/us/dca-plane-helicopter-crash-invs/index.html


The time and place to get him will certainly arise, and probably sooner rather than later. This is not the time and place, imho. We need to be better than them. How is this any different than how gross it felt when trump and his nasty posse of bootlickers blamed Gov. Newsom for the still ongoing wildfires?

"respect" Does that Fuck Face have?

Oh and mzmolly is Showing RESPECT by calling out the LIAR.

Thank You,!

"The Federal Aviation Administration’s leader stepped down on Jan. 20, months after Elon Musk demanded that he quit."

https://www.thedailybeast.com/faa-chief-michael-whitaker-quit-on-jan-20-after-elon-musk-told-him-to-resign/

And DOGE Musk is designing a new AF-1!

with a 30% shortage of ATC, you all should have been around when Ronald Reagan, overnight, FIRED over 50% of ATC when he was in office.

Several commercial airline pilots I knew back then, told me that they were way beyond frightened while flying after that...............
and that fear lasted for YEARS due to the difficulty in training replacements............

Incidentally they also stated that Air Traffic Controllers had to space planes farther apart for safety under the situation, and it resulted in serious delays for their passengers. They also pointed out, that they were ORDERED not to say to the passengers, that the delay was due to Air Traffic Controllers......

BTW, both pilots had tens of thousands of hours flying commercial passenger jets, both were die hard Republicans, and also voted for Reagan for a second term........imagine that....LOL

BTW, this 30% shortage in ATC began back in Trump's first term. And interestingly ATC during the Covid period were EVEN BUSIER than normal, even though many passenger flights were cancelled.....this was due to the huge increase in Air Freight flights of PPE going on around he country and supplies coming in from other countries on freight aircraft.......

Noem as head of Homeland security runs the Coast Guard.
Chump is at fault just by being president.

That was all that was available as I watching everything unfold on Agenda Free TV last night.

There have been quite a few articles written today.

It should be made clear that Trump wants to gut aviation safety. There’s no reason not to exploit that weakness.

Yeah, and apparently endless rationalizations for doing so (just like the Repugs).

Frankly I think Trump and his cronies are going to crash and burn on their own and there is little to be gained by going down with them.

Plonk.

eom

He only cares about himself

Musk is working on the new Air Force One. I’m sure even Trump has seen his SpaceX rockets go boom.

There are actually TWO being built.......

They both started production during Trump's first term........

Trump didn't like the exterior paint job, designed by Jacquie Kennedy when they were built.
Sooooo, he ordered a new exterior paint job. Three horizontal bands of color: Red White and Blue. Much like the Russian Flag, but in a different order........

Biden cancelled his exterior paint order. Now Trump will dictate a return to the RWB stripes.......

Philosophically approached the way the Titan submersible was. No time for regulatory groups to examine. Billionaire techies & their followers seem to like this.

Look up while walking under any windows of high-rise buildings. I'm sure that's coming next.

CABAL much better defines his group.....Look it up in the dictionary.......

Reagan's CABAL, WBUSH's CABAL, which coincidentally, had a large number of Reagan's CABAL...

Orders!

Unless We STOP IT!

TFG froze hiring when there is an existing shortage of Air Traffic Controllers

Link to tweet

F47 fired the head of TSA...

F47 illegally fired the entire Aviation Security Advisory Committee mandated by Congress...

F47 put a hiring freeze on all air traffic controllers...

The blood is on F47's hands...

Why would you think he'd be responsible for a plane crash?

a qualified group, having studied the U.S. Covid Deaths during the Pandemic states that

there were an ADDITIONAL 500,000+ deaths in the U.S. directly due to Trump's actions/inactions and also due to all the same with Republican Senators and House Members............

Another epidemic/pandemic, avian flu, is on our door step, and Trump has already cancelled our membership in the World Health Organization, and will be eliminating or cancelling the National Disease Control agency..... In addition he appointed RFK jr to office and he is trying to cancel ALL vaccine mandates in the U.S. including kids vaccinations.

I is rumored that, in fact, Kennedy made sure to have HIS grandchildren vaccinated with all the normal childhood vaccinations.

Maybe that is their plan; to vaccinate THEIR kids and Republicans, and encourage their 74+ Million voters to not get vaccinated along with all the dems......."Creative Genocide" ???????????????????????????????????

No problem - former realty show personality and Fox News contributor Sean Duffy has been confirmed as the Secretary of Transportation. As evidenced by the news conference on the tragedy tonight, he will ‘um’ his way through this ordeal.

Budget cuts impacting federal workers at airports will be devastating.

what kind of a commander finks out in a crisis? The republicon kind.

➡️ January 20: FAA director fired
➡️ January 21: Air Traffic Controller hiring frozen
➡️ January 22: Aviation Safety Advisory Committee disbanded
➡️ January 28: Buyout/retirement demand sent to existing employees
➡️ January 29: First American mid-air collision in 16 years

Not just incompetent or negligent, it's was purposeful and criminal. Trump should face the consequences.

That's where we're at.

Travelers Need to Have Safe Sky Travel, and Congress Needs to have more Air Traffic Controllers Working to Keep Us Safe

I gotta tell you, that if true, it is utterly disgusting to me that Trump is blaming the crash cause, on the "Diversity employment" factor this morning according to NBC.....

MINORITY AIR TRAFFIC CONROLLERS ARE TO BLAME !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Every Democrat need to repeat that ad nauseum

but he's never held accountable for anything.

It's up to us to do so.

There is normally one controller for landing and another for takeoffs.
This guy was assigned both.
I haven't heard why this happened though.

in addition to the victims of the crash.