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submitted 1 hour ago* (last edited 1 hour ago) by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/politics@lemmy.world

“I’ve spoken with 60 air traffic controllers tonight about what Sean Duffy said at the White House today,” said one journalist. “None of them are buying what he said.”

Air traffic controllers are rejecting US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy’s explanation for Friday’s nationwide flight ground stop, raising questions about the Trump administration’s account of a communications failure that disrupted air travel across the United States, affecting an estimated 1.5 million travelers.

Washington Examiner homeland security reporter Anna Giaritelli told CNN’s Laura Coates during a Friday night interview that she’d spoken with 60 air traffic controllers about the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) ground stop, which was just the third to ever occur.

“None of them are buying what he said,” Giaritelli said. “The controllers were saying, ‘We don’t buy that this is actually what’s happening, the reason that Sean Duffy is saying this has happened.’”

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[-] pelespirit@sh.itjust.works 40 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 1 hour ago)

So what really happened? It sounds like it's what we all suspected and it's the rollout of the AI.

None of them are buying what he said because they said these types of switches that the FAA is doing, they don't happen during the day, they don't happen during busy times like a Friday afternoon. They're doing these midweek, middle of the night when there is no air traffic going on.

[-] FlexibleToast@lemmy.world 13 points 52 minutes ago

It also doesn't make sense because anything this important is fully redundant. There is no fucking way switching over a switch/router from copper to fiber should include any downtime in a datacenter as important as the FAA communication/radar equipment.

[-] BooBees@fedinsfw.app 1 points 48 minutes ago

Believe it or not those communications lines they are on are singular, there is not redundancy. Yes, it’s that stupid, they’ve been that stupid about it. Other things may have happened and they may be lying, but there is only one system of communications lines.

[-] FlexibleToast@lemmy.world 2 points 41 minutes ago

I work with the US government. So, on one hand that wouldn't surprise me. But on the other hand for something this important they often have really strict rules and I would need some actual evidence to trust you. Tech debt in these government agencies is insane and it wouldn't surprise me too much if they just had an ancient system that doesn't support redundancy or something like that.

[-] dhork@lemmy.world 11 points 1 hour ago

It's possible these 60 experienced Air Traffic Controllers are competent, though, and can't relate to the shitty people who make bad decisions who are in charge right now

[-] wagesj45@fedia.io 3 points 35 minutes ago

It's also possible that there's a bunch of terminology that's being slung around inexactly. Non-technical people are hearing "switch," for example, and are all hearing different things. Even me, a fairly technical person that runs a home network, am not familiar with enterprise-level switch technology and all its intricacies. My assumptions on hearing Duffy's explainations are different than an expert's and a laymen's.

this post was submitted on 14 Nov 2026
117 points (99.2% liked)

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