Basically what is happening here is, with increased fuel costs, airlines are purposely putting less fuel in their planes, so that air traffic controllers are forced to get the planes on the ground quicker so airlines can cut fuel costs.  This is gonna cause a disaster, our major airports are taking on way more traffic than they can handle as is. 

Pilots have been forced or pressured by to carry less fuel by their airlines, and a retired pilot has come out and stated that he was pressured by his airline to carry less fuel, he refused, not only because he tried to follow safety regulations, but because of increasing delays at already overburdened airports, which suck up fuel while you wait to take off.

In 2005, only five planes landed with minimum fuel at Newark Airport.  This year, seventy-three have had minimum fuel, and another ten were in emergency fuel situations and had to be landed immediately, or else they would have run out of fuel.

Between the story of illegal immigrants with bogus IDs working in sensitive places in O'Hare and airlines now cutting corners on safety regulations, its a recipe for disaster.  There needs to be a crackdown on the airlines, the decay of safety and security standards need to be addressed, now!

In the longterm, we need to increase and rebuild our infrastructure.  Our airports are taking on way more traffic than they were ever built to handle already, and air travel continues to grow.  Our Federal government has done everything but the basic duties it was designed to perform.  They are failing to provide basic security, and failing to maintain basic infrastructure, and the costs to our nation will be dire.

Posted by: doubleplusundead at 09:02 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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