Published: January 2018

Aviation and passenger advocates oppose air traffic control privatization

Consumer Action joined aviation and passenger advocates renewed opposition to an air traffic control takeover by big airlines following a massive American Airlines holiday travel glitch.

Consumer Action joined aviation and passenger advocates in renewed opposition to the big-airline plan to takeover air traffic control after yet another high profile “glitch” in December which allowed all American Airlines pilots to leave on vacation in the last two weeks of December even though there were no other pilots available to operate scheduled flights, resulting in thousands of flight cancellations during the holiday travel period. Advocates released a press statement about the "embarrassing mishap [that came] on the heels of news that the airlines are raking in $82 billion in fees from passengers this year". At a time when the airlines continue to put profits ahead of passengers and still can’t seem to manage their own customer service, operations or technological systems, the same highly concentrated airlines continue to ask Congress and the public to trust them to run our air traffic control system. The press release can be downloaded below.

Other Organizations

National Consumers League | Alliance for Aviation Across America | Consumer Action | Flyers Rights | In The Public Interest

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Aviation and passenger advocates oppose air traffic control privatization   (big-airlines-fees-jointPR.pdf)