FAA to hire 15,000 air-traffic controllers

The Federal Aviation Administration is planning to hire 15,000 air-traffic controllers over the next decade to address an increase in air traffic and a rush of retirements.

Dennis Roberts, the FAA Northwest regional administrator, announced the plan Wednesday at the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport control tower. The agency held similar news conferences around the country.

Nearly three-quarters of the FAA's 14,600 controllers will reach retirement age in the next 10 years, and congressional leaders have questioned whether the agency has a plan to replace the workers.

Roberts said the FAA has streamlined its training and increased recruitment among military controllers and college students. The agency plans to boost its number of controllers to 16,000 by 2016.

"We have enough controllers in the pipeline," Roberts said. "Our goal is to have the right people in the right places at the right time."

After President Reagan fired more than 10,000 controllers after a strike in 1981, the FAA went on a decadelong hiring wave. Those controllers are now reaching retirement age, forcing the agency to look for new recruits.

The agency has 24 controllers at the Sea-Tac control tower, 44 at another Sea-Tac facility and about 210 at a regional control center in Auburn.

The controllers union, the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, said FAA facilities are already critically understaffed. Even if the FAA increases hiring, it will take a few years to ease the shortage because it takes three years to train new hires, according to the union.

The agency regularly has underestimated the number of retirees over the past few years, so controllers aren't so sure the FAA will fill the need, said Isabel Cole, a controller at the Sea-Tac tower and the tower's union representative.

"I'll believe it when I see it," Cole said.

Controllers at the tower are overworked and ticking down the days until their retirement, she said. There are enough controllers to direct airport traffic on a normal day, but if controllers call in sick, there's no one to replace them.

The airport is safe, but if current staffing levels are maintained, the "potential is there" for an overtaxed controller to make an error, Cole said.

Roberts said staffing levels at the FAA's three Seattle-area facilities are adequate. "We believe our data speaks for itself," he said.

Ashley Bach: 206-464-2567 or abach@seattletimes.com