FAA to close 149 air traffic towers as budget cuts bite

BBC ^ | 22 March 2013 Last updated at 16:21 ET | BBC

[haffast]

The US aviation authority plans to close 149 air traffic control towers in response to steep budget cuts that took effect this month.

Towers will close at small airports but the facilities will remain open, the Federal Aviation Administration said.

Pilots will have to co-ordinate takeoff and landing by themselves after 7 April using a shared radio channel.

On 1 March, $85bn (£56bn) was cut from this year's budget after Congress failed to reach a budget deal.

"We heard from communities across the country about the importance of their towers and these were very tough decisions," Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said in a statement.

But he said the closures were unavoidable because of the spending cuts known in Washington as the sequester.

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[uncommonsense]

My bad - in a hurry. GWB was in the TX National Guard and flew the F-102 Delta Dagger which The Cavanaugh has a prime specimen. According to Aerospace Web - F-102 in Vietnam, it was a handful

”ANG members of the period who we've been able to locate indicate that only highly qualified pilot candidates were accepted for Delta Dagger training because it was such a challenging aircraft to fly and left little room for mistakes. According to the Air Force Safety Center, the lifetime Class A accident rate for the F-102 was 13.69 mishaps per 100,000 flight hours, and the rate was especially high during the early years of the plane's service.”