WASHINGTON (NewsNation) — U.S. Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy said that despite recent delays, system outages and staff shortages at Newark Airport, it’s safe for Americans to travel this summer.
“Air travel is safe,” Duffy told NewsNation in an exclusive interview. “We have a number of redundancies in place, but we have seen an aging system, and that has been underscored by what’s happened in Newark.”
The problems that led to hundreds of cancellations and delays at Newark appear to have improved since the Federal Aviation Administration limited the number of flights at the airport, allowing it to handle the volume with the available number of controllers.
The already short-staffed air traffic control facility in Philadelphia, which directs planes in and out of Newark, lost five controllers to trauma leave after the first radar and communications outage on April 28, and another is currently on medical leave.
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That left the facility with only 16 certified controllers and five supervisors. Duffy said there are another 16 experienced controllers in training that he hopes will start to get certified between now and October.
“On average, there were about 50 to 54 flights departing an hour in Newark,” said Duffy. “We’re now down to 28. The runway is going to come back online in Newark by June 15 and we’ll go up to 34 so we’re still slow. But the key now is that if you book your flight, you’re going to fly, you’re not going to sit and be delayed for four hours like we saw when we had the outage.”
Despite the agency’s touted improvements, the Transportation Department is still hoping Congress will allocate more money for repairs.
“So in the big, beautiful bill, there’s $12.5 billion that came from the House,” said Duffy. “I think the Senate is going to provide some additional money as well. How much, I’m not sure. But this is about efficiency, right?”
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As the head of a federal agency, Duffy said there were some initial “hiccups” working with Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency team but said “he’s a great partner.”
“There were some hiccups, I would say, when we first started with DOGE,” he said. “But as it was new, with $36 trillion in debt, the purpose was right. But the integration and implementation was a little more challenging. I got along well with Elon.”
