Record Year for New Controllers, and the Roster Is Still Filling

The FAA has hired more air traffic controllers than in any earlier hiring period on record. As of August, the agency was still a few hundred people below the staffing level it set for itself, so the gap is narrowing but has not closed. Owners fly IFR in the same system as everyone else and depend on the controllers on the frequency, so the size of that workforce matters to them.

With reporting from Flying.