EVERGREEN HEADLINE: ‘It is not safe. Don’t fly into Newark.’
Newark Liberty International Airport is “not safe” for travelers, one air traffic controller at the delay-plagued travel hub reportedly warned.
“It is not safe. It is not a safe situation right now for the flying public,” the federal air safety employee reportedly told NBC News correspondent Tom Costello.
“Really an incredible statement, unsolicited. He just said that to me, and separately, ‘Don’t fly into Newark. Avoid Newark at all costs,’” Costello recounted on MSNBC.
The airport, which served 49 million travelers in 2024 and is the second busiest in the New York City area, has been drowning in delays and cancellations for days.
Related: Newark airport air traffic controller screens black out again.
Audio footage shows air traffic controllers telling a FedEx plane that their radar screens went dark. The air traffic controllers also asked the pilots to tell the company to be adamant that the problems get resolved.
“FedEx 1989, I’m going to hand you off here, our scopes just went black again,” one controller said, according to a released audio recording. “If you care about this, contact your airline and try to get some pressure for them to fix this stuff.”
Another transmission shows a controller telling a private jet landing that they experienced a brief outage and to remain flying at or above 3,000 feet as a precautionary measure in case the controllers could not get in touch during the aircraft’s descent.
On Friday, the Federal Aviation Administration announced another ground stop at the airport, with the average delay being four hours.
This outage follows a similar blackout last week when controllers in Philadelphia Terminal Radar Approach Control, which coordinates planes arriving at Newark, “temporarily lost radar and communications with the aircraft under their control, unable to see, hear, or talk to them” for 60 to 90 seconds, according to a CNN report.
The culprit has been identified; authorities are on the lookout for an airport employee who resembles this man:
