7 ms·

In any event, unless the weather was IMC, where neither aircraft can see because of weather/cloud, which I'm deducing is not the case if they were allowed to ma

In any event, unless the weather was IMC, where neither aircraft can see because of weather/cloud, which I'm deducing is not the case if they were allowed to maintain visual separation, the ultimate responsibility for maintaining separation is with the pilot(s) .. But as I posted, we should not have this happen anywhere in the United States in 2025 & much less the nation's capital. Hopefully DOT and FAA get to work, but I have a feeling that will be the end of DCA's usefull life as a major passenger airport.

jfengel 2y ago
[flagged]
- jjtheblunt 2y ago
  > everyone is expecting to be fired regardless of their experience and skill. How do you know this?
  - SenHeng 2y ago
    Presumably because Trump just offered an 8month severance package to all fed workers. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cnvqe3le3z4o https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cnvqe3le3z4o > US President Donald Trump has offered federal workers the option to resign and receive pay for eight months, in a major effort to shrink and reform the US government.
    - sarcasmatwork 2y ago
      [flagged]
      - defrost 2y ago
        In the opinion of one person who has a grand total of zero minutes of experience of all US Gov. employees being offered resignation leters. The GP comment was about accident investigators rather than air traffic controllers but the consquences are the same, a lot of regular gov. employees are distracted by a current situation with no prior occurrence.
      - cranky908canuck 2y ago
        Ronald Reagan?
        jjtheblunt 2y ago
        wasn't the situation then that the air traffic controllers walked off on strike, so new replacements had to be made to keep planes flying, which was realized by firings? (i was pretty young then, but that's what i remember reading)
        mech422 2y ago
        IIRC, rather then negotiate with the experienced union controllers until an agreement was made - they brought in inexperienced non-union controllers.. source: my uncle was an ATC during the strike. I believe he was a shift lead/supervisor and was NOT part of the walk out. He was appalled at how bad the replacements were and was going crazy trying to get them up to snuff.
      - Brybry 2y ago
        Trump's written order threatening the jobs of FAA employees does exist. https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/keeping-americans-safe-in-aviation/ https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/keep... And this is in the context of a Republican argument that DEI hiring at the FAA for Air Traffic Controllers is a big problem. https://web.archive.org/web/20240308145022/https://ag.ks.gov/docs/default-source/documents/kansas-faa-letter.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20240308145022/https://ag.ks.gov... I don't believe the environment Mary Schiavo experienced in the 1990s was the same as today's environment.
      - mapt 2y ago
        "A reality check"? FAA-employed ATCs are like any other non-appointed federal employees - politics should have no impact on their employment and this arrangement is protected by federal civil service laws. Which Trump is roundly ignoring because he wants to appoint every agency with burrowed MAGA loyalists, top to bottom. If you haven't been following what this administration has said and done with a painful degree of critical focus, it's probably bleaker than you imagine.
        throw0101c 2y ago
        > FAA-employed ATCs are like any other non-appointed federal employees - politics should have no impact on their employment and this arrangement is protected by federal civil service laws. "Trump reclassifies thousands of federal employees, making them easier to fire": * https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jan/20/trump-executive-order-schedule-f https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jan/20/trump-execut... * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Policy/Career_appointment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Policy/Career_appointment > The federal civil service system exists to ensure that hiring and firing decisions are based on merit, not political favoritism. Legal and procedural standards, enforced by the U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board, require managers to provide a reason for taking disciplinary action, give employees the right to respond and mandate that decision-makers consider both sides before taking action against a federal employee. This system is crucial for maintaining fairness; it prevents arbitrary and unjust terminations. > Before this system was established, many new administrations fired their predecessors’ civil servants and replaced them with donors and cronies. This practice led to instability and inefficiency within the federal government. To address this issue, Congress established merit-based hiring and firing procedures that apply to civil servants who are not political appointees, ensuring that government agencies are staffed with qualified individuals who can effectively serve the public. * https://thehill.com/opinion/5107846-federal-employees-civil-service-system/ https://thehill.com/opinion/5107846-federal-employees-civil-... Trump et al seem to want to go back to the system where folks can be hired and fired at will: * https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-actions/executive-order-creating-schedule-f-excepted-service/ https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-actions/ex... Do a search for "Schedule F" for more on the topic.
      - jfengel 2y ago
        That had always been the case. The new administration has already done a lot of things differently from previous administrations. It was largely a matter of precedent, rather than law. It's unclear how much of the current path is legal. And, of course, whether it's good judgment is completely orthogonal to whether it's legal.
        deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
    - rayiner 2y ago
      [flagged]
      - Alcor 2y ago
        This time around it seems less targeted, which gives the perception that it is not really about streamlining, feel free to prove me wrong though. From the document you linked: > The buyouts were not offered in a random fashion, however. We targeted them to reduce the layers of bureaucracy and micro-management that were tying Government in knots. We made sure that departments and agencies tied their buyout strategies to their overall plans to streamline their bureaucracies. As a result, almost 70 percent of our buyouts in the non-Defense agencies have gone to people at higher grade levels, such as managers.
      - 1986 2y ago
        > The buyouts were not offered in a random fashion, however. We targeted them to reduce the layers of bureaucracy and micro-management that were tying Government in knots. We made sure that departments and agencies tied their buyout strategies to their overall plans to streamline their bureaucracies. As a result, almost 70 percent of our buyouts in the non-Defense agencies have gone to people at higher grade levels, such as managers. this isn't how it's being done now
    - brendoelfrendo 2y ago
      It's not even a buyout. They have to work for those 8 months; it's not a severance package.
      - Larrikin 2y ago
        There's also no evidence they have the money to pay if the offers were in good faith. Combined with the fact the two people who came up with the idea have a history of deciding not to pay and instead go to the courts to avoid paying
        jrs235 2y ago
        From what I have seen, if a worker agress to it, they agree they could be reassigned or terminated early (and thus not paid the same or at all). Seems like a trap.
      - brendoelfrendo 2y ago
        Replying to myself days later to correct this statement: I did learn later on that the deferred resignation does mean that the employee is free to stop working once they submit the resignation, and will continue to be paid for 8 months regardless of whether or not they continue working. I don't think it was clear from the initial "buyout" offer, but it was clarified in later communications.
  - jfengel 2y ago
    Because I live here.
    - cjaybo 2y ago
      I also live here but that doesn’t give me crystal ball-like insight into what every single fed and fed-adjacent employee is feeling. It’s a fairly big city! Do you work in the federal space? I have acquaintances who do and their mood doesn’t quite match the hysteria you see on e.g. the regional subreddits.
      - beedeebeedee 2y ago
        I live far away from DC, but my friends in two different federal agencies (stationed outside of DC) are partly bemused and partly shocked at how unprofessional the emails and new directives they are receiving from this new administration are. All of their colleagues are expressing the same sentiment (and my friends usually do not fraternize after work with their colleagues, but they have all been doing that after work just to cope with what is going on). Your contrarian-ness about the 'hysteria' is misplaced. Professional and dedicated federal workers are deeply concerned.
        naasking 2y ago
        [flagged]
        beedeebeedee 2y ago
        > I have no stake here I don't want to sound flippant, but if you have no familiarity with a system and what it does, then you won't be able to make any useful judgments about it. This new administration has made it clear that they do not know the function of these agencies but have decided to destroy their structures. As a concerned bystander who has some knowledge and stake in them continuing to function, it is deeply painful to witness
        2y ago
- rayiner 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - TheCoelacanth 2y ago
    Maybe if the orders weren't so ineptly or maliciously ambiguous and overly broad, then people would have more confidence that safety critical jobs aren't being cut.
    - nickff 2y ago
      The "Hiring Freeze" seems to clearly and explicitly exclude cases like this. https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/hiring-freeze/ https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/hiri...
    - ModernMech 2y ago
      I think they really do want to hollow out the federal government, and we should expect things like planes falling out of the sky as part of that. Given the release of this memo[1] offering the buyout of any federal employee who wants to step down, what I think we are looking at is the Musk-Vance-Thiel axis of the MAGA movement is implementing Curtis Yarvin's "R.A.G.E." plan to install a king dictator atop a neo-feudalist executive branch. I wish those words weren't as crazy as they are, but I mean, what else am I supposed to believe when the crazy plan Yarvin is pushing[2] is coming out of the Office of Personnel Management, which is being run by a billionaire who just gave a neo-Nazi salute behind the presidential seal? Under his Moldbug pseudonym, Yarvin gave a talk about "rebooting" the American government at the 2012 BIL Conference. He used it to advocate the acronym "RAGE", which he defined as "Retire All Government Employees". He described what he felt were flaws in the accepted "World War II mythology", alluding to the idea that Hitler's invasions were acts of self-defense. He argued these discrepancies were pushed by America's "ruling communists", who invented political correctness as an "extremely elaborate mechanism for persecuting racists and fascists". "If Americans want to change their government," he said, "they're going to have to get over their dictator phobia."[39] They're trying to do a greenfield government like it's a startup, turning the US government into a company where they are the shareholder lords who own everything and get to decide who the king dictator is, while we are the employee peasants who don't own shit and have a say in nothing. I really wish that weren't my conclusion but those are the literal words of the guy whose plan they are doing. Quote: "get over their dictator phobia". So what else am I supposed to conclude? [1] https://fedscoop.com/trump-federal-workforce-buyouts-legal-or-not/ https://fedscoop.com/trump-federal-workforce-buyouts-legal-o... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtis_Yarvin#:~:text=Under%20his%20Moldbug%20pseudonym%2C%20Yarvin,"Retire%20All%20Government%20Employees". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtis_Yarvin#:~:text=Under%20...
datadrivenangel 2y ago
Weather was fine tonight. Also DCA is the most popular airport and congress would stage their own revolution if they had to go further.
- stall84 2y ago
  I definitely think it’ll stay open for charter flights (part 135)
  - nopzor 2y ago
    it’s actually really hard for private jets / charter (whether part 91 or part 135) to use dca. requirements include having an armed officer on board. as a result almost nobody flies charter into dca.
- alistairSH 2y ago
  Yeah, it's at least partially Congress's fault DCA is as busy as it is. Every few years, they push to allow more flights, and longer flights, into the airport, because they all want to convenience. Which is silly, it's not like IAD is all that far away. It's a straight shot down the Access Road to 66 and then into the city. Of course, with the RTO mandate, the portion from 66 inward is going to get busy again, but hey, Congress wanted that too, so reap what they sow, I suppose.
  - wat10000 2y ago
    DCA is much nicer in pretty much all respects other than having a fairly restricted set of routes. When the routes are available, I’ll pick DCA every time. It’s a gem, and I’m glad that Congress’ selfishness overrode their terrorism paranoia on this one.
    - alistairSH 2y ago
      That's true, DCA is smaller footprint, so easier to navigate inside. And even better now that the remote terminal redone and linked properly (vs the old "Take a bus and wait on a bench"). But, the last few years, I haven't had any issues at IAD. Yeah, it takes longer to get from the front door to the gate, but that's about it. The security lines are more reasonable now (pre-COVID they were pretty long at times). I pick IAD when I can, but that's only because I live in Reston. If I lived inside the Beltway, I'd pick DCA, but only because of the shorter drive, not the airport experience itself. And I wouldn't want DCA to be shuttered. But, it's been at capacity for a while and Congress keeps pushing that limit.
insane_dreamer 2y ago
[flagged]
- stall84 2y ago
  I didn’t know. this line is really upsetting people tonight.
  - ty6853 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - femto 2y ago
      The Westminster tradition is for the public service to give "frank and fearless advice" [1] in the interests of the nation. It's still democratic, as a minister can choose to ignore this advice, at their own peril, and issue orders. As hinted at by their name, a public servant's first loyalty should to the public/nation rather than their Minister/Master. Maybe the US has a different system? Of course the above is theoretical. In practise governments demand loyalty to themselves and there is little peril to Ministers as there now seems to be little repercussion for denying responsibility. [1] https://vpsc.vic.gov.au/about-vpsc/updates-from-the-commissioner/informing-and-advising-ministers/ https://vpsc.vic.gov.au/about-vpsc/updates-from-the-commissi...
      - Ntrails 2y ago
        > It's still democratic, as a minister can choose to ignore this advice, at their own peril, and issue orders Whilst this is true, the civil service has been alleged to leak/ brief against such orders, not to mention be obstructive about their implementation. The hard part for me at least is telling whether this is because eg "ordering us to make buildings out of compacted sand is hard" or "we are going to drag our feet as much as we can because this is dumb"
      - throw0101d 2y ago
        > As hinted at by their name, a public servant's first loyalty should to the public/nation rather than their Minister/Master. Maybe the US has a different system? Both systems rely on the people in charge being told okay with being told "no, this is a bad idea". The Ministers/Secretaries/Executive may think their plan(s) are a good idea and the civil service are being obstructionist. (Of course the civil service could be wrong as well.)
JohnBooty 2y ago
but I have a feeling that will be the end of DCA's usefull life as a major passenger airport. Wait, what? I was with you until this last sentence. You think DCA will be spun down because an accident occurred there? This seems wild - what am I missing here?
- dehrmann 2y ago
  I only have a passing interest in this, but DCA's approach is tricky, the airspace is complex and restricted, and then you mix in military pilots doing VIP helicopter training runs across the approach. The procedures make it safe-ish, but it's riskier than other major airports.

jfengel 2y ago

[flagged]

jjtheblunt 2y ago
> everyone is expecting to be fired regardless of their experience and skill. How do you know this?
- SenHeng 2y ago
  Presumably because Trump just offered an 8month severance package to all fed workers. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cnvqe3le3z4o https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cnvqe3le3z4o > US President Donald Trump has offered federal workers the option to resign and receive pay for eight months, in a major effort to shrink and reform the US government.
  - sarcasmatwork 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - defrost 2y ago
      In the opinion of one person who has a grand total of zero minutes of experience of all US Gov. employees being offered resignation leters. The GP comment was about accident investigators rather than air traffic controllers but the consquences are the same, a lot of regular gov. employees are distracted by a current situation with no prior occurrence.
    - cranky908canuck 2y ago
      Ronald Reagan?
      - jjtheblunt 2y ago
        wasn't the situation then that the air traffic controllers walked off on strike, so new replacements had to be made to keep planes flying, which was realized by firings? (i was pretty young then, but that's what i remember reading)
        mech422 2y ago
        IIRC, rather then negotiate with the experienced union controllers until an agreement was made - they brought in inexperienced non-union controllers.. source: my uncle was an ATC during the strike. I believe he was a shift lead/supervisor and was NOT part of the walk out. He was appalled at how bad the replacements were and was going crazy trying to get them up to snuff.
    - Brybry 2y ago
      Trump's written order threatening the jobs of FAA employees does exist. https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/keeping-americans-safe-in-aviation/ https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/keep... And this is in the context of a Republican argument that DEI hiring at the FAA for Air Traffic Controllers is a big problem. https://web.archive.org/web/20240308145022/https://ag.ks.gov/docs/default-source/documents/kansas-faa-letter.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20240308145022/https://ag.ks.gov... I don't believe the environment Mary Schiavo experienced in the 1990s was the same as today's environment.
    - mapt 2y ago
      "A reality check"? FAA-employed ATCs are like any other non-appointed federal employees - politics should have no impact on their employment and this arrangement is protected by federal civil service laws. Which Trump is roundly ignoring because he wants to appoint every agency with burrowed MAGA loyalists, top to bottom. If you haven't been following what this administration has said and done with a painful degree of critical focus, it's probably bleaker than you imagine.
      - throw0101c 2y ago
        > FAA-employed ATCs are like any other non-appointed federal employees - politics should have no impact on their employment and this arrangement is protected by federal civil service laws. "Trump reclassifies thousands of federal employees, making them easier to fire": * https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jan/20/trump-executive-order-schedule-f https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jan/20/trump-execut... * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Policy/Career_appointment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Policy/Career_appointment > The federal civil service system exists to ensure that hiring and firing decisions are based on merit, not political favoritism. Legal and procedural standards, enforced by the U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board, require managers to provide a reason for taking disciplinary action, give employees the right to respond and mandate that decision-makers consider both sides before taking action against a federal employee. This system is crucial for maintaining fairness; it prevents arbitrary and unjust terminations. > Before this system was established, many new administrations fired their predecessors’ civil servants and replaced them with donors and cronies. This practice led to instability and inefficiency within the federal government. To address this issue, Congress established merit-based hiring and firing procedures that apply to civil servants who are not political appointees, ensuring that government agencies are staffed with qualified individuals who can effectively serve the public. * https://thehill.com/opinion/5107846-federal-employees-civil-service-system/ https://thehill.com/opinion/5107846-federal-employees-civil-... Trump et al seem to want to go back to the system where folks can be hired and fired at will: * https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-actions/executive-order-creating-schedule-f-excepted-service/ https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-actions/ex... Do a search for "Schedule F" for more on the topic.
    - jfengel 2y ago
      That had always been the case. The new administration has already done a lot of things differently from previous administrations. It was largely a matter of precedent, rather than law. It's unclear how much of the current path is legal. And, of course, whether it's good judgment is completely orthogonal to whether it's legal.
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
  - rayiner 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - Alcor 2y ago
      This time around it seems less targeted, which gives the perception that it is not really about streamlining, feel free to prove me wrong though. From the document you linked: > The buyouts were not offered in a random fashion, however. We targeted them to reduce the layers of bureaucracy and micro-management that were tying Government in knots. We made sure that departments and agencies tied their buyout strategies to their overall plans to streamline their bureaucracies. As a result, almost 70 percent of our buyouts in the non-Defense agencies have gone to people at higher grade levels, such as managers.
    - 1986 2y ago
      > The buyouts were not offered in a random fashion, however. We targeted them to reduce the layers of bureaucracy and micro-management that were tying Government in knots. We made sure that departments and agencies tied their buyout strategies to their overall plans to streamline their bureaucracies. As a result, almost 70 percent of our buyouts in the non-Defense agencies have gone to people at higher grade levels, such as managers. this isn't how it's being done now
  - brendoelfrendo 2y ago
    It's not even a buyout. They have to work for those 8 months; it's not a severance package.
    - Larrikin 2y ago
      There's also no evidence they have the money to pay if the offers were in good faith. Combined with the fact the two people who came up with the idea have a history of deciding not to pay and instead go to the courts to avoid paying
      - jrs235 2y ago
        From what I have seen, if a worker agress to it, they agree they could be reassigned or terminated early (and thus not paid the same or at all). Seems like a trap.
    - brendoelfrendo 2y ago
      Replying to myself days later to correct this statement: I did learn later on that the deferred resignation does mean that the employee is free to stop working once they submit the resignation, and will continue to be paid for 8 months regardless of whether or not they continue working. I don't think it was clear from the initial "buyout" offer, but it was clarified in later communications.
- jfengel 2y ago
  Because I live here.
  - cjaybo 2y ago
    I also live here but that doesn’t give me crystal ball-like insight into what every single fed and fed-adjacent employee is feeling. It’s a fairly big city! Do you work in the federal space? I have acquaintances who do and their mood doesn’t quite match the hysteria you see on e.g. the regional subreddits.
    - beedeebeedee 2y ago
      I live far away from DC, but my friends in two different federal agencies (stationed outside of DC) are partly bemused and partly shocked at how unprofessional the emails and new directives they are receiving from this new administration are. All of their colleagues are expressing the same sentiment (and my friends usually do not fraternize after work with their colleagues, but they have all been doing that after work just to cope with what is going on). Your contrarian-ness about the 'hysteria' is misplaced. Professional and dedicated federal workers are deeply concerned.
      - naasking 2y ago
        [flagged]
        beedeebeedee 2y ago
        > I have no stake here I don't want to sound flippant, but if you have no familiarity with a system and what it does, then you won't be able to make any useful judgments about it. This new administration has made it clear that they do not know the function of these agencies but have decided to destroy their structures. As a concerned bystander who has some knowledge and stake in them continuing to function, it is deeply painful to witness
        2y ago
rayiner 2y ago
[flagged]
- TheCoelacanth 2y ago
  Maybe if the orders weren't so ineptly or maliciously ambiguous and overly broad, then people would have more confidence that safety critical jobs aren't being cut.
  - nickff 2y ago
    The "Hiring Freeze" seems to clearly and explicitly exclude cases like this. https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/hiring-freeze/ https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/hiri...
  - ModernMech 2y ago
    I think they really do want to hollow out the federal government, and we should expect things like planes falling out of the sky as part of that. Given the release of this memo[1] offering the buyout of any federal employee who wants to step down, what I think we are looking at is the Musk-Vance-Thiel axis of the MAGA movement is implementing Curtis Yarvin's "R.A.G.E." plan to install a king dictator atop a neo-feudalist executive branch. I wish those words weren't as crazy as they are, but I mean, what else am I supposed to believe when the crazy plan Yarvin is pushing[2] is coming out of the Office of Personnel Management, which is being run by a billionaire who just gave a neo-Nazi salute behind the presidential seal? Under his Moldbug pseudonym, Yarvin gave a talk about "rebooting" the American government at the 2012 BIL Conference. He used it to advocate the acronym "RAGE", which he defined as "Retire All Government Employees". He described what he felt were flaws in the accepted "World War II mythology", alluding to the idea that Hitler's invasions were acts of self-defense. He argued these discrepancies were pushed by America's "ruling communists", who invented political correctness as an "extremely elaborate mechanism for persecuting racists and fascists". "If Americans want to change their government," he said, "they're going to have to get over their dictator phobia."[39] They're trying to do a greenfield government like it's a startup, turning the US government into a company where they are the shareholder lords who own everything and get to decide who the king dictator is, while we are the employee peasants who don't own shit and have a say in nothing. I really wish that weren't my conclusion but those are the literal words of the guy whose plan they are doing. Quote: "get over their dictator phobia". So what else am I supposed to conclude? [1] https://fedscoop.com/trump-federal-workforce-buyouts-legal-or-not/ https://fedscoop.com/trump-federal-workforce-buyouts-legal-o... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtis_Yarvin#:~:text=Under%20his%20Moldbug%20pseudonym%2C%20Yarvin,"Retire%20All%20Government%20Employees". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtis_Yarvin#:~:text=Under%20...

datadrivenangel 2y ago

Weather was fine tonight. Also DCA is the most popular airport and congress would stage their own revolution if they had to go further.

stall84 2y ago
I definitely think it’ll stay open for charter flights (part 135)
- nopzor 2y ago
  it’s actually really hard for private jets / charter (whether part 91 or part 135) to use dca. requirements include having an armed officer on board. as a result almost nobody flies charter into dca.
alistairSH 2y ago
Yeah, it's at least partially Congress's fault DCA is as busy as it is. Every few years, they push to allow more flights, and longer flights, into the airport, because they all want to convenience. Which is silly, it's not like IAD is all that far away. It's a straight shot down the Access Road to 66 and then into the city. Of course, with the RTO mandate, the portion from 66 inward is going to get busy again, but hey, Congress wanted that too, so reap what they sow, I suppose.
- wat10000 2y ago
  DCA is much nicer in pretty much all respects other than having a fairly restricted set of routes. When the routes are available, I’ll pick DCA every time. It’s a gem, and I’m glad that Congress’ selfishness overrode their terrorism paranoia on this one.
  - alistairSH 2y ago
    That's true, DCA is smaller footprint, so easier to navigate inside. And even better now that the remote terminal redone and linked properly (vs the old "Take a bus and wait on a bench"). But, the last few years, I haven't had any issues at IAD. Yeah, it takes longer to get from the front door to the gate, but that's about it. The security lines are more reasonable now (pre-COVID they were pretty long at times). I pick IAD when I can, but that's only because I live in Reston. If I lived inside the Beltway, I'd pick DCA, but only because of the shorter drive, not the airport experience itself. And I wouldn't want DCA to be shuttered. But, it's been at capacity for a while and Congress keeps pushing that limit.

insane_dreamer 2y ago

[flagged]

stall84 2y ago
I didn’t know. this line is really upsetting people tonight.
- ty6853 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - femto 2y ago
    The Westminster tradition is for the public service to give "frank and fearless advice" [1] in the interests of the nation. It's still democratic, as a minister can choose to ignore this advice, at their own peril, and issue orders. As hinted at by their name, a public servant's first loyalty should to the public/nation rather than their Minister/Master. Maybe the US has a different system? Of course the above is theoretical. In practise governments demand loyalty to themselves and there is little peril to Ministers as there now seems to be little repercussion for denying responsibility. [1] https://vpsc.vic.gov.au/about-vpsc/updates-from-the-commissioner/informing-and-advising-ministers/ https://vpsc.vic.gov.au/about-vpsc/updates-from-the-commissi...
    - Ntrails 2y ago
      > It's still democratic, as a minister can choose to ignore this advice, at their own peril, and issue orders Whilst this is true, the civil service has been alleged to leak/ brief against such orders, not to mention be obstructive about their implementation. The hard part for me at least is telling whether this is because eg "ordering us to make buildings out of compacted sand is hard" or "we are going to drag our feet as much as we can because this is dumb"
    - throw0101d 2y ago
      > As hinted at by their name, a public servant's first loyalty should to the public/nation rather than their Minister/Master. Maybe the US has a different system? Both systems rely on the people in charge being told okay with being told "no, this is a bad idea". The Ministers/Secretaries/Executive may think their plan(s) are a good idea and the civil service are being obstructionist. (Of course the civil service could be wrong as well.)

JohnBooty 2y ago

but I have a feeling that will be the end of DCA's usefull life as a major passenger airport. Wait, what? I was with you until this last sentence. You think DCA will be spun down because an accident occurred there? This seems wild - what am I missing here?

dehrmann 2y ago
I only have a passing interest in this, but DCA's approach is tricky, the airspace is complex and restricted, and then you mix in military pilots doing VIP helicopter training runs across the approach. The procedures make it safe-ish, but it's riskier than other major airports.