January 24, 2019 - 08:43 PM EST
National air traffic controller union leader: 'Stressed' workers ‘making mistakes’ amid shutdown
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BY TAL AXELROD
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The leader of the national air traffic controllers' union is warning that the partial government shutdown could force "stressed out" air traffic controllers to make mistakes putting passenger safety at risk.
"I'm getting notes from people who are saying they're making mistakes that they hadn't made in the 10, 15, 20 years of service that they've been an air traffic controller. They're making them because they're stressed out, because they don't know when this is going to end and they're distracted," Trish Gilbert, president of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, said Thursday on PBS NewsHour.
"We cannot have that in our system. It's unsafe and we need to open the government, get them paid...I think we are less safe than we were a month ago."
Funding for the Federal Aviation Administration lapsed on Dec. 22 and the partial government shutdown began, resulting in employees being furloughed or required to work without pay.