The air traffic controllers directing planes into the Newark, New Jersey, airport briefly lost their radar Friday morning for the second time in two weeks, renewing concerns about the nation's aging air traffic control system that President Donald Trump wants to overhaul.
The Federal Aviation Administration said the radar at the facility in Philadelphia that directs planes in and out of Newark airport went black for 90 seconds at 3:55 a.m. Friday. That's similar to what happened on April 28.
That first radar outage led to hundreds of flights being canceled or delayed at the Newark airport in the past two weeks after the FAA slowed down traffic at the airport to ensure safety. Five controllers also went on trauma leave after that outage, worsening the existing shortage. It's not clear if any additional controllers will go on leave now.
The number of cancellations and delays spiked after the FAA limited traffic at Newark and has remained high since then. The FAA said Newark is one of the most delay-prone airports in the nation right now. In addition to all the technical and staffing challenges, an ongoing runway construction project is adding to the disruptions.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a briefing Friday that the ''glitch this morning at Newark'' was caused by the same issues as last week.
The latest Newark problems reinforce the need for the multibillion-dollar plan Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy announced Thursday to replace the nation's aging air traffic control system, Leavitt said. The plan is designed to prevent such problems from happening and give controllers modern technology. More than 4,600 new high-speed connections would be installed and 618 radars would be replaced across the country.
Officials developed the plan to upgrade the system after a deadly midair collision in January between a passenger jet and an Army helicopter killed 67 people in the skies over Washington, D.C. Several other crashes this year also put pressure on officials to act.
But the shortcomings of the air traffic control system have been known for decades. The National Transportation Safety Board has not determined that a problem with the air traffic control system caused the crash near Reagan National Airport.