this post was submitted on 17 Feb 2025
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Summary

Trump is firing hundreds of Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) employees despite recent fatal air crashes, CNN reports.

The AFL-CIO says terminations were issued Friday, with affected staff possibly locked out of FAA facilities after Monday.

Aviation safety union PASS calls the cuts “dangerous,” especially after four deadly incidents in the past month.

Critics argue these moves risk public safety amid ongoing air traffic controller shortages.

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[–] [email protected] 224 points 4 days ago (2 children)

This is a great time for anyone thinking of flying to the U.S. to reconsider.

America is becoming a very dangerous country to visit and travel inside.

Best to find another destination to travel in that’s safe and can ensure you remain safe. American cannot.

[–] [email protected] 126 points 4 days ago (6 children)

What's wild is how quickly a motivated fascist has been able to dismantle the government..

[–] [email protected] 100 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (2 children)

That's usually how it goes. It comes tumbling down very quickly. Hitler dismantled democracy in 53 days. We're 4 weeks--28 days--into ~~Musk's~~ Trump's presidency.

[–] [email protected] 37 points 4 days ago

You had it right the first time, crossed out the wrong name.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 4 days ago

Trump is President, but Musky is the Chancellor.

[–] [email protected] 40 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Breaking shit is easy (and fast and cheap). A dumb bull in a China shop can cause a lot of damage in seconds without even trying.

Building or repairing things takes skill and a lot of time and money.

[–] [email protected] 38 points 4 days ago (2 children)

Part of the reason Pres. Biden’s term seemed so useless to those not paying attention. A lot of it was spent fixing all the damage Orange Combover 1.0 did. Entire departments had data and knowledge loss and had to be rebuilt.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 days ago

Yep. A whole lot of dipshits were saying Bronzo the Clown and Biden were more or less the same because they were both older white men. Also: Gaza.

And now it seems all of us have to deal with that incredibly stupid take.

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[–] [email protected] 43 points 4 days ago (3 children)

Nope. Took Hitler 53 days. Let's circle back on that statement in a few weeks and see if the government is still here or not.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 4 days ago (2 children)

But Trump has shown time and again that he is completely incompetent compared to Hitler!
But maybe he has better help, so we can't even rely on his incompetence anymore? 😬

[–] [email protected] 26 points 4 days ago (2 children)

Hitler was a fucking idiot too...

[–] [email protected] 16 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Hitler was extremely charismatic, an effective speaker and a clever politician. He was a terrible commander, compounded by his inability to acknowledge and account for that weakness, but in the run-up to the war and in the opening phase, he correctly estimated and effectively capitalised on the other powers' reluctance to fight another war.

In Musk and Trump, you can observe a similar phenomenon: the ability to hit the right notes with the right people in order to rile them up and seize the moment before their opponents manage to effectively rally and organise a resistance. Whether by blind luck, intuition or cunning calculation, their results aren't those of fumbling idiots. However idiotic they may seem to us, their success (so far) proves they got something right.

But the story isn't over yet. If I'm wrong and they do end up fumbling their big chance, I'll happily rescind those words. But as it stands now, I'd rather not underestimate their cunning.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 4 days ago

But maybe he has better help, so we can't even rely on his incompetence

What he has this time is no "adults in the room" to act as guardrails. He's surrounded himself with sycophants and yes-men, so there's nobody to stop him from flailing randomly and breaking shit.

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[–] [email protected] 27 points 4 days ago (3 children)

It’s been in the making for 30 years, this is just the endgame. Fox News started in 1996.

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[–] [email protected] 14 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Despite everything, the odds of being in an airplane accident are still extremely low. But they are always even lower if you don't fly.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Despite everything, the odds of being in an airplane accident are still extremely low.

That's largely because of the safety systems in place. Remove those and safety (along with aircraft) plummets.

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[–] [email protected] 90 points 4 days ago (8 children)

It's worth noting that during President Obama's eight year administration, there were no fatal accidents involving major commercial airlines in the U.S. And under a month of Trump we've had how many? Lost count.

[–] [email protected] 52 points 3 days ago (10 children)

As an aviator with a degree in aviation I can honestly say this. It's a miracle it's taken this long for something this bad to happen. No administration, from Regan onwards, has done anything about the ATC shortage (nothing effective anyway). I'm friends with controllers, I've been to several ATC facilities, what they do everyday is a fucking miracle. While it's easy to point at the DC crash and the other subsequent crashes and say "see, Trump did it" the truth is far more nuanced and systemic than that. Also, in my opinion, the DC crash is 100% on the helicopter pilots.

Is what Trump doing now going to help the situation? Fuck no. We need more controllers. Better pay, better benefits, and more slots at the ATC academy.

[–] [email protected] 26 points 3 days ago (1 children)

I don't think ignoring a systematic issue can be put on the same level as actively enabling it. sure, previous presidents haven't helped much, which is asking for a tragedy to happen, but trump has been pretty much forcing them to happen with these cuts.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 days ago (6 children)

Tbf, I think it was just the 1 in DC. There was a military one and a small aircraft as well, but only one involving commercial airlines to my knowledge. Still, the number is embarrassingly high.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 days ago (1 children)

He did change the rules for trains tho allowing much longer trains. That required electronic braking systems. He didn't make that mandatory and gave the companies 14 years to install them. He allowed the companies to force their employees to work longer hours. He was certainly responsible for the Palestine disaster. (the chemical accident not thre genocide)

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[–] [email protected] 89 points 4 days ago (6 children)

Four deadly crashes so far

[–] [email protected] 39 points 4 days ago (2 children)

And it's only been a month.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 4 days ago (1 children)

And I've barely heard about the other three. It took us barely any time to treat plane crashes as we treat mass shootings.

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 4 days ago (1 children)

I have heard of the Plane and Helicopter over Washington DC, killing some 70 or so people and another one with a small plane, killing 6 or so. Which other two have i been missing?

[–] [email protected] 23 points 4 days ago

The move comes less than three weeks after a U.S. Army helicopter collided with a passenger jet that was about to land in Washington, D.C., killing 67, and an air ambulance crashed in Philadelphia, killing seven. Ten people died when a regional flight in Alaska went missing and was found crashed, earlier this month. Days later one person died in Scottsdale, Arizona, when a plane veered off the runway and collided with a parked aircraft.

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[–] [email protected] 33 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Insane corruption, with Musks well documented hate for the FAA. He bought an election and I'd wager a large part of it was for this reason alone.

[–] [email protected] 32 points 3 days ago

Damn, it's all falling apart. They are creating a problem that they can then solve by privatizing it. f_ckers.

[–] [email protected] 35 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Well good to know ahead of time to not fly for the next eight years.

[–] [email protected] 36 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Damn. Didnt think Trump would be the president to curb airline emissions but he just might.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 days ago

The Gang Fixes the Climate Crisis

[–] [email protected] 17 points 3 days ago

It will take more than 8 years to repair the damage done so far.

[–] [email protected] 32 points 3 days ago (3 children)

Confirmed - American aviation is now unsafe. American trains are now unregulated and their safety compromised. I guess it is time to find pleasure in the little things in my home city again.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Back to the all time American classic, the automobile. It's both what made America great and awful all in one useful machine.

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 3 days ago

Four deadly crashes and it hasn't even been a fucking month yet.

[–] [email protected] 38 points 4 days ago (1 children)

How to artificially impose a curfew by making people too afraid to fly. Is this what happens when you get King Musk mad about getting his flights publicly tracked? Gonna bet so, the guy is bitter and corrupt enough the he would want to replace the entire aviation system with one that won't track him regardless of how many deaths it would mean.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 4 days ago (1 children)

You think "the government is intentionally crashing planes" is more likely than "the slow but inevitable collapse of a system pushed past capacity since Reagan fired the workers pushing for better pay and reasonable hours?"

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[–] [email protected] 29 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Interesting to be cutting oversight during a time when Boeing was having so much trouble with its planes.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 4 days ago (3 children)

I mean did you see what oversight did to share prices?

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 3 days ago

And yet another plane incident today...

[–] [email protected] 19 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

They tested the drones (NJ, UK)... They promoted flight crashes to ease into projecting a new fear... Now they will replace ATC with AI and utilize their drones on a mass scale.

For surveillance?

[–] [email protected] 12 points 3 days ago

Basically, it would be safer to fly over Ukraine and fucking Russia. An over worked and stressed ATC is higher risk than a bunch of drunk Russian bastards manning a SAM battery.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 3 days ago
[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 days ago

LOL US planes are even crashing in Canada now. I think the invasion attack just started. Defend yourself!

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 days ago (4 children)

Time to stop putting our faith in flying.

I already decided I'm never going on another dangerous amusement park ride because I don't trust the businesses to maintain them properly.

Gonna be living like native americans before long!

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