{"id":684064,"date":"2026-11-14T02:28:18","date_gmt":"2026-11-14T02:28:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/684064\/"},"modified":"2026-11-14T02:28:18","modified_gmt":"2026-11-14T02:28:18","slug":"the-faa-is-rolling-out-its-ai-air-traffic-tool-nationwide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/684064\/","title":{"rendered":"The FAA Is Rolling Out Its AI Air Traffic Tool Nationwide"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is expanding use of an $875 million AI tool, SMART, to \u201cassist in managing air traffic across the entire national airspace system,\u201d Ars Technica reported<\/a> on Thursday\u2014but the agency says that the route-management software will not affect air safety.<\/p>\n

The FAA first rolled out the Strategic Management of Airspace Routing Trajectories (SMART) system for Washington, D.C., airspace in September and claims it has already rerouted 180 flights for average savings of 10 minutes and 80 gallons of fuel, Ars wrote (that\u2019s just shy of $345 per flight, at jet fuel rates of $4.31\/gallon<\/a> as of Thursday). The agency wrote on Nov. 10 that after the D.C. test, it will \u201cnow use SMART in the airspace of all 22 centers across the country to reduce delays, reduce fuel consumption and improve the travel experience for the flying public.\u201d The tech was already being deployed at some airports<\/a>.<\/p>\n

While FAA fact sheets describe the system as combining \u201cweather patterns, flight paths, traffic flow and controller staffing metrics,\u201d Ars wrote, the FAA also says a D.C.-based team of experts validates findings before they\u2019re ever passed on to air traffic control, and the controllers retain the final decision on whether to accept SMART\u2019s suggestions. Basically, the FAA\u2019s claim is that this system predicts delays and optimizes routes, and that those improved routes are passed on to controllers in pretty much the same process as before.<\/p>\n

Sean Duffy, President Donald Trump\u2019s secretary of transportation, has talked up the SMART launch a great deal in recent months, stating it will help with inefficiency. He\u2019s emphasized that there\u2019s \u201calways going to be a human that manages the airspace in America,\u201d according to Politico<\/a>.<\/p>\n

That said, Ars reported that the National Air Traffic Controllers Association (NATCA) told Flying Magazine<\/a> it was not involved in the \u201cdesign, testing, or implementation of SMART and therefore cannot speak to its effect on the air traffic control workforce.\u201d Democrats in the House have also expressed concerns about the tool and recently sent a letter<\/a> to the Government Accountability Office (GAO) asking that it review the FAA\u2019s SMART implementation strategy, performance metrics, and safety risk management, according to Fedscoop<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The concern here appears to be that the Trump administration, which has a slipshod record on air safety<\/a> and has repeatedly taken heat over delays caused by air traffic control personnel issues<\/a>, is rushing an insufficiently tested system into widespread use.<\/p>\n

\u201cConcerningly, the nation\u2019s frontline aviation safety workforce apparently had little to no input into SMART\u2019s development and have received limited training and information during the current deployment process,\u201d the Democrats wrote. \u201cThe use of artificial intelligence within SMART has rightfully raised serious questions about its reliability and safety benefits, particularly on its potential to interfere with decision-making by experienced air traffic controllers or to hallucinate safety-critical information.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump infamously blamed<\/a> diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives for the collision of an Army helicopter and passenger jet over the Potomac River in Washington, D.C., that killed 67 people early in his second term\u2014dog-whistling, basically. Trump never walked back the racist remarks, but later blamed outdated air traffic control technology, promising to build computerized systems that would be \u201cbrand new\u2014not pieced together, obsolete.\u201d<\/p>\n

In mid-September, Politico reported<\/a> that airlines had \u201cstopped panicking\u201d after Duffy and FAA officials told them the full rollout would only follow a 90-day test period. (It\u2019s not clear why the FAA is outpacing its own professed timetable.) That said, Politico wrote the panic was also driven by a lack of clarity about what the tool actually does, and airline executives were relieved to learn SMART will \u201csimply generate alternative route information that is passed through the FAA\u2019s existing systems and procedures.\u201d<\/p>\n

The concerns didn\u2019t appear to center on safety, but on the risk that an abrupt transition could be rocky, especially if SMART doesn\u2019t work as advertised. Politico wrote airline brass had warned the system could overcompensate for predicted delays by canceling or rerouting flights unnecessarily in a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy. One airline industry official told Politico it was \u201ca big relief\u201d that the system didn\u2019t inject itself into day-to-day ATC operations and expressed \u201csome trepidation\u201d over the feasibility of integration if it had.<\/p>\n

Ars wrote that the FAA gave The Dallas Morning News<\/a> an example of one successful reroute of a cargo plane that saved time, although the agency didn\u2019t provide any specifics or information about its use on passenger flights. Ars also noted American Airlines CEO Robert Isom (a known Trump flatterer<\/a>) has praised the tool.<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t the only tech upgrade the FAA is working on. The agency declared earlier this month that it will finally rid itself of dependency on the 55-year-old floppy disk format<\/a> by 2028.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is expanding use of an $875 million AI tool, SMART, to \u201cassist in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":684065,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[220,20204,4323,218,219,22708,16150,61,60,5681,28730,80,4229],"class_list":["post-684064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-airlines","tag-airports","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-aviation","tag-faa","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-sean-duffy","tag-smart","tag-technology","tag-transportation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/684064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=684064"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/684064\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/684065"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=684064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=684064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=684064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}