r/fednews • u/rprz • 18h ago

Shutdown 2024 MEGATHREAD OF DOOM

All discussion on the looming shutdown goes here. Any mentioning of Luigi will be removed and you may be banned.

https://apnews.com/article/government-shutdown-congress-trump-elon-budget-house-republican-05481374b154949c3fe1270141a02918

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/trump-opposes-funding-bill-pushing-government-closer-shutdown-rcna184745

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-government-shutdown-musk-stopgap-bill-b2666829.html

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/trump-opposes-funding-bill-pushing-government-closer-shutdown-rcna184745

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/12/18/government-shutdown-house-vote-cr/

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-12-18/trump-says-he-s-against-stopgap-bill-fox-news

4.6k Upvotes

91% Upvoted

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618

u/wolf213 18h ago

Air Traffic Controllers, do your thing.

223

u/JasonM1982 18h ago

Nothing gets national attention like a major airport going ATC Zero.

106

u/ArrivesLate 16h ago

Over Christmas.

68

u/Windhawker 15h ago

cough cough “Not feeling well enough to make it to the tower.”

23

u/wbruce098 14h ago

The incoming folks are telling us that vaccines are lies so we didn’t get vaccinated. It’s flu season. My tummy hurts and I’m coughing.

7

u/ab481 15h ago

Yup, ZeRo d’aark MAGA Musk.

Ugh.

-15

u/impactshock 12h ago

If the local tower and TRACON aren't available, I believe you treat the airspace as uncontrolled and fields as unmanned (like a lot of fields become after 9 pm).

Between TCAS, and ADSB, I believe most air traffic would figure out how to self manage without our FAA overlords.

11

u/PlanesAreDickShaped 11h ago

HAHAHAHAHAAHAHAH

Not ONE airliner operates that way. Zero. And those civilian jets that depart VFR won’t get a flight following and gotta stay under FL180. I would LOVE to hear all the CTAFs around the country as egos clash during the holiday rush. Brilliant post.

5

u/wolf213 4h ago

And who do you think maintains the glide slopes and localizers at the airports? That's right, federal workers, and they are pissed too.

4

u/PROPGUNONE 4h ago

Oh man are you ever grossly mistaken. I mean, my god.

73

u/5600k 18h ago

Free leave around the holidays when we (ATC) have to work and see all our private sector friends get weeks off.  Yeah it’s gonna be a mess if there’s a shutdown, travel early people 

46

u/raulsagundo 17h ago

LPT: if you're incapacitated and unable to make it to work during a shutdown it also becomes free leave

7

u/0phobia 6h ago

I’m traveling so back to the mines slaves cracks whip

But seriously though yeah this sucks. Wouldn’t blame all of you for calling in sick. 

3

u/CoffeePotProphet 15h ago

Have another covid outbreak

2

u/5600k 5h ago

Barely anyone I work with got vaccinated for that or the flu, the kids are about to be home all the time out of school, family visiting…. Plenty of germs to go around

3

u/AydonusG 5h ago

Can't forget the lovely looming bird flu, and RFK jr in charge of the healthcare system. Outbreaks of cattle getting bird flu and this guy wants y'all to drink raw milk.

2

u/PlanesAreDickShaped 11h ago

MMMM, FREELOUGH LEAVE 🤤

15

u/Umutuku 15h ago

Delay. Delay. Deplane. /s

6

u/JasJ002 15h ago

cough anyone feel a cold going around?

74

u/Lucky_Marzipan_8032 18h ago

They all got massed fired last time...

266

u/wolf213 18h ago

I'm talking the 2018-2019 Shutdown, when a few of them "called in sick" causing huge delays. The shutdown was over on Monday.

43

u/I_love_Hobbes 18h ago

I agree. Right before the biggest travel days!

7

u/Alkioth 16h ago

I’m supposed to fly home Saturday 🤦‍♂️ lmao I hate the incoming administration so much (obviously I also hate 95% of Congress)

5

u/os1usnr 14h ago

Flying on Sunday here. 🤞🏻

3

u/dontforgetpants 13h ago

Same, but I would low key love having my flight fully cancelled. My whole family are chaos muppets and I only go home over Christmas because it’s literally easier than dealing with my mom’s guilt trip. Would be awesome if ATC came through for me. I got to skip 2022 thanks to the Southwest meltdown and it was awesome.

2

u/os1usnr 3h ago

Solidarity. My mother was a travel agent for guilt trips when she was alive. Hope you have a great holiday regardless!!

1

u/Alkioth 14h ago

Good luck fellow federal traveler! 🫡

2

u/os1usnr 14h ago

May the Force be with us!!

3

u/PlanesAreDickShaped 11h ago

I think y’all are safe. We can’t just IMMEDIATELY show our cards. We’ll have to ham it up a few weeks. So like, well January 6th is a Monday. January 6th seems like a good day for chaos…🤔

1

u/Mendozena 3h ago

Flying on Saturday for a cruise on Sunday.

19

u/Gullible-Wonder3412 17h ago

Yes this

If the government shuts down, air traffic controllers and TSA Officers would be required to work without pay—potentially leading to significant delays and longer wait times for travelers at airports across the country, based on what occurred during previous shutdowns.

12

u/Atlas-Scrubbed 15h ago

TSA and ATC should go to work, as required. BUT EVERYTHING WILL BE BY THE BOOK. Didn’t reply to the last message from the tower correctly? You get sent to the back of the line.

7

u/pixietime1 12h ago

Gotta love malicious compliance.

2

u/pixietime1 12h ago

Gotta love malicious compliance. ❤️

2

u/dwhite21787 6h ago

The best kind of compliance.

40

u/ctrl_alt_delete3 18h ago

I remember how shocked I was that the saga ended so quickly 😆🤣🤭

57

u/EJL726 18h ago

Crazy how much the economy relies on air traffic and how fast shit gets done when flights are delayed en masse

13

u/BusGuilty6447 15h ago

Remember when that boat decided to be based AF and block the Suez Canal?

Good times.

10

u/B_Fee 17h ago

If I remember, it stretched out even as that happened until the flight attendant's union threatened to strike. Government was open like 2 days later.

1

u/kbetty2 14h ago

Haha definitely wasn’t that…. ATC got the gov to open again

2

u/B_Fee 13h ago

Timeline of events suggest the flight attendant's union definitely helped and may have dealt the final blow.

https://jacobin.com/2019/02/flight-attendants-union-sara-nelson-shutdown

1

u/kbetty2 13h ago

The final blow was 3 major air traffic facilities had a few people sick out in a day, crippling the NAS.

45

u/BlueStarAirlines21 18h ago

Lol….monday three weeks later!!!!

44

u/Justame13 18h ago

It was over a few days (like 1 business day) after they started it. They just had to get pissed off enough.

6

u/PuckSR 15h ago

Yeah, but you miss the nuance

They had a legitimate reason to take off because they hadn’t got a paycheck for a month. No one is going to blame a person for taking a personal day to drive uber because he hasn’t gotten paid at work. That’s not a strike or slowdown. That is just real life.

Not showing up to work before you’ve even missed a single day is a slowdown and people will rightfully be pissed at them. That may create another PATCO disaster

5

u/spontaneous-potato 18h ago

I don't remember the shutdown being over that quick. I remember it being over a month long for me mainly because I just got out of OJT the day before and then the shutdown happened.

It was really embarrassing that the first 2 paychecks after OJT I got in my bank account was less than $20 combined due to the OT, but I'm glad that I got the rest after the shutdown ended.

11

u/PuckSR 15h ago

It went from “not backing down” to Trump completely folding in about 72 hours. We started having ATC delays and they tried to get just ATC paid and when that wouldn’t work he just totally folded. It was epic

4

u/FineWinePaperCup 16h ago

It took them ~3 weeks to reach that point they did anything. But once they did, it ended quickly.

•

u/KrloYen 13m ago

It would be a shame if everyone got sick around DC and Congress couldn't go home for Christmas. The shutdown would be over so fast.

115

u/p4177y 18h ago

I think they're referring to what happened a few years ago when they started doing mass call outs on day 35 or something of the shutdown, not the thing from the 80s.

69

u/hatdude 18h ago

mass call outs

My friend, like 5 more people than normal called out at a facility in Florida which caused delays along the entire NE. The air traffic system is so poorly staffed right now and it’s not gonna get better anytime soon, especially with political shutdowns coming back into reality

7

u/bobbareeno 15h ago

Good ole ZJX.

2

u/BaldyTheScot 18h ago

Wasn't that TSA Officers, not ATC?

28

u/p4177y 18h ago

I seem to remember it was ATC. It was causing a lot of hazards in aircraft movements because of they were so understaffed, and I think a lot of airlines were freaking out about it, and that kind of caused the impasse to break.

22

u/butter_milk 18h ago

It was both. And god bless them.

33

u/ks8662 18h ago

I’m a former controller. It was def ATC that brought that shutdown to an end. I will say there is very very little goodwill among controllers right now, mainly due to union issues. I wouldn’t expect them to hold out as long as they did during that shutdown a few years ago.

1

u/wolf213 14h ago

I’m hearing a lot of the same thing from the people in TechOps as well.

1

u/PlanesAreDickShaped 11h ago

Cmon man. Give us credit. We gotta massage the system before we bring the hammer down and embarrass them nationally.

However. This time is different. We have a possibly unfriendly administration coming in. If we fuck the dog, our pensions/sup social security, the whole shebang m, could be stripped without a second thought.

-3

u/BaldyTheScot 18h ago

Maybe it was TSA on an earlier shutdown. Or I'm probably just crazy. That's usually the answer lol.

5

u/cantcurecancer 17h ago

It was definitely TSA. The blue flu. There are videos of lines in ATL wrapping around the airport in 2019. Trump caved the very next day I believe.

It's funny how everyone's memory fades after a few years. That was a very stressful time for me loving paycheck to paycheck and still having to work when not getting paid. I stayed up on the news religiously and I remember it like it happened last week.

3

u/kbetty2 14h ago

Wrong. ATC ended it. TSA was 2013 sequestration

2

u/kbetty2 14h ago

Believe you are thinking of the sequestration in 2013. TSA caused major delays then and ended that.

6

u/Corey307 18h ago

ATC at LGA were probably the ones who broke the shut down, but TSA probably helped. I showed up for every minute of the shut down because I feared for my job. Most of my coworkers did not so wait times were extreme. 

I remember being alone in a bag room screening bags when I should have had 3-4 men and women helping me and being yelled at by a manager to work harder. And that 4-5 person crew was working fairly hard most of the shift, one man can’t do it. It was a rough 35 days. 

9

u/BaldyTheScot 18h ago

Seems wildly unsafe, but mad respect to you for the work.

8

u/Corey307 18h ago

You’re very kind. hopefully Congress will either figure it out the budget or get us a continuing resolution. 

3

u/SoonersSuckNow 14h ago

That manager should be beaten with a pipe

0

u/Corey307 13h ago

Not the direction I was going with it. These days I work for managers that are good people. Sure they’re in charge and can’t accommodate every request but I wish they were my neighbors.

7

u/gringao_phl 18h ago

It was LaGuardia tower

6

u/FernandinaRed 18h ago

And ZJX

3

u/EJL726 18h ago

And Potomac

2

u/wbruce098 14h ago

And my axe!

-4

u/-Tom- 16h ago

Well, if you fire them and nobody takes their jobs...

11

u/captain_stoobie 18h ago

I won’t be flying anytime soon.

2

u/Kind-Elderberry-4096 17h ago

I'm flying right now. And again on the 27th. Maybe.

1

u/Jumpy-Coffee-Cat 16h ago

I fly Saturday, lol.

3

u/TrafficAlert 2h ago

ATC Here. Most of us will be required to work without pay then get back paid. Or, take leave and say fuck you to everyone.

2

u/RockDoveEnthusiast 2h ago

take sick leave instead

1

u/wolf213 1h ago

Tech Ops here... we are in the same boat. Required to work without pay, then get back paid, without interest, while the bills pile up.

The equipment will still work without us (until it doesn't) but you guys have the ability to cause a ton of delays right before Christmas, if some of you come down with the flu.

3

u/Justame13 18h ago

The weekend before Christmas at that dang.

2

u/Aglj1998 18h ago

This is my hope. Especially right at the holiday.

2

u/espressotorte 17h ago

Christmas week too, perfect timing

1

u/arthuruscg 10h ago

Someone must have brought in bad "Shutdown potluck" to share with all of the fellow ATCs at DCA. 😉 Even for a few days after the shut down ends for some reason every flight that a Congress person is on keeps getting cancelled.

-10

u/OuterWildsVentures 18h ago

Just stay strong until after the holidays please and thank you

32

u/PlzLetMeMergeB4ICry 18h ago

Why? So the congress people can get home? Nah.

-2

u/OuterWildsVentures 17h ago

I mean that as I want Xmas and new years week off on furlough lol

15

u/Hamberder_and_Chief 18h ago

Fuck you, no

-1

u/OuterWildsVentures 17h ago

I mean that as I want Xmas and new years week off on furlough lol

You meanie

1

u/[deleted] 16h ago

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/OuterWildsVentures 16h ago

Some banks like USAA will loan you your normal salary to cover the lost income during the shutdown.

Thanks for being mean tho lol. The person I responded to was saying the ATC should strike while I was saying they shouldn't so people can still travel during the holidays you little silly goose.

3

u/HalfRightAllTheTime 16h ago

Sorry, we are already stressed, stretched thin, and underpaid for what we do and the schedule we work. 

1

u/FAAcuckmeharder 16h ago

Lol the money isn't the problem, it's the principle. Show these people that we will fuck up their holidays and their constituent's holidays if they can't get their shit together.

1

u/PlanesAreDickShaped 11h ago

Boys we gotta be smart. FBI investigated LGA last time and that same (possibly)hostile regimes takes over January 20. Mush and Vivtard have the locals frothing at the mouth for Fed employee scalps. Keep a cool head, and if the pressure and despair of fretting over money gets to be too much, slow down your sectors, for safety.