The Federal Aviation Administration is betting on artificial intelligence as part of its ambitious overhaul of the nation's air traffic control system, but its rollout comes at a moment of rising public concern about the technology.
The head of the company building the AI-assisted software for the federal agency emphasized that humans will still be making key air traffic control decisions.
"I want to be very clear because this is important. This is not about automating air traffic control," said Phillip Buckendorf, co-founder and CEO of Air Space Intelligence (ASI). "What we're focused on is how do we optimize the airspace in its entirety."
The FAA tapped the Boston-based company to make the nation's crowded airspace more efficient. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy unveiled the $875-million software tool last week.
"Let's use the best technology possible, the best predictors possible, so humans can make the best decisions possible," Duffy said. "We're just giving them way better technology, way better foresight."
In a wide-ranging interview, Buckendorf said air traffic controllers will still be in charge of keeping planes separated. The FAA's software tool is designed for traffic managers, who are tasked with managing the airspace as a whole, to help them make better decisions about flight routing and scheduling.
"The AI does the math, the AI does the computation," Buckendorf said, but it's ultimately up to the human operator whether to take the system's recommendation. "They make the decision, they are the decider, they are the judge."
Buckendorf compared the process to a game of chess, where the tool can help traffic managers see four or five moves into the future.
"We're looking at over 200 data sources from weather, congestion, turbulence, winds, runway closures, to figure out what is the most optimal flight path for every flight across the country," Buckendorf said. "So that traffic is flowing, flights arrive on time, delays are reduced, cancellations are reduced, which is ultimately what makes a better travel experience."
The system is known as Strategic Management of Airspace, Routes and Trajectories, or SMART for short. It's similar to another software tool known as Flyways AI that ASI built for airline flight dispatchers, which is already in use at Alaska Airlines and other carriers.
But the stakes with the SMART system are undeniably higher.
The rollout will begin with a pilot project at three major airports in the Washington, D.C., area. That prompted complaints from Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.), whose Northern Virginia district includes Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.
"The FAA should not use my constituents as guinea pigs for an unproven AI air traffic control system," Beyer said in a statement. "Dangerously rushing a system that holds Americans' lives in its hands is not a good use case for artificial intelligence."
Buckendorf acknowledged that fears about AI and air traffic control are real. But he encouraged critics to take a closer look at how the software works.
"Come and see it. Look at the technology. I think a lot of the skepticism comes from actually not knowing," he said.
"I totally understand that there is fear about, like, 'this is AI for air traffic control.' But it's not," Buckendorf said. "The machine never makes a decision. It's a human operator, the air traffic manager. And we want them to have the very best technology. We don't want them to run on 1980s software. Who can disagree with that?"
But skeptics wonder how much of a difference the new software will make for an air traffic control system that's stretched to its limits, particularly at the most congested airports and major hubs.
Former FAA air traffic controller Dave Riley called the SMART system "a step in the right direction." Though he cautions that it's not a "cure all" for the bigger problems facing the air traffic system, including a longstanding staffing shortage that forces many controllers to work mandatory overtime and grueling schedules.
Riley thinks the FAA is overstating the impact this software tool will have on the flying public.
"Throw the buzzword 'AI' on it and get everybody's attention," Riley said. "That's what I see."
Still, ASI CEO Buckendorf argues that air traffic managers deserve the best possible tools to make crucial decisions. He noted that the mapping apps on their phones often have more sophisticated predictive capabilities than the software they've been using at work.
"I don't think that's the world that we want to live in," Buckendorf said. "You want to make sure that those specialists, those very, very well-trained operators that make really critical operations when they're on shift, that they have world-class software."
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