Notice how the guys who don't work traffic keep looking to the heavens for answers to an overburdened, antiquated airport.
"Sturgell says JFK's problems won't be solved without new technologies the agency plans to introduce in coming decades, such as satellite-based navigation that will allow aircraft to safely fly closer together."
"Kelley, who now manages the FAA's effort to redesign flight corridors on the East Coast, says using modern technology such as highly accurate aircraft routes guided by satellite would help reduce delays at JFK and other area airports."
The guy who works the traffic can tell you what the problem is.
"Controller Barrett Byrnes, president of the local controllers union and one of those on duty in the tower that day, says the scene has become typical.
"It's not every night, but it's most nights," Byrnes says. "When you overburden an airport, as delays begin to happen, you are never able to recover from them. Once the delays start, it's over.""
Unless you can pour concrete from satellites to make more runways, taxiways, and ramp area for gates, then satellites are not the answer to JFK's problems.
Each airport has a limit. When airlines schedule too many aircraft at a particular airport at one time, then you will have delays, even on a perfect day. Just a small burp in the system has a rippling effect. Thunderstorms blow the whole thing away. Satellites won't fix that.
w0x0f