Our Objective(s)To assess FAA's (1) processes for analyzing data and identifying risks associated with runway incursions, and (2) actions for preventing and mitigating runway incursions at primary commercial service airports. The audit focused on FAA's processes for analyzing runway incursion data and its efforts to prevent and mitigate serious runway incursions (Category A and B) at primary commercial airports since the beginning of fiscal year 2022.
Why This AuditIn early 2023, a series of incidents at large commercial airports occurred in which aircraft came significantly close to each other on runways. FAA has taken various actions in response to these incursions, such as holding a safety summit and granting over $200 million to airports for runway incursion mitigation, but challenges persist.
What We FoundFAA lacks an integrated approach for analyzing runway incursion data and identifying risks.
Runway incursion data is mainly used to conduct analyses to prevent and mitigate runway incursions at individual airports.
FAA does not have all causal data available for analysis or always share data freely across the Agency, preventing it from conducting full-scale analyses and developing corresponding mitigations.
FAA concluded that a review of Aviation Safety Information Analysis and Sharing data did not provide additional context to determine if there were indicators of emerging trends regarding runway incursions.
While FAA has taken some actions to mitigate runway incursions, it has yet to implement several key initiatives.
FAA is in the process of deploying and finalizing key mitigations, most notably deploying new airport surface surveillance and other safety technologies.
In response to the 2023 string of runway incursion incidents, FAA acted to further aviation safety awareness, held discussions with stakeholders, and continued with long-standing mitigation practices.
An independent Safety Review Team issued 24 recommendations in November 2023 in the areas of process integrity, staffing, facilities, equipment, and technology. FAA has only implemented five of these recommendations as of October 2024.
RecommendationsWe made five recommendations to improve FAA's ability to share data between its organizations and to provide stakeholders with pertinent information for preventing and mitigating runway incursions.
