. delta 94, cancel takeoff times. tonight, close calls. it would have been catastrophic had a collision taken place. bird strikes. it s really hard to know how long we were going to survive trying to breathe in that. dangerous turbulence. this felt like a roller coaster. it is one of the days you count your blessings. unruly passengers. system meltdowns. we have been delayed three times. there are no more flights today that would get us there on time. america s aviation industry facing headwinds and life and death questions about the safety of passengers and the future of flying. cnn takes you into the air. on the runway and inside the tower to get the answers. flight risk, a cnn prime time special starts right now. good evening. i m kate baldwin. the faa is holding a safety summit to figure out what s happening in america s skies and tonight we re getting answers with a visual in depth look at some of the biggest concerns. we have simulations and fir
us is captain sydney clark from u.s. airways. thank you for being here. ambassador, first to you, what is going on with these close calls? just what do you think? in every system that s complex, we will have ups and downs in outcomes. i m reminded that even though we made aviation ultra safe in the united states, we have not had a fatal airline crash in the united states in over 14 years. that does not mean just because we haven t had a crash, we are not doing everything as we should. there are still improvements to be made. and we are way passed the time when we can define safety solely as the absence of accidents. we have to do more than that and look more closely at incidents. these are concerning incidents that indicate to me in important ways that we re not doing everything we should be doing as
well as we should be doing it. i get the infeeling you don get nervous about much, but are you nervous about the trend we re seeing with these incursions? no, not yet. we re coming out of covid. when we cut back on flying so much and pilots took time off and came back to work, it takes a while to get back up to speed. some air traffic controllers have retired. some facilities are understaffed, over worked and playing catchup. and in a system like that, then there are chances for opportunities like this, to have loss of separation. captain clark, i want to play for you what transportation secretary pete buttigieg said about all of this. listen to all of this. it would be one thing if we found a certain piece of technology in the cockpit or a certain control tower where there are a lot of issues.