SAN DIEGO (KGTV) - U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy took a tour of the San Diego International Airport Thursday morning as he touted President Donald Trump's "Big, Beautiful Bill," which sets aside billions of dollars for air traffic control upgrades.
Air safety has gotten a lot of attention in 2025. Several devastating crashes and near-misses have been seen at some of our nation's biggest airports. Now, the Trump Administration said it's time for an overhaul.
President Trump's bill has more than $2 billion going to air traffic control towers and about $1 billion going to recruitment, retention and training.
However, the bill doesn't specify where the money is going or whether San Diego will receive a new air traffic control tower specifically.
Air traffic controllers would possibly need to apply for that upgrade.
WATCH: Following his tour of the airport and air traffic control tower, Duffy held a press conference to discuss issues he saw and how the "Big, Beautiful Bill" can address them
Right now, experts said these air traffic control centers are in need of funds for hiring and retention, along with the replacement of equipment. One retired airline captain said that's where the funding could really help.
"Increase the hiring paradigm to make sure their people that have real interest and real qualifications to come into the program," said Joe Graham, a retired airline captain. "The electronics need to be updated using satellite technology and getting rid of landlines. And the deficient landlines in the older air traffic control centers that are causing problems and outages, those all absolutely should be improved and updated."
According to San Diego International, the airport is one of the busiest single-runway commercial service airports in the world, and in 2024, it had its busiest year with 25.24 million passengers.
Although air traffic control centers are short-staffed around the country, numbers ABC 10News obtained from the FAA show San Diego's towers are above the staffing standards target, at 23 people in 2023.
In May 2021, the FAA launched an investigation after air traffic controllers diverted a plane just 200 feet above the ground from landing while a second plane was on the runway preparing for departure. Just a month later, in June 2021, another incident: Air traffic captured confusion as one plane was cleared to land while another was still exiting the runway.
All the planes mentioned in those two cases landed safely, and incidents like that at the San Diego International Airport are rare.
Graham says some of the equipment used in air traffic control towers is antiquated, but it all really comes down to a controller's experience level.
"It's all about pay. It's all about retention. So I think that they can improve the school and air traffic, and then they can improve the training, and plumbers become journeymen and then the apprentices, journeymen, and things like that, and they have to they have to improve the pathway to make qualified controllers that are really, really competent," he says.
