Mike Whitaker knows first hand how challenging flying can be. The head of the US’s aviation safety agency once damaged his Cessna after a bungled landing soon after gaining his private pilot’s licence.
The incident took place in his first stint at the Federal Aviation Administration when he was the agency’s deputy head during Barack Obama’s presidency. No one was hurt but the FAA did investigate.
“I was in the unusual position of being the number two guy at the FAA now being investigated by the FAA for not being a very good pilot,” Whitaker recalled during a 2019 interview on Aviation News Talk’s podcast.
Whitaker had decided to get a pilot’s licence after he was appointed to the agency in 2013, hoping to understand its work and the air traffic control system better.
“I needed to just not understand it at a theoretical level, but actually operate in the system,” he said.
Whitaker, who returned to the FAA as its administrator last October, will need all that thoroughness to steer the agency through its current challenges.
The aviation watchdog already had a long to-do list: a shortage of air traffic controllers has periodically crippled air traffic in the US, while safety concerns have increased after airline near misses. Precarious Congressional funding has hampered investment in infrastructure. On top of all this is the crisis at Boeing. The US plane maker is under pressure again after a section of a Boeing Max 737 9 aircraft blew out in mid-flight a fortnight ago.
The FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board have launched separate investigations. The aviation regulator is looking at Boeing’s manufacturing practices and quality control procedures, including those of key supplier Spirit AeroSystems.
The incident has again raised concerns over the FAA’s oversight of Boeing, which had come under fire after two crashes of Boeing’s Max 8 aircraft in 2018 and 2019 killed 346 people.
Whitaker, who vowed in his confirmation speech that making aviation safe was “mission number one”, has a fine line to tread between being seen to be tough with Boeing and ensuring a proper investigative process.
He is “facing a perfect storm right now”, said Alan Diehl, an aviation consultant who previously worked at the FAA and NTSB.
“He’s got three challenges that he is dealing with: first, the Boeing bombshell, [then] the air traffic control problems, and the general loss in confidence in the government’s ability to maintain oversight of this industry.”
Born in San Antonio, Texas, in 1961, Whitaker attended the University of Louisville, graduating with bachelor’s degrees in political science and French in 1984. He gained a doctoral degree from Georgetown University Law Centre in 1987 and started his career in aviation in the legal department of Trans World Airlines in 1991.
“I have your typical random airline career,” Whitaker recalled in a 2021 podcast with Airlines Confidential about joining the now-defunct TWA.
“That was a pretty chaotic time in the industry; Carl Icahn owned TWA at the time and it was about to go through its first of three bankruptcies.”
He moved to United Airlines in 1994. Now in his early 30s, he rose rapidly through the ranks before becoming a senior vice-president, gaining a ringside seat at international negotiations on aviation issues.
He added to his international experience by becoming group chief executive at India’s InterGlobe Enterprises, owner of the low-cost carrier IndiGo, in 2009. He left for the FAA in 2013, spending three years as its deputy head. Before rejoining the agency last year, Whitaker worked as chief operating officer at Supernal, Hyundai Motor Group’s nascent electric aircraft business.
People who have worked with him describe him as knowledgeable, very detailed but also personable. “He’s very focused on people and knows how to build consensus among different stakeholders,” said one industry executive.
Before he rejoined, the FAA had not had a permanent leader since Donald Trump’s appointee, Stephen Dickson, stepped down in 2022. Industry stakeholders said Whitaker’s unanimous confirmation to the role should stand him in good stead.
The 98-0 confirmation was a “mandate from Congress that is extremely rare in these political times in the US”, said Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA.
While the Boeing crisis has his immediate attention, Whitaker cannot lose sight of the FAA’s broader challenges, notably rebuilding the public’s confidence in air travel that was undermined by flight delays, cancellations and near misses.
An FAA-commissioned report into air traffic safety, published in November, found there had been an increase in the most serious type of runway incidents, and air traffic control systems suffered from “inadequate funding” in staffing, equipment, technology and facilities.
Whitaker must also navigate the fight with Congress over the FAA reauthorisation bill which, said Nelson, would “allow him to staff up”, noting that agency inspectors are “drastically needed in a situation like [the Boeing incident]”.
Nelson credits Whitaker for acting swiftly with regards to Boeing, saying “he is in my view taking very pointed action with Boeing that simply did not exist before”.
“There were a lot of people concerned he was too close to the industry but he is proving to be very open and solicitous to all stakeholders,” she added.
Additional reporting by Emiko Terazono
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