Open Threads

The child who was taken to Sick Kids is in good condition.   Apparently there’s one person left in critical condition but I haven’t seen a recent update.  Juan Browne of the Blancolirio YouTube channel is up with his first take.  He didn’t see anything obviously bad about the approach.  He’s got the latest video which was shot from the cockpit of another aircraft waiting to take off.  Everything we’ve seen so far points to a problem with the plane or the flight crew, not Toronto Pearson airport, and the plane and crew are US (Endeavor flying as Delta Express) so this crash is squarely on the shoulders of Endeavor, Delta and the FAA.

(The flight attendants and the firefighters here did a great job.  Don’t take your luggage with you when you evacuate, and wear some decent shoes.)

This is a huge political opportunity with two prongs:

First, Musk’s cuts to the FAA, which are making it less safe.  The original Rolling Stone piece is paywalled, but Democratic Underground has some excerpts:

-snip-

Rolling Stone spoke with a fired FAA employee who was among a handful of employees working on an obstacle impact team at the Mike Monroney Aeronautical Center in Oklahoma City. The team evaluates many tens of thousands of potential new hazards — such as new buildings, windmills, and especially cranes — to inform flight procedures each year.

The obstacle impact team was already understaffed before it was gutted. “There are currently four people remaining over there to do the work of 15 people,” they say, adding: “The danger to the national airspace can’t be understated. This is a very real threat to the American flying public.”

-snip-

Though Musk and the White House claim their job cuts relate in no way to anyone involved with airline safety, Rolling Stone separately spoke with a second terminated FAA employee whose job was ensuring that pilots are medically able and certified to fly. It’s a vital role, especially given the ongoing airline pilot shortage.

“We were already behind,” says the terminated FAA employee. “The pilots already complained that there’s a shortage in getting their medical certification [approved]. It’s just going to be put further behind now.”

-snip-

Second, the nonsensical idea that SpaceX is going to somehow “fix” the Air Traffic Control system.

A team from Elon Musk’s SpaceX is visiting the Air Traffic Control Command Center in Virginia Monday to help overhaul [ed. note: vomit] the system in the wake of last month’s deadly air disaster in Washington, DC, US Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy announced. The news comes after CNN reported that the Federal Aviation Administration fired hundreds of probationary employees who maintain critical air traffic control infrastructure.

The exact number of workers losing their jobs is unknown, but the union representing them said it was in the “hundreds.” The Trump administration is in the process of trying to eliminate thousands of federal employees as it works with Congressional Republicans on a massive tax cutting bill that is said to favor mostly corporations and the wealthy.

If I’m in SpaceX management and King Elon calls up to have me send some people to “fix” the air traffic control system, I’m sending the most annoying, incompetent assholes that I can find, so let’s start there.  Continue with the fact that the FAA has gone through a 20 year cycle with a lack of radar system replacement (according to their own document).  This means that the systems are old, and the people who repair them have years of experience on how to maintain old radars.  ATC radar and whatever radar SpaceX uses to track launches are completely different animals.

The FAA is understaffed, removing more staff will just lessen safety, and a lot of people are nervous flyers.  I think the natural inclination of the responsible party is to not scare people unnecessarily.  I’m telling you that I’m scared of flying, and scaring people right now is necessary.

Quick Post on the Toronto CrashPost + Comments (85)

Thanks to everyone who sent protest pics from yesterday.  I’m going to post your reports and pics soon.  But, sheesh, seems like everybody’s quitting, and it isn’t quiet quitting,  so I wanted to cover that first.

Let’s start in New York City.  Yesterday, four deputy mayors resigned their posts.  There are eight in total.  The city comptroller, Brian Lander,  sent a letter to Adams asking him to provide a contingency plan by the end of the week, otherwise Lander might convene an “Inability Committee” meeting, which is the way under the Section 10 of the City Charter to remove the mayor if the governor doesn’t act.  Kathy Hochul, who needs a lot of weathermen to see which way the wind is blowing, issued a statement that seemed like she’s actually considering using her power to remove Adams.  She’s going to meet with key members of the downstate machine as well as Lander today:

CBS News New York’s Marcia Kramer has learned the meetings Hochul will have will be one on one with New York political leaders, including City Comptroller Brad Lander, City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, and Queens Congressman Gregory Meeks.

Kramer has also learned everything is on the table, including the mayor deciding to resign or deciding not to run for reelection, and even the governor using her powers to remove the mayor from the power, something that has never happened in New York state history.

While it’s true that the mayor has never been removed, FDR started the process and had court rulings saying he could do so back when he was governor (the mayor resigned instead), and Pataki removed the Bronx DA from a case and won court rulings on that.

The state of play on the dismissal of Adams’ charges is that Young Voldemort Bove apparently put all the remaining public integrity prosecutors in a room and said nobody’s leaving until someone files a dismissal on Adam’s charges. The dismissal was filed by two attorneys, Antoinette Bacon and Edward Sullivan.   I’m not an expert, but reading that filing, it’s all “The Acting Attorney General determined…” — that’s Bove.  So, I think they filed the dismissal but basically hope to keep their careers and bar cards by simply reporting what Bove told them to do.  The federal judge handling the case, Dale E. Ho, has scheduled a hearing for tomorrow.

The DOGErs got another one:

The top official at the Social Security Administration stepped down after a clash with DOGE employees over access to sensitive personal records, two sources told ABC News.

Michelle King, a career official who served at the agency for more than 30 years, was serving as acting commissioner of the Social Security Administration but left the agency after she was replaced with Leland Dudek this weekend.

Sources said that DOGE employees were seeking access to an internal data system which includes sensitive, personal information of Americans.

Presumably King’s replacement will be more open to letting Elon have every American’s data so he can enroll us all in his new payment system on X.

Edit: Sorry, missed another one:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The top federal prosecutor who supervised criminal cases at the Washington, D.C. U.S. Attorney’s office resigned on Tuesday, citing what she described as an improper demand by officials appointed by President Donald Trump’s administration to launch a criminal probe and pursue an asset freeze.

In a letter to the interim U.S. Attorney Ed Martin reviewed by Reuters, the office’s criminal chief Denise Cheung wrote that the Trump administration had ordered her to investigate a government contract awarded during Joe Biden’s administration and pursue a freeze of the recipient’s assets.

She said that neither request was supported by the evidence, which she said she was provided with by the Deputy Attorney General’s office.

Cheung is a 24-year career prosecutor at DoJ.  I’m sure her replacement, someone who graduated from Liberty University and just passed the bar on their third try, will be up to the task.

Everybody’s QuittingPost + Comments (102)