United CEO Says FAA is ‘Brazenly Breaking Rules’ With Congestion at Newark

United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby said the Federal Aviation Administration is “brazenly breaking the rules” by not enforcing rules that limit the number of hourly takeoffs at Newark-Liberty International Airport, creating a congestion issue for passengers.

Kirby made his comments during the company’s earnings call on Thursday according to the aviation blog The Points Guy. He said that overscheduling the number of flights leads to delays not only for United but for all other airlines that operate at Newark, one of the New York City-area’s three major airports.

“The FAA has rules that limit the airport to 79 operations per hour, and they are letting airlines violate those rules,” Kirby said in response to a question from TPG. “It’s unheard of behavior for me for the FAA to just let people … brazenly break the rules.”

United has a strong presence at Newark that is being directly challenged by JetBlue Airways and Spirit Airlines – two carriers that he called out directly during his remarks.

“The two biggest offenders are Spirit Airlines and JetBlue. Spirit Airlines and JetBlue [customers] are paying the biggest price,” Kirby said. “It’s a disaster for their customers because they’re flying more flights [than] the airport can handle. Unfortunately, our employees and our customers are collateral damage to that.”

Kirby alleged that JetBlue and Spirit combined were responsible for 20 percent of all cancellations at Newark this month and that the overscheduling creates a trickle-down effect that not only includes delays at the New Jersey airport but also prevents United and other airlines from getting crew and staff in place in other cities.

It was actually worse than the 20 percent. The Points Guy noted that through April 20 JetBlue had canceled almost 10 percent of flights out of Newark and delayed 52 percent, while Spirit canceled 15 percent and delayed 40 percent.

United canceled two percent but had to delay 33 percent through the first three weeks of April.