Nearly 2,000 Chicago Flights Canceled After Worker Sets Fire At Radar Center

SpzToid sends this news out of Illinois: Nearly 2,000 flights in Chicago have been canceled so far today as federal aviation officials slowly resume operations at O'Hare and Midway airports following a fire that was deliberately set at an FAA radar center, apparently by a disgruntled worker. The center handles high-altitude traffic across parts of the Midwest. Controllers there direct planes through the airspace and either hand off the air traffic to other facilities handling high-altitude traffic or direct the planes to terminal radar facilities, including one in Elgin, which in turn direct planes to and from airport towers.

Comments

No redundancy?

[billrp]

So there's no provision for having the work done at this center be taken up at other centers? The news reports say radar center, but can't the data be routed elsewhere? What it there were a much larger fire that took down the facility for months? Does that mean Chicago becomes a no-fly zone?

Re:what a difference a day makes

[amicusNYCL]

Police said the man is a contractor, not an air traffic controller or FAA manager.

Reading is hard.

Re:Big Goverment no backup

[Wookact]

You want them to land planes from home? LOL That has to be the silliest thing I have heard all week.

Re:Really, a single oint of failure?

[Xipher]

Redundancy costs money, and people don't like spending more money. To save cost you cut redundancy.

HR still says

[Livius]

cheap contract workers are better than investing in employees!

Re:what a difference a day makes

[ColdWetDog]

Which is exactly why lots of people wonder about the intelligence of hiring on the lowest bidder to clean out and stock commercial aircraft. You know, those people who scrunch down everywhere in the cabin with no supervision. Who load baggage in the hold after the TSA 'screens' it. Who deliver boxes and boxes of stuff to all manner of aircraft.