Billy Nolen
Billy Nolen | |
|---|---|
| Acting Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration | |
| Assumed office April 1, 2022 | |
| President | Joe Biden |
| Preceded by | Stephen Dickson |
| Associate Administrator for Aviation Safety of the Federal Aviation Administration | |
| In office January 1, 2022 – March 31, 2022 | |
| President | Joe Biden |
| Preceded by | Ali Bahrami |
| Succeeded by | David Boulter[1][2] |
| Personal details | |
| Education | Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University (BS)[3] |
Billy Nolen is an American government official who has served as Acting Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) since April 1, 2022.
Prior to Nolen's appointment as Acting Administrator, he worked with American Airlines, Airlines for America, Qantas Group, and WestJet in safety positions. He left WestJet in January 2022 to join FAA and served as the Associate Administrator for Aviation Safety of the FAA, before resigning in April to become Acting Administrator.
Career
Nolen first worked as a pilot for American Airlines in 1989 where he flew as a pilot and was type rated in the Boeing 757, Boeing 767, and McDonnell Douglas MD-80 aircraft.[4] He joined Airlines for America on July 1, 2015, as the Senior Vice President of Safety, Security and Operations after 26 years at American Airlines.[5]
He joined Qantas Group in 2018 as the Executive Manager for Group Safety and Health.[6] Nolen left his role at Qantas on February 24, 2020, to join WestJet as the Vice-President, Safety, Security, and Quality in Calgary, Canada.[7][8]
It was announced he would join the FAA on December 17, 2021,[9] and become the Associate Administrator for Aviation Safety on January 1.[10] The position had previously been held by Ali Bahrami, but he stepped down in June 2021 following harsh criticism after the Boeing 737 MAX groundings that killed 346 people.[11]
Acting Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration
On February 16, 2022, the prior Administrator, Stephen Dickson, announced his resignation which would be effective on March 31.[12] On March 26, the FAA announced they had named Nolen as Acting Administrator until the Biden administration could find a nominee to be confirmed by the United States Senate.[13] He took office the day after Dickson's resignation.
In July 2022, the Biden administration nominated Phil Washington, CEO of Denver International Airport, to become the Administrator and take Nolen's place.[14] His confirmation hearing was delayed upon questioning about his limited aviation experience and allegations of corruption, but he was renominated when the United States Congress went into its 118th session.[15]
On January 11, 2023, a system outage occurred with the FAA due to the NOTAM system having a corrupt system file[16] that ordered all flights to a ground stop for the first time since the September 11 attacks.[17] The outage sparked criticism on the administration for not sufficiently upgrading systems.[18] Nolen responded by saying that his "agency is working to determine what caused the breakdown to ensure it doesn’t happen again."[19]
On the day of the outage, Nolen was supposed to go to Mexico on a planned trip to review progress on recovering their air safety rating, but it was canceled following the issue.[20]
References
- ↑ "Boulter To Serve As Top FAA Aviation Safety Executive". Aviation Week Network. Retrieved 12 January 2023.
- ↑ "David Boulter". Federal Aviation Administration. Retrieved 12 January 2023.
- ↑ "Billy Nolen, FRAeS". www.faa.gov. Retrieved 15 January 2023.
- ↑ "Aviation safety chief Billy Nolen to serve as acting FAA administrator - AeroTime". www.aerotime.aero. 28 March 2022. Retrieved 15 January 2023.
- ↑ Maxon, Terry (28 May 2015). "American Airlines exec Billy Nolen joins airline group". Dallas News. Retrieved 15 January 2023.
- ↑ "FAA Selects Capt. Billy Nolen to Lead Safety Office". State Aviation Journal. Retrieved 15 January 2023.
- ↑ Curran, Andrew (12 February 2020). "Billy Nolen Says Goodbye Qantas Hello WestJet". Simple Flying. Retrieved 12 January 2023.
- ↑ Frame, Chris. "Ex-Qantas Executive takes up role at WestJet". Australian Aviation. Retrieved 15 January 2023.
- ↑ "FAA Selects Capt. Billy Nolen to Lead Safety Office" (Press release). Washington, D.C.: Federal Aviation Administration. December 17, 2021. Retrieved 2023-01-12.
- ↑ Muntean, Pete; Swire, Sonnet (26 March 2022). "Biden administration taps FAA safety official to be acting agency chief". CNN. Retrieved 13 January 2023.
- ↑ Shepardson, David (16 December 2021). "U.S. FAA names WestJet official as new aviation safety chief". Reuters. Retrieved 12 January 2023.
- ↑ Duncan, Ian (February 17, 2022). "FAA Administrator Steve Dickson to resign next month". Washington Post. Retrieved 12 January 2023.
- ↑ "Top FAA Safety Official Nolen to Serve as Acting FAA Administrator" (Press release). Washington, D.C.: Federal Aviation Administration. March 26, 2022. Retrieved 2023-01-12.
- ↑ Thropp, Christine (7 July 2022). "Phillip Washington Nominated for FAA Administrator Role". executivegov.com. Retrieved 12 January 2023.
- ↑ Liptak, Kevin (11 January 2023). "FAA without permanent leader as Biden's nominee faces criticism". CNN. Retrieved 12 January 2023.
- ↑ Josephs, Leslie. "FAA system outage disrupts thousands of flights across U.S." CNBC. Retrieved 12 January 2023.
- ↑ Altus, Kristen (11 January 2023). "Pilots say FAA computer outage that grounded US flights nationwide unprecedented". FOXBusiness. Retrieved 12 January 2023.
- ↑ Chokshi, Niraj; Walker, Mark (11 January 2023). "F.A.A. Outage Highlights Fragility of the Aviation System". The New York Times.
- ↑ Shepardson, David; Kumar Singh, Rajesh. "Airlines' U.S. operations return to normal as FAA investigates outage". Reuters. Retrieved 12 January 2023.
- ↑ Shepardson, David (11 January 2023). "Acting FAA chief cancels trip to Mexico after flight computer issue". Reuters. Retrieved 12 January 2023.
External links
This article "Billy Nolen" is from Wikipedia. The list of its authors can be seen in its historical. Articles taken from Draft Namespace on Wikipedia could be accessed on Wikipedia's Draft Namespace.