BEFORE THE 

DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION 

WASHINGTON, D.C.

________________________________________________ 

) 

Motion of ) 

 ) 

AIRLINES for AMERICA (A4A) ) Docket No. OST-2013-0084 

REGIONAL AIRLINES ASSOCIATION (RAA)) 

 ) 

For a temporary exemption from ) 

14 CFR 259.4 ) 

________________________________________________) 

ANSWER OF THE AMERICAN SOCIETY OF TRAVEL AGENTS 

Communications with respect to this document should be addressed to: 

Paul M. Ruden, Esquire 

Senior Vice President 

Legal & Industry Affairs 

American Society of Travel Agents, Inc. 

1101 King Street, Suite 200 

Alexandria, Virginia 22314 

Tel. (703) 739-6854 

Fax (703) 684-9185 

pruden@asta.org

April 26, 2013 
2 

BEFORE THE 

DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION 

WASHINGTON, D.C.

________________________________________________ 

) 

Motion of ) 

 ) 

AIRLINES for AMERICA (A4A) ) Docket No. OST-2013-0084 

REGIONAL AIRLINES ASSOCIATION (RAA)) 

 ) 

For a temporary exemption from ) 

14 CFR 259.4 ) 

________________________________________________) 

ANSWER OF THE AMERICAN SOCIETY OF TRAVEL AGENTS 

 The American Society of Travel Agents (“ASTA”) respectfully submits this 

Answer to the Motion of Airlines for America (A4A) and Regional Airlines 

Association (collectively the “Movants”) for a temporary exemption from 14 CFR. 

sec. 259.4. 

 It appears that Congressional action is imminent to resolve the problem of 

furloughed air traffic controllers which was the factual predicate for the relief 

sought by Movants. Such action cannot be completed until sometime next week at 

the earliest. If such legislation is enacted and resolves the problem of flight delays 

alleged, then either the Movants should withdraw the application or it should be 

denied outright. If, however, the legislation is not finally enacted or is judged not to 

resolve the problem, leading the airlines to maintain the motion for exemption, then 

ASTA responds as set forth below. 

 ASTA believes that the situation described by the Movants is largely the 

responsibility of two entities: (1) the Congress that created the sequester in the first 
3 

place and could largely cure it with respect to the issue raised here through passage 

of S. 724, the Essential Services Act of 2013, which would give federal agencies such as 

the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the Transportation Security Administration and 

U.S. Customs and Border Protection the flexibility to determine which employees are 

essential personnel as they manage sequester requirements, including the vital services of 

control tower operations and border security, or similar legislation; and (2) the FAA, which 

could do much more to manage the situation through planning and provision of 

information to the airlines and engagement in true collaboration regarding the 

likely course of events under the sequester. FAA’s engagement with the airlines in 

this manner would better enable flight flows to be matched to expected available 

resources. The messages being received by the traveling public now (“expect long 

delays”) are neither informative nor confidence building. They imply that no one 

has any real idea what is going on so “just hunker down and prepare for the worst.” 

As the old aphorism suggests, “this is no way to run a railroad.” 

Nevertheless, the problem is here and now and it may affect millions of 

travelers before it is resolved. With extreme reluctance, ASTA believes the Movants 

have made a case for some relief from the Tarmac Delay Rule embodied in 49 CFR 

sec. 259.4. However, as serious as the situation is, we do not believe it prudent or 

justified to simply give the airlines carte blanche to hold travelers on aircraft 

indefinitely while they wait out delays induced by the manpower shortages of the 

sequester. There is also the difficult question of how to distinguish between tarmac 

delays that are driven by sequester-related manpower shortages and other reasons. 
4 

A reasonable solution would be to expand, temporarily, the hours of 

permissible holding of aircraft on the tarmac before a mandatory gate-return from 

the regulation’s current three and four hours for domestic and international flights 

to five and six hours, respectively, while keeping in place other elements of 49 CFR 

sec. 259.4 such as provision of water to passengers and code-share responsibility. 

This expanded window would help avert massive sequester-induced flight 

cancellations while preventing the worst-case situation of passengers being 

stranded on aircraft for the very long periods that induced the Department, rightly, 

to adopt the rule in the first place. 

We also believe that the exemption should be more tailored, to prevent its 

application to airports where there are no discernable sequester-induced 

manpower shortages in the flight management system operated by the FAA, 

provided, of course, that it is possible to isolate such situations in a manner that 

enables the airlines to plan appropriately. Under no circumstances should a 

situation be created in which pilots have to guess whether they are covered by the 

exemption. That, it would seem, is a sure road to more chaos. 

We further submit that any exemption should be specially conditioned to 

require explicit notice to consumers at the time of boarding that the flight is subject 

to exemption from the Tarmac Delay Rule and may be held on the runway for up to 

five hours domestically and six hours on international flights. 

Finally, the Department should make clear that it will closely monitor the 

airlines’ handling of operations under the exemption and reserves the right to 
5 

terminate the exemption or otherwise condition it if it is abused or if the conditions 

that justified it are corrected through Congressional and/or administrative action. 

Respectfully submitted, 

Paul M. Ruden 

Attorney for 

American Society of Travel Agents 

CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE 

I hereby certify that I have this 26th day of April, 2013, served, by electronic 

transmission, a copy of the foregoing Answer of the American Society of Travel 

Agents upon counsel for Airlines for America (A4A) and Regional Airlines 

Association as set forth below: 

David A. Berg Roger Cohen 

Senior Vice President, General President 

Counsel & Secretary Regional Airline Association

Airlines for America 2025 M Street NW 

1301 Pennsylvania Avenue NW Washington, DC 20036 

Suite 1100 Telephone 202-367-1250 

Telephone 202-626-4234 Fax 202-367-2170 

Fax 202-626-4139 cohen@raa.org

dberg@airlines.org

 

 ___________________________________ 

 Paul M. Ruden