Associate Director of Communications, Art & Design
Laura Roose: lroose@natcadc.org ; 202 - 220 - 9814
Communicati ons Specialist
Sarah Zilonis : szilonis@natcadc.org ; 202 - 266 - 9844.
Senior Social Media Associate
Meagan Roper : mroper@natcadc.org ; 202 - 220 - 9813
Administrative Assistant for Public Affairs
Pauline Hines : phines@natcadc.org
WEEKLY UPDATE FROM FAA ATO COO TERI BRISTOL
Working in the Eye of the Storm
Hi everyone.
When hurricanes form, most people in the storm's track board up their homes and get
out of town. But there are people in the ATO workforce who have the opposite instinct.
They deploy as close as safely possible to the path of every storm, joining federal
response and relief efforts, coordinating available resources, sp ending nights away from
their families, securing equipment, maintaining systems, and keeping things as safe, dry,
and intact as possible.
Over these several weeks of historic weather, we've seen tremendous sacrifice and
selflessness from thousands of ATO employee s – I can't possibly name everyone, but
today I want to recognize the unique role that our System Operations Security team
plays.
The men and women in Sys Ops Security form a core part of our nation ' s disaster
response team. These experts start talking to the Federal Emergency Management
Agency, Department of Defense, Coast Guard, National Guard bureaus , and state
emergency operations centers as many as four days before a hurricane ' s expected U.S.
landfall. And then they put people in place near the point of expected landfall three days
beforehand.
They are in the field to proactively facilitate efforts to save lives and property while also
constantly ensuring the safety of flight. They bridge the gaps in understanding between
the stakeholders who use the national airspace system and our ATO colleagues who
separate aircraft, manage airspace and get equipment back online after the storm.
Disaster response is both dynamic and demanding, and our Sys Ops Security folks are
always models of professionalism and collaboration in how they conduct themselves and
manage in these situations.
That has been particularly evident the past few weeks in the way Sys Ops masterfully
integrated unmanned aircraft systems into the busy airs pace after hurricanes Harvey
and Irma. The System Operations Support Center at headquarters handled the
paperwork, issuing more than 173 emergency airspace authorizations for UAS
operations after Harvey and Irma combined. These teams in the field coordinat ed with
