Federal employee cut air targeted visitors communications with planes | KOLR
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HONOLULU (AP) — A longtime federal worker has been fined $5,000 and supplied two a long time of probation for reducing conversation in between air targeted traffic controllers and planes flying above Honolulu in early 2019.
Joelyn DeCosta was sentenced this 7 days by a federal judge just after pleading guilty to maliciously interfering with a federal interaction method. In a plea offer, she agreed to resign her task as a transportation-systems specialist and forfeit retirement added benefits worth extra than $500,000, in accordance to federal prosecutors.
In accordance to court files, DeCosta severed most important and standby interaction traces concerning air site visitors controllers in Honolulu with about 10 planes in two independent incidents on Jan. 4, 2019. Prosecutors reported pilots could not listen to guidance from controllers for two minutes.
A person of the pilots testified about the threat that was posed to his aircraft and its 40 travellers.
The outages afflicted airspace utilized for flights between Oahu and 5 other Hawaiian islands.
DeCosta, 48, of Honolulu, experienced worked for the Federal Aviation Administration for 26 several years.