The FAA, pushing to cut into a nationwide shortage of approximately 3,500 air traffic controllers, is turning its recruitment attention to gamers.
A new ad opens with snippets from a variety of video games. Then, a call to action: "Are you up for the challenge? You've been training for this."
The ad then segues to snippets of air traffic controllers in front of video monitors in the tower.
The recruitment effort is timed for the opening on April 17 of the FAA's next controller recruitment window. The window will remain open until the agency receives 8,000 applications.
"To reach the next generation of air traffic controllers, we need to adapt," Department of Transportation secretary Sean Duffy said in a statement. "This campaign's innovative communication style and focus on gaming taps into a growing demographic of young adults who have many of the hard skills it takes to be a successful controller."
The FAA said successful gamers have skill sets that transfer well to a control tower, including high cognitive function, multitasking, spatial awareness, strategizing and problem-solving.
The FAA has increased hiring every year since 2021, but as of September of last year, there were still 6% fewer controllers than 2015, according to a Government Accountability Office report in December. Total flights using the air traffic control system grew 10% over that period.
At present, just short of 11,000 certified controllers are in service, the DOT said Friday. The FAA's target number is more than 14,600, according to its 2025-28 workforce plan.
Last year, the FAA stepped up trainee pay and streamlined the controller hiring process in an effort to improve recruitment. In the fiscal year that ended in September, 2,026 controllers were hired, up from 1,811 the previous year. The DOT said Friday that this fiscal year it has thus far hired almost 1,200 air traffic controllers.
Attrition has long been a challenge for controller trainees. The GAO report found that of the 4,000 trainees hired between 2017 and 2022, only 2,300 were either fully certified or still in training as of last September.