Federal Aviation Administration

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is the United States government agency that regulates civil aviation safety, operates the national air traffic control system, and regulates U.S. commercial space transportation. It is an administration within the Department of Transportation, headed by an Administrator appointed by the President with the advice and consent of the Senate, serving a five-year term and reporting to the Secretary of Transportation.¹

What the FAA is and does

Among the FAA's principal duties, as it describes them, are overseeing civil aviation in the interest of safety, building and running an air traffic control and navigation system serving aircraft both civilian and military, overseeing commercial space transportation in the United States, and managing aircraft noise along with other environmental impacts.³ Under the Secretary of Transportation's delegation of authority in 49 CFR 1.82, the agency promulgates and enforces regulations on all safety matters relating to the operation of airports and the manufacture, operation, and maintenance of aircraft.⁵

Its operating duties are broad. The FAA issues and enforces regulations covering manufacturing, operating, and maintaining aircraft; certifies airmen and airports serving air carriers; operates a network of airport towers, air route traffic control centers, and flight service stations; and registers aircraft.³ It also regulates and encourages the U.S. commercial space transportation industry, licensing commercial space launch facilities and private launches of space payloads on expendable launch vehicles.³ The agency is charged with preserving and enhancing the safety and efficiency of the national air transportation system by implementing NextGen and other technologies.⁵

History

Federal civil aviation oversight predates the FAA. The Civil Aeronautics Act of 1938 established an independent Civil Aeronautics Authority with a three-member Air Safety Board; in 1940 it was split into the Civil Aeronautics Administration under the Commerce Department and the Civil Aeronautics Board.⁶

The modern agency came out of a 1958 push for unified airspace management. On May 21, 1958, Senator A. S. "Mike" Monroney (D-OK) put forward legislation establishing a Federal Aviation Agency as an independent body charged with ensuring that the nation's airspace would be used safely and efficiently; the Federal Aviation Act received the President's signature on August 23, 1958. Retired Air Force General Elwood "Pete" Quesada became the first Administrator on November 1, 1958, and the agency began operations on December 31, 1958.⁶

Two institutional changes followed. When the Department of Transportation began full operations on April 1, 1967, the Federal Aviation Agency became one of DOT's modal organizations and received its present name, the Federal Aviation Administration; the Civil Aeronautics Board's accident-investigation function transferred to the new National Transportation Safety Board.⁶ The Airline Deregulation Act, signed October 24, 1978, created a highly competitive airline industry and increased FAA workload through the certification of many new airline applicants.⁶

Modernization. In June 2003 the FAA selected Russell Chew as the first Chief Operating Officer of its Air Traffic Organization, and the Vision 100 act, signed in December 2003, endorsed the Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen), whose Integrated Plan was unveiled on December 15, 2004.⁶

Organization and leadership

The FAA is managed by an Administrator assisted by a Deputy Administrator. Five Associate Administrators direct line-of-business organizations, and the agency also has nine geographical regions and two major centers, the Mike Monroney Aeronautical Center and the William J. Hughes Technical Center.³ The Administrator's five-year term, presidential appointment, and Senate confirmation are fixed in statute at 49 U.S.C. 106.¹

The Air Traffic Organization (ATO) is the line of business that provides air navigation services across the national airspace system.⁴ The Office of Aviation Safety (AVS) is responsible for the certification, production approval, and continued airworthiness of aircraft, and for certification of pilots, mechanics, and others in safety-related positions.⁴

Air traffic operations

The FAA develops air traffic regulations and administers air navigation services for control of civil and military air operations within U.S. airspace, and in international and foreign airspace for which the FAA has accepted responsibility.⁵ Its physical infrastructure consists of the airport towers, air route traffic control centers, and flight service stations it operates.³

The scale is large. The Department of Transportation states that the FAA safely manages more than 50,000 U.S. commercial and general aviation flights daily.⁴

Certification and safety oversight

Through the Office of Aviation Safety, the agency handles the certification, production approval, and continued airworthiness of aircraft, and certifies pilots, mechanics, and others in safety-related positions.⁴ It also certifies airmen and airports that serve air carriers.³

Certification extends internationally: the FAA negotiates bilateral airworthiness agreements with other countries and certifies foreign repair shops, airmen, and mechanics.³

Safety record. In the period covered by the agency's own history, fatal accidents became rare events. Between 2001 and 2007, excluding the September 11, 2001 attacks, scheduled air carriers had three fatal accidents in 2001, none in 2002, two in 2003, one in 2004, three in 2005, two in 2006, and none in 2007, with fatal accident rates of about .01 accidents per 100,000 flight hours or .018 accidents per 100,000 departures.⁶

Funding

The FAA's operations are funded by congressional appropriations with multi-year statutory authorizations. Under 49 U.S.C. 106, authorized appropriations for salaries, operations, and maintenance are $12,729,627,000 for fiscal year 2024, $13,055,000,000 for FY2025, $13,354,000,000 for FY2026, $13,650,000,000 for FY2027, and $13,954,000,000 for FY2028, a planned rise of about $1.2 billion, or roughly 9.6 percent, across the five years.¹

Separately, the Airports office each year awards $3.5 billion in airport grants and approves passenger facility charge collections totaling $2 billion.⁴

By the numbers

The airspace the FAA serves, 29.4 million square miles, is more than 17 percent of the world's airspace, extending over the United States and large portions of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans and the Gulf of Mexico.⁴ Daily traffic is more than 50,000 U.S. commercial and general aviation flights.⁴ Operations funding rises from about $12.73 billion in FY2024 to about $13.95 billion in FY2028, a total increase of about $1.22 billion, or roughly $306 million per year across the authorization period.¹ Against this scale, the historical fatal-accident rate for scheduled carriers, about .01 per 100,000 flight hours in the 2001-2007 period, marks the safety baseline the agency's certification and oversight work is meant to preserve.⁶

References

1. 49 U.S.C. 106: Federal Aviation Administration, United States Code
2. Federal Register :: Agencies - Federal Aviation Administration
3. What we do | Federal Aviation Administration
4. Federal Aviation Administration | US Department of Transportation
5. 49 CFR 1.82 -- The Federal Aviation Administration, eCFR
6. A Brief History of the FAA | Federal Aviation Administration

Topic: Encyclopedia › Society and history › Politics and government › Government and public administration › Civil service, government agencies, and public administration › United States federal government

Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Sep 30, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Sep 30, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026

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