By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Transportation Deputy Secretary Polly Trottenberg is taking on as performing head of the Federal Aviation Administration, the division mentioned on Thursday.

President Joe Biden additionally plans to call Katie Thomson, the FAA’s chief of employees, as deputy administrator, changing Bradley Mims.

Trottenberg’s appointment is efficient instantly. She replaces Billy Nolen, who has been performing head of the FAA since April 2022. Nolen introduced in April that he would resign after a brand new administrator was nominated.

In March, Denver Worldwide Airport CEO Phil Washington withdrew his nomination to function FAA administrator after Republican criticism. The White Home has not but named a brand new nominee.

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg mentioned he has “full confidence in Polly’s regular hand through the seek for a everlasting administrator.”

Mims is leaving the FAA to move up the Transportation Division’s Workplace of Small and Deprived Enterprise Utilization.

The US has confronted critical questions on aviation security after a sequence of close-call runway incidents this yr and a pc outage in January that led to the primary nationwide grounding of departing passenger airliners since September 2001.

The Nationwide Transportation Security Board is investigating six runway incursion occasions since January together with some that might have been catastrophic.

Trottenberg beforehand served as New York Metropolis’s transportation commissioner, as senior USDOT coverage official below President Barack Obama, and as an aide within the U.S. Senate to Senator Charles Schumer.

Thomson has served numerous roles on the FAA throughout two presidential administrations and has additionally served in senior USDOT roles, most just lately as director of implementation of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Legislation.

Reuters earlier reported that Nolen is anticipated to take a place with electrical air taxi agency Archer Aviation.