President Biden yesterday nominated Jennifer Homendy for another term as chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board. (It’s actually two separate nominations, each of which requires a separate Senate vote – she is nominated for a new five-year term as a Member through the end of 2029 (PN1499), and is also nominated for a new three-year term as the designated chairman (PN1498).)

Homendy has been chairman since August 2021, and the combination of the Norfolk Southern derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, along with the ongoing travails of the Boeing 737 MAX (even though the actual investigation of the two MAX crashes with fatalities was not handled by NTSB) have meant that she has been a particularly high-profile NTSB chair.

Her nomination now goes to the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee, where Homendy testified just last week on the status of various NTSB investigations.

Meanwhile, on Friday, March 11, after the Senate had finished voting on the minibus appropriations package at 7:30 p.m. and most Senators had left town, the chamber quietly confirmed the two pending nominees for NTSB seats: former Jacksonville, Florida mayor Alvin Brown, and former USDOT chief of staff Todd Inman. The Board wasted no time in swearing in both men on March 13.

As of today, the Board’s membership looks like so:

49 U.S.C. §1111(c) provides that “When the term of office of a member ends, the member may continue to serve until a successor is appointed and qualified,” which explains how Chapman is still in office, and how the projected end date of the terms of the other Members should not be taken too literally.