>

Until it isn't.  But why spend money doing something useless until it costs you millions of dollars and/or customers?
Not surprised. That’s why you use a test environment before implementation. On something as big as the FAA probably roll it out in parts too. >

That's not fair. They had a test system.
They just didn't have a separate production system. >

In every company I've ever worked for I always ask if we have a clone of production for testing.
Only once have I been told "yes".
Every other time, I'm told that the QA environment is "close enough".