A surge in pilots requesting RVSM flight levels or operating in RVSM airspace (FL290 to FL410) without the required authorization prompted the FAA to issue Information for Operators (InFO) 12001, which emphasizes flight-planning responsibilities when conducting these operations. “In the first 15 days of November, 35 IFR operations were filed incorrectly,” the FAA said in the document.
Equipment codes
June 18, 2008 - 10:40am
Innovative Solutions & Support continues its aggressive certification schedule of reduced vertical separation minimums (RVSM) equipment for a wide range of business and regional jet aircraft.
May 15, 2008 - 9:05am
With the anticipated publication this month of an NPRM in the Federal Register, the FAA is laying the groundwork for implementation of domestic reduced vertical separation minimums (DRVSM) in U.S. airspace between FL 290 and FL 410 in December 2004.
April 23, 2008 - 7:07am
The FAA is considering a Boeing proposal that eventually could replace 18 different kinds of instrument approaches with a single, ILS-like procedure. Based on required navigation performance (RNP) and area navigation concepts, the new RNP Rnav approaches would use the aircraft FMS to create procedures that eliminate stepped or non-precision approach paths.
February 26, 2008 - 7:00am
A Lufthansa Boeing 737 recently became the first aircraft to use Mode S capability to transmit its radar identification (flight ID), without the use of secondary surveillance radar (SSR) code. Rod Marten, who oversees mode-S operations at Eurocontrol, said that air traffic controllers typically assign a four-digit SSR code to a target on the radar screen then manually correlate the aircraft information with the electronic flight plan data.
November 5, 2007 - 6:29am
November 21 marks the start of reduced vertical separation minimums (RVSM) in China’s airspace from FL291 to FL411. That differs from RVSM in much of the rest of the world, where the airspace stretches from FL290 to FL410. China selected the odd flight levels because its military, which controls the country’s airspace, uses metric flight levels.
October 12, 2007 - 6:05am
Effective February 20, the /F suffix for aircraft equipped with single FMSs has been revised to account for advanced Rnav equipment.
May 29, 2007 - 12:34pm
AOPA wrote a letter to the FAA last week saying that if a new policy outlined in Advisory Circular (AC) 90-100A is allowed to remain as it is currently written, more than 25,000 GPS users will not be able to use the unit as a substitute for DME or Rnav procedures.
April 10, 2007 - 7:31am
Effective September 1, operators will be required to use a new set of flight plan aircraft equipment suffixes to indicate advanced navigation capabilities. According to an FAA notice published last week, either J, K, L or a newly defined Q is to be used to specify advanced RNAV and RVSM capabilities. Pilots should continue to use a W to indicate RVSM capability only.
April 9, 2007 - 11:26am
To help business aircraft operators cope with new Rnav routes and procedures as of September 1, the FAA is developing a Web-based RAIM (receiver autonomous integrity monitor) prediction service that will be made available for general use by flight crews, according to NBAA.
