Case Studies
Hazardous Airspace and Improper Documentation
Issue identified during NOSS
Some general aviation and turbo-prop aircraft were filing departure routes through a piece of Special Use Airspace (SUA) which contained activity that could be extremely harmful to aircraft and its occupants. It was further identified that documentation available to pilots for flight planning purposes did not reflect the threat of this SUA. In all instances in which flights were planed through the SUA, controllers amended the routing so that the SUA was avoided.
Response to findings
While the controllers successfully detected and corrected all instances in which flights had planned through the SUA, it would be preferable to prevent events using more strategic measures so that the controllers do not have to “catch” such flight planning issues on a case-by-case basis. As such, the departures in question were immediately canceled via NOTAM and the documentation materials were updated to remove the departures in question.
