FAA to Allow Longer Notices to Airmen When Towers Need Repairs

The Federal Aviation Administration is streamlining its processes for Notices to Airmen (NOTAMs), which identify communications towers with extinguished or faulty lighting, the FCC said in a notice. Under FCC rules, tower owners are in general required to notify the FAA within 30 minutes of discovering a lighting outage or malfunction and they must take steps to repair the faulty lighting as quickly as practicable, the FCC said. “The planned change will enable tower owners to self-select the amount of time their NOTAMs remain active.” The FCC said the change is expected to take effect next month. Under the current system, NOTAMs last for 15 days, though some tower repairs take longer to complete, the agency said. By allowing longer NOTAMs the FAA will allow tower operators to avoid filing for repeated notices, the FCC said. “While the change will allow tower owners to self-select the repair deadline, every outage should be corrected as soon as possible, and the FCC and FAA will respond aggressively if they discover tower owners are abusing a system designed to protect aviation safety,” the FCC said.