After 2023 outage that paused flights nationwide, FAA now has backup system
Back in January of last year, contractors working with the Federal Aviation Administration accidentally deleted files while trying to update a database, inadvertently disrupting the Notice to Air Missions system that the agency uses to communicate important flight information to pilots. The outage forced the FAA to issue a nationwide ground stop and pause thousands of flights — one of the largest disruptions to air traffic since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
But the agency has now confirmed that there’s a backup system in place and that systems involved in sending NOTAMs have been updated.
“The FAA developed a contingency system which is used to issue Notice to Air Missions (NOTAMS) to pilots if the primary system is experiencing an outage,” the agency said in a statement to FedScoop. “Equipment and systems dealing with NOTAMs have been updated and a NOTAM Task Force has been created to improve policies and processes. These are still in place and have been communicated to staff.”
The agency addressed the issue within hours of the initial outage in 2023 and flights resumed soon afterward. Still, the malfunction catalyzed bipartisan interest in improving the country’s NOTAM system, which are used to communicate important issues to pilots, like warnings about weather and closed-off airspace.
The National Archives and Records Administration sought further information from the FAA about potentially destroyed records almost immediately after news outlets reported on the ground stop. While there were other copies of the records, the FAA told NARA that it had subsequently implemented a staggered backup database approach in order to avoid “a cascading system failure.”
The agency also told NARA that it now requires that two people be on site when the NOTAM system is undergoing maintenance and that a federal employee provides supervision.
In June of last year, the Biden administration approved the NOTAM Improvement Act, which required that the FAA create a task force to study potential improvements to the system. Last July, the FAA sought information from private industry about potential ways to improve the system.
