DC CLOSED...

Just got off the phone with Leesburg FSS. As of 20 minutes ago, all civilian operations insde the 15 mile tfr have been suspended till further notice.

In reply to:


Just got off the phone with Leesburg FSS. As of 20 minutes ago, all civilian operations insde the 15 mile tfr have been suspended till further notice.


This would only affect those select pilots, based at CGS or VKX who have undergone background checks, fingerprinting, special briefings, etc. right?
For the rest of us, the 15 mile tfr has been offlimits since 9/11/01. In other words, DC has been closed for a year now – DCA and W32 are inaccessible to any part 91 operators, and CGS and VKX are only open to based pilots who go through the procedures I mentioned above.

Or did I misunderstand your post? Maybe those guys are no longer allowed inside the 15 mile ring? Or maybe the 15 mile ring has expanded again?

(Keep in mind that tomorrow morning no VFR traffic is allowed within 30 miles of the washington monument, unless that notam has also changed recently.)

Steve

As of 20 minutes ago, all civilian operations inside the 15 mile tfr have been suspended till further notice.

This statement seems to say that Part 91, 135, and 121 operations are all forbidden to enter the TFR. Is this correct?

If you’ve already read this post, FUGEDABOUTIT! Seems I misread the issue date and assumed an OLD Notam was a new one. The subsequent posts by Steve Lin, et. al. set me straight, so I decide it would be best to ditch the original version of this post. Sorry for the miscommunication…

Also, see this notam for being near public gatherings:

!FDC 2/9583 FDC …SPECIAL NOTICE… FLIGHT RESTRICTIONS
EFFECTIVE IMMEDIATELY UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE. PURSUANT TO 14 CFR
SECTION 99.7, SPECIAL SECURITY INSTRUCTIONS, AND 14 CFR SECTION
91.139, EMERGENCY AIR TRAFFIC RULES, UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE ALL
WAIVERS TO FDC NOTAM 1/3353 ARE RESCINDED IMMEDIATELY. FDC NOTAM
1/3353 PROHIBITS ALL AIRCRAFT OPERATIONS WITHIN A 3 NAUTICAL MILE
RADIUS/3000 FEET AGL AND BELOW OVER ANY MAJOR PROFESSIONAL OR
COLLEGIATE SPORTING EVENT OR ANY OTHER MAJOR OPEN AIR ASSEMBLY OF
PEOPLE. THEREFORE, ALL OPERATIONS ARE PROHIBITED AS DESCRIBED
ABOVE, EXCEPT AS AUTHORIZED BY ATC FOR OPERATIONAL PURPOSES, AND
THERE ARE NO AUTHORIZED WAIVERS TO THIS RESTRICTION. THIS ACTION
IS BEING REVIEWED TO DETERMINE APPROPRIATE NEXT STEPS. REFER TO
THE FAA WEBSITE AT http://www.faa.gov/ntap/index.htm AFTER 0900 EDT
LOCAL, SEPTEMBER 11, 2002, FOR FURTHER INFORMATION.

In reply to:


Just looked it up on DUATS, and got a special security alert e-mail from AOPA. The DC area is shut down to all traffic until further notice, unless you have prior special permission from the FAA and Secret Service. Not only are all waivers for the DC TRF revoked, it seems that all other traffic is barred as well. Here’s the NOTAMs: Seems that the first one just shut DC down from 0830 until 1100 for GA traffic. The second one lists EVERY type of traffic I’ve heard of! (other NOTAMS have also closed College Park, Potomac Airfield, and Hyde Field)


Bill,
Yes, those notams are in effect.
The first one (which shuts down VFR traffic within 30 nm of DC) for 3 hours tomorrow was announced last week. (Note that IFR traffic is still allowed).
The second one, which prohibits all GA aircraft (part 91), but NOT airline (part 121) traffic, has been in place since last September 11th.
Other than the 3 hour VFR prohibition, this is just “normal” life here in the DC area – College Park, Potomac, Hyde, and DCA (National) have never been opened to transient aircraft since last September. Hyde and DCA are completely closed, whereas College Park and Potomac allow based pilots, who undergo a security check, fingerprinting, and obey special rules, to fly to and from the airports.

The specific NOTAM you mentioned which basically shuts down DC to GA was issued a LONG time ago (April, if I remember right) – check out the NOTAM number (2/1369) which means it was the 1,369th FDC notam issued this year. This indicates it is at least 4-6 months old or so.

[Sorry, I’m not trying to be nit-picky, it’s just that we’ve been dealing with this since Sept 11th of last year. The “permanent” “temporary flight restriction” prohibiting GA aircraft within 15 nm of DC comes about 3 nm from the airport where I (and Jim Fallows, and Art Pileggi, and others) are based…]

Steve

… ALL PARTS 91, 103, 105, 125, 133, 135, 137 FLIGHT OPERATIONS ARE PROHIBITED WITHIN THE WASHINGTON D.C. METROPOLITAN AREA SPECIAL FLIGHT RULES AREA.
Bill,
Note that FDC 2/1369 does not ban Part 121 (scheduled air carrier) operations. So it’s not correct to say that all civilian operations are banned.
Put another way, the only banned operations are those that have not been used by terrorists…!

Cheers,
Roger

In reply to:


Yes indeed! EVERYBODY! (see my post just now for the NOTAMs.)


Nope, the notam prohibiting flight within 15 nm of DC does NOT apply to scheduled airlines. Airlines are part 121, which is NOT mentioned in the notam you posted.
As I mentioned in my reply to that post, this is NOT a new NOTAM. This restriction has been in effect since 9/11/01. (The notam has been re-issued a few times since then but the restrictions themselves have been there since last year).

Again, Bill, I’m sorry to sound so harsh in my replies - it’s not directed at you, honest… I’m just a little disappointed that groups like AOPA and EAA (and even NBAA for the DCA crowd) aren’t making it more widely known that there are still effectively 4 airports which have been shut down to transient GA since 9/11.

Steve

P.S. Yes, there is one new notam which is the one prohibiting VFR flight (only) within 30 nm of DC for 3 hours tomorrow. But the “main” notam prohibiting ALL GA within 15 nm of DC has been there for a year and will remain there for the forseeable future.

yeah, I goofed. I first read the 2nd NOTAM as being 2/9369, not 2/1369 and assumed it had just been issued. I edited my original post to fix the part 121 and 129 error. SORRY! But, a call to the local FSS confirms, no traffic into or out of DC unless authorized by the Secret Service at least through tomorrow.

In reply to:


no traffic into or out of DC unless authorized by the Secret Service at least through tomorrow.


“at least through tomorrow”… [:)] This restriction has now even been printed on the new edition of sectionals and VFR TACs. Which is good, as it will hopefully alert transient VFR pilots to the TFR. But it’s bad because it means that these are here to stay for a LLOONNGG time… I would say more likely the 15 nm TFR will be here for several years.

But we can always hope!

Steve

In reply to:


But, a call to the local FSS confirms, no traffic into or out of DC unless authorized by the Secret Service at least through tomorrow.


Just guessing – you’re not based in the DC area, are you? [;)] This is how it’s been around here for the last 364 days. Some of the “satellite” airports around DC, like Gaithersburg, were the last in the country to be re-opened after the attacks. Those closer to the city are effectively closed by these and other Notams.

If I had to bet, I’d assume that the 15 mile TFR around DC will never be removed. It’s like the closing of Pennsylvania Avenue, the dotting of the city with concrete barriers, and the conversion not just of the White House but of the Capitol into bunkers: there’s always an argument for leaving them in place (and the Secret Service will always make that argument). There’s always a risk in removing them, so no one wants to be the administrator or politician everyone blames for removing a safety system – and then something goes wrong. The advantage of a “real” war, like WW II, is that it could be over at some time, which would be a signal for rationing etc to be relaxed. There will never be a comparable V-J day to indicate the end of a terrorist threat, so there may never be a time when anyone feels like overruling the Secret Service’s objections.

(There’s a whole separate story here about the Secret Service, but that’s for another time. In the current environment, it’s probably also for another place – that is, not for a public Internet forum.)

Steve: Again, sorry for the confusion. I pulled the first bad post of mine on this subject and left a note of apology for the miscommunication in its place.

As I already pointed to to Steve Lin et. al., I goofed. Yes, I’m not from the DC area and I’ve only had to navigate the area a couple of times since the attacks, with no hassles at all from ATC or others.

As for the “bunker” mentality - you’re right. Better discussed elsewhere…[:)]

In reply to:


(There’s a whole separate story here about the Secret Service, but that’s for another time. In the current environment, it’s probably also for another place – that is, not for a public Internet forum.)


Jim,

I hope you tell this story. If you can’t, or can’t tell it in public, then that’s an even bigger story.

Gary Fitts

Sorry folks…I am a VKX based pilot and mis-spoke when I said “all civilian …” I have been living with the TFR rules since they began and have found them to be a minor ripple trying to counter a larger wave.
The Potomac Airport community has evolved and adapted in the past year into something truly unique. The airport manager, David “the bigcheese” Wartofsky,( who is also the voice of ATIS) has worked tirelessly to promote the return of GA to everyone in the DC area and deserves our support and gratitude.

Bill,
As Jim said, no apology is necessary - as I mentioned in my posts, any anger which might have come through was NOT directed at you, but rather just general frustration at the way local DC airspace has been effectively closed.
Just to give a little history (like a “I had to walk to school uphill both ways in the snow” story, to use another analogy like Jim’s Moscovite one) – after last September, MANY airports around DC were closed. Jim’s and my home base was completely closed (no IFR, no VFR, no nothing) for about 6 weeks, if I remember right – finally IFR-only was allowed for about another month**, then eventually, sometime like last December, VFR traffic was finally allowed. But at the other fields we’ve been talking about in this thread, they are still closed - a couple of them are closed altogether to part 91 traffic and some are open only to those people based there who go through special procedures to take a flight. A recent newspaper article says it can take up to an hour to call the numerous (not just FSS) FAA facilities required just to get permission and a clearance to make a VFR joyride from College Park, for example.
In addition, the NOTAMs were subtly changed over the summer to indicate that military interceptions can be initiated against people who go near a TFR. This is tough, because I can understand why they might go after you if you actually bust a TFR. But if you just go “near” a TFR (with no definition of “near”)??
See for example the text of FDC NOTAM 2/1370 which includes this phrase: EFFECTIVE
IMMEDIATELY UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE, ALL COMMERCIAL AND PRIVATE AIRCRAFT FLYING IN PROXIMITY TO NEWLY ESTABLISHED OR CURRENTLY EXISTING RESTRICTED OR PROHIBITED AREAS WILL BE SUBJECT TO BEING FORCED DOWN BY ARMED MILITARY AIRCRAFT. (bold characters = my emphasis)

Some local pilots have gotten interpretations from FSS that “near” means 5 miles – which effectively increases the TFR sizes by 5 miles on each side. Which, if true, would again close down the airport a bunch of us are based at.

What I think is a little closer to the truth is that one can operate close to (but outside of) the TFR, but in those situations (like every time I land at home), we need to be prepared for an intercept anyway, just because we’re “close”.

Again, this is NOT directed at you, Bill – this is just a general post to explain to everybody what we in the DC area have been dealing with. Unfortunately, and somewhat understandably, AOPA has bigger fish to fry and hasn’t been making much noise about these issues lately.

Steve

** Having IFR-only is a huge pain at a very busy uncontrolled field. Normally the standard one-IFR-in-or-out separation works okay because there’s not THAT many people flying on those days when you can’t cancel until you’re on the ground. But when the weather is CAVU and yet people still can’t cancel until they’re on the ground (which was the cast last fall and today), it really gums up the works.

No apology needed at all! The DC contingent, or at least that subset represented by Steve and me, is secretly enjoying behaving like sullen Muscovites. “You tourists think it’s cold today? This is nothing!!! When the real snow starts…”

On the other hand, the Muscovites have a real winter, and we have a real situation here in DC.